In The Monster Hunter's Handbook: The Ultimate Guide to Saving Mankind from Vampires, Zombies, Hellhounds, and Other Mythical Beasts (yeah, shameless plug - but I love throwing out that title), I invented the word 'cryptohoplology'. I use it to describe the study of legendary arms and armour, in a similar construction to cryptozoology.
So, what are people's favourite weapons or pieces of armour from myth and legend? Either because you like the story attached to them, their properties, their appearance, or anything else about them.
As a piece of art, the one I would most like to have hanging on my wall is Aeneas' shield, forged for him by Vulcan and described by Virgil in the Aeneid. The poet lavishly describes it as depicting the whole sweep of Roman history, centring on the Battle of Actium.
As a practical tool, I guess I would pick Sharur - the mace used by the Sumerian god Ninurta. In addition to being a powerful weapon, it's sentient and capable of both speech and flight. Hence it would be the ultimate tool for the armchair warrior. You could laze around and just send it out to smash your enemies on your behalf.
Oh, come on IBI! Why go for the imitation when you can have the original? Virgil patterned Aeneas' shield after Achilles' in the Iliad. And while you're at it, you might as well add the rest of the armor in as well!
Achilles' shield has a pretty nice theme, displaying the entire universe, the whole of Hellenic life - the life Achilles will never get to go back to. But as a matter of personal taste I would prefer to look at the history displayed on Aeneas' shield.
I am somewhat biased, however. When I was at school I came up with an idea of how I believed Aeneas' shield would look, based on the description in Virgil. I remember sketching my design on the whiteboard (albeit with stick figures, because I was lousy at art), one which I felt gave adequate prominence to the scenes Virgil specifically dwells on, but which still left room for plenty of other material from Roman history. Years later I saw a drawing of the shield done by a professional artist, and smugly noted that he had failed to do this.
When Richard Horne, the artist who worked on my book, contacted me and asked me if I had any particular requests or instructions with regard to the illustrations, I told him that I was happy for him to have complete artistic freedom. However, I did offer some comments on these two shields, and sent him a rough diagram of how I imagined Aeneas' one looking. The picture he drew of it used that concept, and it was pretty cool to see it done by someone with the artistic talent I lacked.
Each to his own. I confess to a fondness for Homer, which I have read (in part) in the original, rather than Virgil, which I haven't. I'm still thinking about your initial question, though, and I haven't quite made up my mind. There are so many good ones to choose from....
Cuchulain in Irish mythology killed his former best buddy with a weapon called (forgive my spelling) : the Gae Bulgae??? It was basically a harpoon that he launched from under the water with his foot(they were fighting in a ford, for the third day running). It went up under the armor (which included a rock strapped to the belly) and then prongs in it slowly spread out and killed his former best bud. Wonder what he'ld do to someone he hated? Studied Irish mythology as part of a course on W B Yeats...some really cool stuff, most of which has become quite hazy...one King named Fergus had a geas (which is put on you by a bard, and means that you have to do it) which did not allow him to refuse a drink. Legend declines to state how much he paid the bard for that beauty. Irish mythology is very interesting... i recommend doing some reading in it...i miss it and all the brain cells i destroyed in my undergrad days...sign
shoe
"...He [Thor] would be able to strike as firmly as he wanted, whatever his aim, and the hammer would never fail, and if he threw it at something, it would never miss and never fly so far from his hand that it would not find its way back, and when he wanted, it would be so small that it could be carried inside his tunic."
