Byzantine Weapons and Warfare

[kuura]

Regarding sidearms, the Taktika states

They [the infantry spearmen] must have .. . swords girded at the waist, axes or iron maces, so that one man fights with one weapon, the next with another according to the skill of each one. They should all have slings in their belts.


So the menavlatoi wouldn't be disarming themselves if a menavlion is a missile weapon.

But were they competent, trained swordsmen like the earlier legionaires? You can give any recruit a sword etc but unless they have a high degree of training they would be pretty useless with it. The quoted reference states that each man fights with a variety of weapons and at different skill levels, that to me indicates irregular training, making the Menavlion a Primary weapon and effectively negating the troops competence if they use it as a missile weapon. True, Psiloi and other light troops had sidearms but then they also carried more than one missile weapon.

For arguments sake though, the later Ottoman Turkish Jannisaries were equipped on a personal level with side arms of their choice. However, they were elite troops, the Menavlatoi were probably just handed out sides arms at random, axe, mace, large knife, cheap sword, whatever came to hand.

Effectively, heavy throwing weapons due to their weight and lack of range are for me anyway, a melee weapon. True, they technically are a missile but the range they are discharged would not give you time to skirmish or evade, especially against horse. A point that should be mentioned though is that the armies throughout history that have used them were primarily infantry based and initially fighting infantry based foes, Early Imp Romans with Pila, Franks with Fransisca and angons, angons (or varients of) still being used by Baltic tribes well into the 13th century.
The Romans only discarded the Pila in favour of plumbata and other 'light' missile weapons because they later faced more mobile enemies on horseback and required lighter equipment and weapons with a greater range. Why would the Byzantines, who from the earliest period always faced cavalry based foes adopt such an antiquated form of missile weapon? Also, look at the way the Menavlion is made, massive head on a whole sapling which probably isn't that straight! You try throwing an even slightly bent javelin or spear, absolutely useless, it will go of course almost immediately. You would get better results tying a big stone to a stick!