The Tomahawk
Note the tomahawk in mid-flight
It's a tool, it's a weapon, it's a statement.
Despite scaring the ever-loving crap out of pioneers, the tomahawk was largely a product of the European trade in North America. Prior to the French trading goods (beads, metal knives, tomahawks) to the natives, the only tomahawk-like thing that would have been popular with indigenous folks would have been the stone axe. However once it became a staple of the Indian trade, it became the ubiqitous weapon of the natives.
A tomahawk is quite useful and can be:
- A throwing weapon (a staple of the Rendezvous and fur trade reenactors)
- A hammer
- A tool to skin an animal (seriously)
- A ceremonial weapon
- A pipe
- Wait for it . . . a bladed implement used to cut small branches and trees
Wes with three sticks
I try to always carry some sort of axe, but lately I am more likely to carry a Gerber/Fiskars axe, than one of a more native design. Nothing against the former, however in my state it is illegal to carry a tomahawk, but perfectly fine to carry a hatchet. That little bit of legislative silliness is probably left-over racism from the Republic days.
Hooray for difficult to change state constitutions and the somewhat ineffective Texas Tomahawk Rights PAC.
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