Talk:fan axe
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"Ancient Egyptian polearm weapon with a fan-shaped head mounted on the end of a long pole, depicted in hieroglyphics but never found by archaeologists." It's not just archaeological evidence that's lacking...I can't find evidence the word is used, either, outside Assassin's Creed video games and a few websites which you'll see if you do a Google Image Search. I see a few books mentioning Chinese fan axe money, and a Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society where a "stone axe is called the 'bent fan axe' by Evans [...found near] Pahang", neither of which has to do with Egypt. - -sche (discuss) 22:31, 1 January 2022 (UTC)
- From what I can tell, the entire concept stems from a misinterpretation of fans depicted in ancient Egyptian art. Binarystep (talk) 04:55, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
- But can you tell if the term fan axe has been used for the subject of this depictional misinterpretation? --Lambiam 12:46, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
- I can find a few marginal entertainment "news" websites which use the term in discussing Assassin's Creed or Halloween costumes to make you look like an Ancient Egyptian. In magazines, all I can find is the Portland Timbers' "Fan Axe Photo Shoot", a photoshoot for fans with regular axes. This and this and many other Google Books hits are just the plural of "fan axis", which is SOP in context; this is an axe made by the Fan ethnic group. This is an actual use of "fan axe" to refer to some kind of axe found at Beisamoun, but it's not clear what kind. - -sche (discuss) 22:45, 2 January 2022 (UTC)
- If it’s only ‘depicted in hieroglyphics’, how would it be distinguished from a picture of an actual fan? For reference, the standard ways to depict an actual axe in hieroglyphs are
and
; I’ve been unable to dig up any evidence that a fan-shaped style of axe or polearm existed. If citations can be found for the modern use of the weapon (in Assassin’s Creed, Halloween costumes, etc.) the definition should be changed to make it clear the concept is modern. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 21:46, 7 January 2022 (UTC)
- Yeah, I think Assassin’s Creed et al got the idea of a fan axe precisely from misinterpreting hieroglyphic pictures of fans. Their mistake doesn't seem to have made it into any durable books (yet). The few older uses I can find that refer to actual axes are probably SOP (describing fan-shaped axe-like artefacts). - -sche (discuss) 01:48, 10 January 2022 (UTC)
RFV-failed Kiwima (talk) 00:08, 4 February 2022 (UTC)