Migration Period spear

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The spear together with the sword, the longsax and the shield was the main equipment of the Germanic warriors during the Migration period and the Early Middle Ages.

1 Terminology
2 Ger
3 Framea
4 Anglo-Saxon gar rune
5 Literature
6 See also
7 External links

[edit] Terminology

The pre-migration term reported by Tacitus is framea, who identifies it as "hasta"; The native term for "javelin, spear" was Old High German gêr, Old English gâr, Old Norse geirr, apparently from from Proto-Germanic *gaizaz. The names Gaiseric, Radagaisus indicate Gothic gaisu besides gairu.

Latin gaesum, gaesus Greek γαῖσον was the term for the lance of the Gauls. Avestan has gaêçu "lance bearer" as a likely cognate. The Celtic word is found e.g. in the name of the Gaesatae. Old Irish has gae "spear". Proto-Germanic *gaizaz would derive from PIE *ghaisos, although loan from Celtic has also been considered, in which case the PIE form would be *gaisos. Pokorny has *g'haisos (with a palatal velar aspirate), discounting the Avestan form in favour of (tentatively) comparing Sanskrit hḗṣas- "projectile".

The English word spear itself is from Old English spere (Old Norse spjörr), in origin also denoting a throwing spear or lance (hasta).

[edit] Ger

The word kêr or gêr is attested since the 8th century (Hildebrandslied 37, Heliand 3089).

Gar and cognates is a frequent element in Germanic names, male Hrothgar, Ansgar, Gernot, Rüdiger, Gerhart, Gerald, female Gertrut, Gerlint.

The term survives into Modern German as Ger or Gehr (Grimm 1854) with a generalized meaning of "gusset" besides "spear". In contemporary German, the word is used exclusively in antiquated or poetic context, and a feminine Gehre is used in the sense of "gusset".

[edit] Framea

Tacitus (Germania 6) describes the equipment of the Germanic warrior as follows:

Even iron is not plentiful with them, as we infer from the character of their weapons. But few use swords or long lances. They carry a spear [hasta] (framea is their name for it), with a narrow and short head, but so sharp and easy to wield that the same weapon serves, according to circumstances, for close or distant conflict. As for the horse-soldier, he is satisfied with a shield and spear; the foot-soldiers also scatter showers of missiles each man having several and hurling them to an immense distance, and being naked or lightly clad with a little cloak.

The term is also used by Eucherius, Gregory of Tours and Isidore. By the time of Isidore (7th century), framea referred to a sword, not a spear. Since Tacitus himself reports that the word is natively Germanic, various Germanic etymologies of a Proto-Germanic *framja, *framjō or similar have been suggested, but remain speculative. Must (1958) suggests *þramja, cognate to Old Norse þremjar "edges, sword blades", Old Saxon thrumi "point of a spear".

[edit] Anglo-Saxon gar rune

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Name	Proto-Germanic	Anglo-Saxon
	*Geƀō	Gyfu; Gar
	"gift"	"gift"; "spear"
Shape	Elder Futhark	Futhorc
Shape
Unicode	ᚷ U+16B7	ᚷ ᚸ U+16B7 U+16B8
Transliteration	g	ȝ; g
Transcription	g	ȝ, g; g
IPA	[ɣ]	[g], [ɣ], [ʎ], [j]; [g]
Position in rune-row	7	7; 33

Gar "spear" is also the name of ᚸ, a rune of the late Anglo-Saxon futhorc. It is not attested epigraphically, and first appears in 11th century manuscript tradition. Phonetically, gar represents the /g/ sound. It is a modification of the plain gyfu rune ᚷ.

Old English gâr means "spear", but the name of the rune likely echoes the rune names ger, ear, ior: due to palatalization in Old English, the original g rune (gyfu) could express either /j/ or /g/ (see yogh). The ger unambiguously expressed /j/, and the newly introduced gar rune had the purpose of unambiguously expressing /g/.

Gar is the 33rd and final rune in the row as given in Cotton Domitian A.ix.

[edit] Literature

Gustav Must, "The Origin of framea", Language, Vol. 34, No. 3 (Jul. - Sep., 1958), pp. 364-366.
Mark Harrison and Gerry Embleton, Osprey Warrior 005 - Anglo-Saxon Thegn 449-1066 AD [1] [2]