seax - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Learned borrowing from Old English seax (“dagger”). Doublet of sax and zax.
seax (plural seaxes)
- (historical) A short Saxon sword.
1786, Francis Grose, A Treatise on Ancient Armour and Weapons, page 34:
The Pugio or Dagger was used by the Romans, a species of that weapon called the Hand Seax was worn by the Saxons, with which they massacred the English on Salisbury Plain in 476.
1950 June, Michael Robbins, “Heraldry of London Underground Railways”, in Railway Magazine, page 380:
It consisted of the arms of the City of London, Middlesex (three seaxes, or Saxon swords), Buckingham (a swan), and Hertford (a hart), arranged quarterly, on a background of crimson and ermine mantling […] .
seax
- (Early Middle English) alternative form of sax
- sex — West Saxon
- syx, sex
From Proto-West Germanic *sahs, from Proto-Germanic *sahsą. Compare Old English sagu, seċġ.
seax n
Strong a-stem: