Single handed 3 chain flail

Medieval flails, either for knights, peasants or anyone in between was a fairly common weapon from at least the 12thC through to the 16thC and yet popular culture seems to think they are largely fantasy.  This was not the case and a dig into manuscripts will see them without difficulty.

They came in a variety of forms, either threshing flails that were seemingly used just as they came from the fields or were converted by the addition of studs or spikes.  Large two handed military flails that were purpose built and of course single handed chain flails like this one.

The ash shaft is 50cm/20” long and the individual chains are 30cm/12” so fearsome as it seems to the user (as well as the receiver), the weights cannot hit your hand.  The chains are made as a series of long links connected by a pair of rings to the shaft and finished with shaped pendulous weights.

Overall length 86cm/34”

Weight 1235g