02-15-2013, 01:59 PM
Grosse (Römische Militärgeschichte 1920) cites the Greek and Latin version of a source from the early Byzantine period, that shows that in the 6th century CE, a century afer Vegetius, the Latin semispathium (!) was translated as the Greek paramèrion. Now this second weapon would later, in the 9th century CE, be designated as a one-edged cavalry sword or sabre of the Pallasch-type, but apparently, in the 6th century it was still a short sword for the infantry. As you have shown, short-swords, very much looking like the gladius, have been found that date to the 4th, 5th and 6th centuries, so semi-spatha/spathium simply was a new basterd-name for the previous gladius (a term still used in archaising sources, but meaningless to soldiers, because the general name for sword in everyday use was no longer gladius but had become spatha, in the Greek-speaking east spathion). However, since according to the Strategicon of Emperor Maurice (600CE) the infantry should be armed with "Herulian swords" (the Herulians were a Germanic tribe living in the northwest of the Balkan peninsula) and paramèrion means "single-edged", both paramèrion and semispathium could also have referred to a saex-like weapon.
