Armed and Ready

Just managed to borrow MY digital camera back from the girlfriend. It's been so long I've forgotten how to use it, so the images are a bit ropey.

Tepiztopolli

how much would it cost to get you to make one and ship it ?

those are awsome!!! btw, that spear, Tepiztopolli, are there any acounts of what they did to cavalry?

that last mixtec sabre looks like a katana(well alittle anyways)

I think any spear would be excellent against cavalry, however by all accounts Aztecs didn't have much success against Spanish horse. My guess is because of the way they used them. They fought individually and probably developed 1 to 1 infantry fighting styles with it. For example Chinese martial arts pole arm fighting, more swinging than thrusting. The Tepiztopolli is certainly not a great thrusting weapon, many didn't even have a point. However the blades on the side make it great at cutting.

In Diaz it mentions that when Cortes went off to fight Navaez they trained some Tlaxcallans to face cavalry, which I think supports the above argument. The Spanish I guess taught them to form a close formation spear unit.

The Mixtec Quetzalcoatl Sabre is a beautiful weapon, out of all the Meso-American weapons I've made, this one handles like a dream. Also the oblique angle the obsidian hits at means it easily outcuts a Katana.

As for making them for sale. At the moment my interest in making them it two fold. To test them by clobbering things with them and to learn how they were made, Eg: the skills, materials and methods. The nuances of making them are, Materials = Cheap but hard to get, Manufacture time = Relatively quick but highly skilled and difficult to learn, Research very very difficult and time consuming.

The Tepiztoppoli I'm far from perfecting, most of it's authentic right down to the foot long tropical parrot feathers, but a few problems remain with the recipe for one of the glues and the paint (I'm still to learn to make prehistoric paint). Mixtec Sabres, I've just made another to a different design and am still to perfect them. I need to do more research. For the Aztec broadswords I made two more, one the steriotypical paddle that handles terrible and one a really simple design used by the masses that handles wonderfully. It's undecorated and simple to make and would seem the best candidate to go into comercial production of. Finally I've just completed a two-handed allied sword, actually more like an axe or pole arm that's very nice complete with rattan shield and feathers like the tepiztopolli but suffers from the paint problem as that.

In short I could make you something but it would be better to wait a bit, I still not to an ability or authenticity level I'm comfortable with.