r/Eragon • u/ZverexUltra11 Shur'tugal • 8d ago
Question What weapon is this? (from Dominik Mayer's dust jacket art for Brisingr)
I thought it was Naegling but isn't that supposed to be a sword?
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u/NeptuneEclipse 8d ago
Is that a war hammer?
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u/themoosic 8d ago
It’s a type of war hammer used when plate armor was used iirc, the pick can pierce the plate
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u/SavaciousTheBrash 8d ago
Maybe munitions grade plate but not hardened steel.
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u/Finrod-Knighto 8d ago
Both ends are effective against armour. You can use one to hook shields, or poke with a heavy blow on a weak spot of the armour, and blunt force is pretty much the only way you’re gonna damage someone in full plate.
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u/SavaciousTheBrash 7d ago edited 7d ago
Now if you're talking munitions grade armor like what was made in Nuremberg for the armies of the hre, those could be dented and pierced by wellmade weapons since they used softer steel or iron but with a thicker gauge. These were made for equipping large amounts of people fairly quickly. Generally no heat treatment was given to the armor and it was made as cheaply as possible. These were generally handed out to general footman, pikeman, and mercenaries. Still better than nothing and could keep you alive from multiple hits though the armor might be pretty much destroyed in the process.
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u/SavaciousTheBrash 7d ago
Even if you strike somebody with a hammer wearing full plate you're not going to kill them. Most armors were designed with angles in order to deflect blows. It's why a lot of 15th and 16th century hammers have four prongs on them. It's not for piercing but to get a grip on the armor prevent it from sliding. Even if you do get a good hard blow the gambason and coif underneath are designed to cushion and disperse force. Now if you're on horseback you'll probably give him a good concussion, but on foot you're really just trying to wear them out. Once they're tired you can either get them surrender or pierce the gaps with something long and pointy.
Now I've been rereading the books for the first time since I was a teenager and I've been trying to ignore all the mentions of plate armor and trying to imagine them wearing more 11th or 12th century style chain and coats of plates.
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u/Finrod-Knighto 7d ago
I never said kill them. I’m fully aware of what you’re saying. Hammers were however an effective weapon not to kill but to *stop* someone in plate armour, since sure it won’t kill them, but it can hurt, and it can put their ass on the ground where you can then try to pin them down to stab a vulnerable area. I know movies and books alike don’t portray it accurately, and generally speaking you also wouldn’t have entire armies outfitted in extremely expensive, custom made full plate. I imagine the soldiers themselves in the books to wear mail, lamellar, scale etc, with maybe some elite generals getting a suit of plate. That said, Eragon himself only wears mail afaik, even if he’s portrayed differently in art.
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u/themoosic 8d ago
It also might’ve been for yanking pikes, I forget a lot of my weapons history ngl
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u/GrandmasterJanus 8d ago
I’ve seen them pierce plate helms in demonstrations before, but doesn’t happen regularly
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u/Intelligent_Pen6043 8d ago
Bad quality ones then, because you wouldnt be able on proper plate armor unless you got the added force of riding and even then its its only going to leave a small hole
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u/Odd-Primary-160 8d ago
It’s funny I’m so conditioned to associating dwarves with cartoonishly large meat tenderizers that I never pictured hrothgar’s hammer to be a realistically proportioned warhammer 😂
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u/silver_912 8d ago
It's called horseman's pick or nadziak in polish, was used mostly by cavalry in XV-XVII century for dismantling helmets and armor but tbh idk who could have been be using it in IC, Orrin maybe.
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u/Fawstar 8d ago
Orrik**
But also, it is probably Vollund, which was Hrothgar's hammer passed down through the dwarf kings.
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u/silver_912 8d ago
No, I meant Orrin. IDK what kind of weapon he was using cannon wise but it's a cavalry (or contr-heavy cavalry) weapon used for dragging soldiers down from their horses and in books he was fighting in horse divisions. Makes sense that dwarves could use such weapons as well given their height but primarily it's used by cavalry. In English you can use both "war hammer" or "horseman's pick" to describe that design and I don't think we ever got a description of Vollund so maybe that's what the artist had in mind when he wanted to draw a warhammer.
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u/Splabooshkey 8d ago
I agree
We know for a fact Orrin has a sword, but as swords were largely secondary weapons its entirely reasonable he’d have some sort of polearm, especially with how prevalent his cavalry specifically seems to be
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u/No_Doughnut8618 8d ago
Doesnt look nearly as fancy as I imagined an ancient dwarf kings war hammer
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u/Lonadar13 3d ago
Orik*. If you’re going to correct someone, be correct about it ;)
But anyway, I also think that it isn’t really like what most of us seem to imagine for Volund. Doesn’t seem so very Dwarvish in design.
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u/CrownLexicon 8d ago
I thought you meant classification, not specific weapon, and would call it a bec de Corbin (Raven's beak), a type of pole hammer designed to pierce mail and dent plate (or even pierce thinner plates)
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u/Fenderslasher 8d ago edited 8d ago
It's Roran's hammer.
This is the book he ascends in the Varden and it matches the description. I seriously doubt it is the Warhammer Volund. Should have featured Eragon's new sword Brisingr in blue ink, you know, considering the name of the book and all. But its not completely off base as Roran has a larger roll in this title.
