Original Chinese Qing Dynasty Late 18th Century Qiang Spear Polearm Head – 18 ⅝” Original Items

Original Item: Only One Available. This is a fantastic example of a Late 18th Century to Early 19th Century Chinese polearm spearhead known as a Qiang. Qiang is the Chinese term for spear. Due to its relative ease of manufacture, the spear in many variations was ubiquitous on the pre-modern Chinese battlefield. It is known as one of the four major weapons, along with the gun (staff), dao (sabre), and the jian (straight sword), called in this group “The King of Weapons”.

This example measures approximately 18 ⅝” in length and has a socket that measures about 4 ¼” for the actual wood staff part of the spear. The spearhead appears to be constructed of not only steel, but a mixture of brass and copper as well. The condition reflects that of an item that was ground dug due to the level of pitting present, though nothing too damaging. The leaf-like pattern is still very well pronounced and there appears to be no damage to the blade portion itself. The socket unfortunately has a crack that runs the length of it but could very well just be a seam, but it has separated towards the bottom and is overlapping itself.

All in all this is a fantastic, seldom seen piece from the Qing dynasty era. A lovely example that comes more than ready for further research and display.

The three most common types of Chinese polearms are the ge (戈), qiang (槍), and ji (戟). They are translated into English as dagger-axe, spear, and halberd. Dagger-axes were originally a short slashing weapon with a 0.9 to 1.8 m long shaft, but around the 4th century BC a spearhead was added to the blade, and it became a halberd. The spear is also sometimes called a mao (矛), which is sometimes used to designate polearms with a wavy snake-like spearhead. There was another polearm weapon known as the pi (鈹), translated into English as either sword-staff or long lance, that was used from ancient times until the Han dynasty. It was essentially a short sword attached to a stick. From the Warring States period onward, the length of Chinese polearms varied from around 2.8 m to 5.5 m, however there is no specific designation for a pike in the traditional Chinese lexicon. A very long spear is just called a long spear.