Dagger, bollock dagger

Iron bollock or ballock dagger with single-edged blade. The handle has an iron quillon plate and a wooden grip of octagonal section with a quatrefoil brass cap. There is a maker's mark in copper on the blade. Bollock daggers are so-called due to the two oval swellings or lobes on the handle that give it a phallic appearence. They are also called 'kidney' daggers and were often used as civilian weapons. Almost everyone carried a dagger in the medieval and Tudor periods. Well-dressed Londoners wore beautifully decorated daggers from Europe to signify their wealth and status. During Mary I's reign, the Spanish and Italian servants were at 'daggers drawn' with their English counterparts: 'not a day goes by', wrote one Spaniard, 'without knife work in the court'.