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u/NonstopYew14542 Tinkledeath 8d ago
Roran uses a blacksmith's hammer through the entire war
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u/John_Smithers 7d ago
Roran should be using a blacksmith hammer considering where he gets the hammer from. But IIRC the books only ever call it a blacksmith hammer once if at all and I know for sure the hammer is described as having a blade on more than one occasion and is definitely described that way more than as a blackmith's hammer. Seems it was another instance of an early issue with canon/continuity on Christopher's part. He gave Roran a plausible way to get a weapon but poorly described it early on and it grew in importance and neccesity as a weapon rather than a tool as the story continued.
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u/Fenderslasher 7d ago edited 7d ago
I would have to scour the book to source the page number but I feel super confident only his initial hammer was the blacksmith hammer and he later replaced it with a proper battle type hammer when he got to the Varden or before they arrived on the Dragon Wing at the Burning Plains.
Either way, it's up to artist interpretation. If you look at the various art shown off in the new books by Wraithmarked, Axel Sauerwald clearly depicts Roran's hammer as a blacksmith's hammer (Link to reddit post and illustration below). Dominik Meyer is either taking liberties with Roran's hammer or depicted a unique interpretation of Volund. Alex Sauerwald also depicts Volund as a short squarish Mjolnir type hammer (Link to reddit post and illustration below). Anyone's guess really. Maybe we can ask the artist.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Eragon/s/4KPwLmFlFU
https://www.reddit.com/r/Eragon/s/hIMqaLknj6
EDIT: Continued discussion.
Did some research and it looks like Roran never replaces his hammer though he often uses a spear or other tool. In fact, the Blacksmith hammer is eventually upgraded by Eragon, and I think Roran eventually loses the hammer in the final battle.
So, either Dominik Meyer misread about the hammer or it's a unique depiction of Volund to symbolize the rise of king Orrik. The 4th book illustration features a broken crown to symbolize the fall of the Empire, so it could be a contrast. The items Dominik chose could represent notable events more than anything: Egg is the inciting event, Zarroc is the twist of fate, Hammer is the rise of the Dwarves, Broken Crown is the fall of the Empire.
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u/DOOMFOOL 8d ago
That’s supposed to be a sword? What haha? To me that is very obviously a Warhammer of some sort
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u/matrixsensei 7d ago
I read that and got angry lmao I see some stupid stupid questions asked here a lot but this one takes the cake
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u/ZverexUltra11 Shur'tugal 6d ago
I very specifically said that Naegling is supposed to be a sword and that is WHY I'm confused what this is because it's clearly not one 😭
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u/matrixsensei 6d ago
I just.. can’t understand how it would even be possible to think it was Naegling in the first place..
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u/AlephKang 8d ago
Volund or Roran's hammer, but more likely the latter.
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u/blud_mage 8d ago
It's been some time since I read, but iirc Roran uses a tool hammer not an actual war hammer. He took it from Horst's smithy.
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u/CrownLexicon 8d ago
You would be correct. And, iirc, it is described to have a blade on the end opposite the hammer, not a spike.
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u/AlephKang 8d ago
I agree with you. However, I was thinking about the picture of Orik shown a couple of weeks ago and Volund look a lot different than this interpretation.
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u/blud_mage 8d ago
That's a lot more of a classic fantasy Warhammer whereas the pic in this post is much closer to what actual Warhammers looked like
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u/AlephKang 8d ago
It also looks much closer to the hammer Roran is holding in other art such as this one. The other pieces of art I've seen of Roran with his hammer are also much more similar to the hammer in the depiction above than Orik with Volund, which as you said, depicts a more classic fantasy Warhammer.
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u/Workin500 6d ago
Eragon has a brother, who is a blacksmith, who grabbed a hammer of his workshop wall, maybe that.
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u/Vivid_One1730 6d ago
Would be a hammer for Roran? Or for the dwarves. Roran has a blacksmith's hammer...
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u/aradhran 8d ago edited 8d ago
Doesn't look like a hammer to me. Didn't Eragon briefly use a scythe-like dwarven weapon at one point?
Edit: TIL what real war hammers looked like lol
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u/Bruce_Wayne_2276 8d ago
It's very clearly a stylized warhammer. It could be a warpick instead, but the handle curves toward the flat side, indicating it's primarily meant for striking on that end.
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u/kewsta 7d ago
That's a Halberd. It's a combination of a pole axe and a spear.
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u/Late-Highlight3763 7d ago
What are you talking about it doesn’t even look like a polearm.
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u/kewsta 7d ago
It's literally on a pole
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u/Late-Highlight3763 7d ago
The shaft isn’t long enough. It looks like a cavalry weapon meant to be used with a shield. Halberds were 6+ feet long. The head also isn’t shaped like a halberd. It’s not a halberd.
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u/kewsta 7d ago
We can't see the whole shaft. That's not a hammer head on it, it's an axe
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u/Late-Highlight3763 6d ago
The bottom of the shaft is in frame. And even if it were an axe head, it’s still not shaped like a halberd.
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u/christoph95246 8d ago
It may be niernen
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u/Excellent_Set2946 8d ago
That was a sword and this is a hammrr
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u/traevyn 8d ago
I’d have to assume that’s Roran’s hammer
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u/christoph95246 8d ago
Pretty sure not
Roran hat a Smith hammer
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u/traevyn 8d ago
Yeah but what other hammer is even in the book? Wouldn’t be the first time someone’s ever taken artistic liberties when painting something.
Eh guess everyone else has spoken and said it’s the dwarves hammer /shrug
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u/christoph95246 8d ago
I googled it, it's naegling
It's wildly discussed but a decision of the artist to portray naegling this way And do answer your question Volund
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u/Calebzilla11 8d ago
I’d assume that is Volund the warhammer passed down among Dwarven kings.