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Originally Posted by CutlassCollector
...Great pictures Fernando and a very interesting axe... Or it could just be a Portuguese axe! ... I can't tell anything about the mark although it would be unusual to have a marking on the spike...
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Thank you CC.
The news are that the Portuguese seem to have adopted the diminutive feminine for the naming of the boarding axe, certainly to distinguish it from the long handle ones, which had and have different purposes.
So we have that the name is Machadinha, contextualy called Machadinha de Abordagem. Browsing with these names one finds several publications on the subject, like narratives of episodes of sea battles as also interesting inventories of battle ships of the period. Pity that so far i didn't manage to spot pictures of such axes.
Still is interesting to read those lists of armament equipping the ships, where axes existed in large quantities.
One such example is Nau (ship) Santo Antonio e São José, a vessel with 182 feet length and a crew of 611, while having 60 axes in 04 August 1781, had its quantity amazingly increased to 100 units in October 1785.
Concerning the hypothetical mark, i admit it could be a forging flaw, notwithstanding that smiths marks may also appear on spikes; or at least we see them in pole arms. I am checking with the guy that holds the other example, in case this ‘thing’ also appears in it. Today i gave a slight cleaning to my axe and my impression that it may well be some symbol still stands.
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