Rookbeak Hand Forged High Carbon Steel Medieval War Hammer | 33 Inch Overall with a 10 Inch Head | Reenactment Display Gift | RK-1360

This is a war hammer rather than a polehammer, which is a real distinction and not a fussy one. The head carries a square hammer face on one side and a long tapered spike directly opposite it, both forged from 1095 high carbon steel, set on a haft short enough to be swung in one hand. That is the horseman weapon, the thing a rider carried at the saddle bow to deal with an armoured man on foot, and it is the ancestor of the long hafted polehammer rather than a shrunken copy of it. The pattern runs from the fourteenth century into the seventeenth almost unchanged.

Forged, heat treated and finished in our shop in Memphis, Tennessee, hardened and drawn to 54 to 58 HRC. It ships free anywhere in the United States and it can be engraved with Elder Futhark runes or a Viking pattern of your choosing before it leaves the bench.

Specifications

Why the spike is longer than the hammer

Look at the head from the side and it is obviously lopsided. The spike is more than twice the length of the hammer face, and that asymmetry is doing two things. The first is reach. Against a man in plate the spike is the tool that finds the gaps, the visor slot, the armpit, the back of the knee, and every extra inch of it is an inch of head that arrives before the rest of the weapon does.

The second is balance in the hand. Mass on the far side of the haft from the hammer means the head does not want to roll over as you swing it, so the face lands square instead of catching a corner. Turn the weapon over and the same length of spike becomes a lever for pulling a rider down or hooking a shield edge aside. A short haft makes all of this usable one handed, which is the whole reason to have this rather than a five foot polehammer: you can carry it, mount with it, and still have a hand free.

Why 1095 high carbon steel and not stainless

Every plain steel piece in this group is forged from 1095, a simple high carbon steel with roughly one percent carbon and very little else in it. That plainness is the point. A steel with nothing but iron and carbon to argue about moves predictably under the hammer, takes a clean quench, and comes back to a hardness a smith can actually hold to. These are hardened and drawn to 54 to 58 HRC, which is deliberately a touch softer than a kitchen knife. A head that has to survive impact wants to bend and rebound rather than chip, and 1095 in that range absorbs a bad hit instead of losing a piece of itself.

Stainless alloys buy their rust resistance with chromium, and above about thirteen percent that chromium ties up carbon in carbides that make the steel harder to forge and more brittle at the edge. On a small folding knife that trade is fine. On a head that lands with the weight of a haft behind it, it is not. The cost of choosing 1095 is that it will rust if you leave it wet. Wipe it, oil it, and it will outlast you. There is more on that trade in our guide to Damascus versus stainless.

The hardwood haft

The haft is close grained hardwood, turned to a slight taper so the hand finds the same place on it every time and sanded through the grits before it takes its oil finish. Dense hardwood is chosen over a softwood for a reason that has nothing to do with looks. A dense stave carries the shock of a heavy head into the wood rather than letting it stop at your palm, and it holds a ferrule or a langet tight for years instead of shrinking away from the fitting after one dry winter.

The finish is oil, not lacquer, which is a deliberate choice. Lacquer looks perfect until it chips, then water gets under it and you cannot fix it without stripping the whole handle. Oil wears gradually and is repaired by wiping more oil on. Once or twice a year, a thin coat of boiled linseed or a proprietary handle oil, twenty minutes to soak, then wipe off what has not gone in. See wooden handle care.

Engraving, runes and your own design

Use the rune converter on this page to turn a name, a date or a short phrase into Elder Futhark and we will cut it into the steel or the handle. If you would rather have a Viking pattern than a rune line, choose your own design in the engraving option above the add to cart button and tell us whether it goes on the blade or the handle. Where a piece already carries an engraved design, your chosen engraving replaces it rather than sitting alongside it.

Engraving is cut by hand after the piece is finished and before final oiling, so keep the line short and let it sit where the eye already goes. Names, dates, a line of a poem, a maker mark, a unit or a crew number all work. If you are unsure where a line should sit, send us the text and we will suggest a placement before we cut. Full details and examples are on the engraving page.

Care and sharpening

Carbon steel rusts. That is the only demanding thing about owning it. Wipe the steel down after handling, because fingerprints are salt and moisture and they will etch a bright surface in a week if you let them sit. A thin film of mineral oil, gun oil or paste wax on the metal is enough to keep it stable indoors. If the piece lives on a wall in a room that swings between damp and dry, check it every few months and re oil. Left alone in a garage or a basement it will spot, and once it spots the mark is permanent even after the rust is removed.

The edge is finished sharp from the forge and does not need attention until it stops biting. When it does, a coarse then fine whetstone, kept wet, held at the angle the bevel already carries, will bring it back in a few minutes. Do not take a powered grinder to it. Our guides cover steel care and sharpening with a whetstone in more detail.

Forged in Memphis

This is made in our shop in Memphis, Tennessee. Nothing in this listing is drop shipped from an importer catalogue and nothing is bought in finished and re labelled. The steel is cut, heated, drawn and shaped here, the heat treat is done here, and the fitting and finishing are done here by the same small crew. That is also why the lead time is honest rather than instant. Pieces in stock ship within two to three business days. If yours has to be made, or if you have asked for engraving, allow two to three weeks before it leaves the shop. We will tell you which it is when you order rather than after. Shipping inside the United States is free.

A note on handmade variation

This is hand forged. It is not machine made, not cast and not bulk produced, so what arrives will not be a pixel for pixel copy of the photograph on this page. The grain of the wood, the tone the steel takes from the fire and the oil, the exact run of a pattern, the precise curve of a profile, all of it shifts a little from one piece to the next because each one is worked by hand from natural materials. Two hafts cut from the same board will not read the same. Two etched blades from the same billet will not carry the same swirl.

What does not change is the specification. Dimensions, steel, hardness, fittings and build are the same every time. The character is the part that is yours alone, and it is the reason to buy something forged rather than something stamped.

Frequently asked questions

Is the spike sharp?

It is brought to a working point rather than a knife edge. That is correct for a war hammer, which punctures with mass behind a narrow geometry. A fine edge on a spike this heavy would deform on the first hard contact.

Can I use it for splitting kindling or camp work?

No. It is a weapon shape, not a tool shape. The face is too small and too hard for driving wedges and the spike will bind in green wood. Buy one of our camp axes if you want something to swing at timber.

Can I have runes engraved on it?

Yes. Use the rune converter on this page for Elder Futhark or choose your own Viking pattern in the engraving option. On a war hammer the cheeks of the head and the steel langets both take a rune line cleanly.

Will mine look like the photograph?

The head geometry, steel and length will match. The haft is turned from hardwood and the grain and colour vary from piece to piece, and each head is filed and finished by hand so the facets differ slightly.

What is the difference between this and the long polehammer?

Length and intent. This is a one handed horseman weapon at 33 inches with a hammer and a spike. The polehammer is a two handed foot weapon over four feet long with a hammer, a beak and a top spike. Different jobs entirely.

How long does shipping take?

Two to three business days to leave the shop if it is in stock, two to three weeks if it is being made or engraved. Shipping within the United States is free and tracking goes out with it.

What is in the box

• One hand forged war hammer in 1095 high carbon steel
• Hardwood haft with riveted steel langets
• Care and oiling notes
• Forged and finished in Memphis, Tennessee

Explore the range

More in poleaxes, maces, war axes and viking weapons, and read the guides.