Page:The Fall of Constantinople.djvu/175

 THE WAKINGS. I57 great emperor, and the interview finished with mutual re- spect. Many of the AVarings, and probably of the English, also, had taken military service at an early period under They take •/ i military ser- the Bvzantine emperors.' They formed a body- guard for the emperor, and soon gained for them- selves a renown greater than that possessed by the earlier im- perial guard of the Immortals. The Byzantine writers usual- The Waring b' Speak of them as the barbarian guard or as the guard. axe-bearers. Their weapon was the Danish battle- axe, or rather bill, and seems not to have had two blades turn- ing different ways like those of a halberd, but to have had one with a sharp steel spike projecting so that the weapon could be used either to strike or to thrust.^ Anna, the daughter of Alexis the First, calls them Warings or Yavangians.^ Nicetas speaks of them as Germans.* The Western writers call them usually Danes, or "English and Danes." ^ The conquest of England by William the Xorman caused the Warings had come to be called, had also enlisted in the service of the Mussulman rulers of the East. They were highly prized everywhere as soldiers. Muratori quotes two edicts, by different Lombard kings, which confer rights uj^on them and allow them to settle in their territory. The whole subject of the Warings is well worth examination. Mr. Hyde Clarke has collected a great many interesting and important facts relat- ing to them. ' o'i KaTiofxacbv tovq tTfpocFToixovg TrsXsKEig dvsxov(nv. Nicctas, p. 323, ed. Bonn. Dr. Mordtmann has given an illustration from the seal of the chief interpreter of the Waring guard, which shows an axe with only one blade. The bayonet is curved somewhat less than a reaping-hook, with the edge turned in the opposite direction from that of the axe. Dr. Mordtmann says it is not hipennis, as the Warings' axes are always de- scribed. I am inclined to think, however, that the curved bayonet, which was intended for cutting as well as thrusting, may have given it its ordi- nary name of double-edged. See "Archives de TOrient Latin" (1881), i. e'os, ^ tK tT}q Qovr]Q papayyovg. "Ann." i. 120, cd. Bonn. ' "Z(e« Anglois et Bands mult hien conibattaient avec leurs Jiachesy — Villehardouin.
 * Two Arab writers, Mahsoudi and Abul-feda, assert that Russians, as
 * Nicetas, p. 323.