Huge southeast european battle axe

[AHorsa]

Originally Posted by Victrix

I’m not too familiar with Byzantine arms and armour. Archaelogical finds suggest that vikings serving Constantinople often used their personal arms (swords and axes), but I can’t rule out that they were also issued Byzantine arms and seems logical that this was the case especially for palace guard and parade duties. Care should be taken in considering provenance of historical items.

I think the regular army might have used local arms and armour.

In 2009 the axe on discussion and a couple of similar pieces wearing a cross were sold at Hermann Historica: http://www.hermann-historica-archiv.de/ Maybe it was a hoard?
I will write them a mail asking what made them locate it in southeast europe and if they have more information. Maybe they can remember.

Interesting to see a nearly identical axe on the foto from ebay / picclick. The seller is from Serbia. So it would fit the attributed region. The double bladed axe looks somehow odd. I don´t think it is a real piece.