Montreal City Weblog

Kate 09:59 on 2020-07-13 Permalink Reply  

• Azrhey 15:13 on 2020-07-13 Permalink

  Don’t know if it was explained, but arme blanche is in opposition to arme bronzée aka a fire arm as back in the 16th, 17th? Firearms were covered in some anti-rust stuff that gave them a darkened ( bronzed ) sheen where bladed weapons kept their brilliant ( white ) colour. These days arme blanche is any weapon ( metal but not always cf ceramic knives ) used solely by human force in opposition to weapons that use combustion to “work” ( so also arrows, hammers and whatever ).
  There is a word in english , cold weapon, that means exactly arme blanche, but it is seldom used , I believe, outside of technical situations : Cold weapons include bladed weapons ( arme de melée ) , ranged weapons ( arme de jet ) and blunt weapons (arme contondante).

  ( I picked historical weapons for my final term paper in translation class, I am not (that) weird usually )

• Kate 17:48 on 2020-07-13 Permalink

  Azhrey, no it wasn’t explained, and no, I didn’t know a thing about arme bronzée, so thank you!

  (My theory was, as I mentioned last week, that maybe arme blanche was in contrast to firearms that use gunpowder. Your explanation blows mine out of the water – so to speak.)

• walkerp 20:31 on 2020-07-13 Permalink

  Oh wow “arme contondante” that’s even better! Thanks! Very cool history tidbits Azrhey. I have not heard the term cold weapon but it sounds like it could be used as a bit of inside dialogue on a future investigation show.

• Daniel 07:55 on 2020-07-14 Permalink

  Very interesting, Azrhey!