Weapons of the Klingon Empire – Short CQC Swords!
May 18th, 2009 | 
Author: Welcome to the latest installment of Phyreblades treatise on Klingon melee weapons. If you’ve been following the blog for any amount of time you’ll know I am a fairly big Star Trek fan. Not as fanatical, perhaps, as most, but I certainly do love Star Trek, and everything it has brought for the Sci-Fi genre, not to mention it’s innumerable cultural contributions. But I digress. We are here today to talk about weapons. 
In previous posts I’ve talked a little about Klingon battle axes, such as the ‘aqleH and the oh so popular Klingon knife, the D’k Tahg. And who can forget the ubiquitous Bet’leH? I doubt anyone can think of a Klingon without thinking of a Bet’leH. But today, I’m going to talk about a somewhat less popular, and certainly not as well known Klingon weapon, and some of the other designs it has spawned. I speak of none other but the deadly MeqleH!
MeqleH - The Klingon Short Sword
Now Klingon legend has it that the MeqleH was a weapon borne of necessity. While the Klingons were still planet bound, the Bet’leH was a perfectly fine battle weapon, and they rarely used any other. However, once they became a space faring race, things changed a little. Instead of the open battlefields and large arenas they were used to, they were stuck in closed, cramped space ship quarters.
This changed the face of battle for them, as the venerable Bet’leH, while still a potent weapon, was rather large, and somewhat more difficult to bring to bear in the tight confines of a Klingon Bird of Prey. The first space faring Klingons, ever the resourceful warriors, took to fashioning shorter, faster weapons from one thing they apparently had lots of. Bulkhead supports.
It is said that this is where the unique shape of the MeqleH came from, as they were initially designed to fit against the curved interior bulkheads of the early Klingon space ships, as well as provide support for various conduits and pipes. They simply cut them to size, and sharpened all the available edges. And thus, a new Klingon Battle weapon was born. The MeqLeH!
Or so I am told.
Truth is, regardless of it’s heritage, it is just a really cool design. But it does have some weaknesses. Like little to no thrusting ability. However the design that has spawned a few new but similarly themed designs, none of which have that particular problem to the same degree:
Volkoth Simikath - Klingon Derived Melee Sword
This, is one of them. The Volkoth Simikath. As you can see, the Volkoth Simikath is significantly different from the MeqLeh in design, however it does borrow much from the design of the Klingon Axe, especially the ‘alngegh. I could totally see a Klingon weapon master deciding to use a scaled down axe design as the basis for a melee combat weapon, and this would fit the bill perfectly.
Volkoth Simikath - Klingon Derived CQC Sword
Here’s another etched version, with a leather wrapped grip, a look much more befitting of it’s style. At least in my opinion. The Volkoth Simikath sports a double edged head, much like an axe, except with a much deeper void between the edges, presumably for capturing an enemy blade during a close quarters battle. It certainly doesn’t help it’s strength any, that’s for sure.
And there is yet one more:
Volkoth Simikar - Klingon Derived CQC Sword
The Volkoth Simikar. This is my favorite variation on the hybrid MeqLeH design. This one hearkens a bit farther back towards the original MeqLeH design, with the secondary, rearward facing blade reduced to little more than a short talon. However, there are talons and claws everywhere on this weapon. Besides the one up top, you have one downwards facing little blade at the pommel, with a smaller protrusion facing forward.
This time, both voids are very small, but just large enough to catch a blade either with the pommel or the head, *but* with the added bonus of the main blade extending down a full 3/4 of the way back down the blade to provide additional cutting surface, and hand protection, much like the original meqLeH. It is probably a weaker design than either of the others, however it should be a little faster.
Either way, it is just an absolutely dark, malevolent weapon whose lines I just love to death. What else can I say?
Anyway, I think that is enough weapon ogling for me, I must take my leave of you to clean up the drool from my keyboard, and plan my next post. Until next time.
QAPLA’ My friends. May you bring eternal honor to your house! 
MeqLeH – [By the Sword]
Volkoth Simikath – [By the Sword]
Volkoth Simikath – [Strange Steel]
Volkoth Simikar – [Strange Steel]
Category: Knives, Swords | 
Tags: Bet'leH, Klingon, Melee, MeqLeh, Short, Star, Star Trek, Sword, Trek, Weapon | 
6 Comments »
Hey
Me again, xD I might be getting slightly annoying but, I thought it would get people commenting again if I rolled the wagon.
So here I am
Really bored
And I just read this artictle
and now I am interested.
What would you consider the “Perfect Weapon” (bar guns)
I am a big fan of Polearms (Halbeards especially) and Crossbows. (infact I made my own crossbow a few years back, I added some pretty nifty features to try and get a “perfect weapon” in the end it had two bayonettes on the end, in a slight curve upwards, so a up swipe from the holding posistion would be effective, it had a special “Pump action” system, basically a loader, on rails underneath the crossbow, when you pull it towards you, it loads the string onto the trigger.
oops rambling again
Well yeah
I wonder what you would prefer
Short sword maybe?
Hmmm
The Perfect weapon… Well My personal philosophy is that there is no such thing as a “perfect” weapon. There are weapons that are good for specific purposes, and then there are weapons OK for many things but not particularly good at any one thing. So I’ll answer your question with another question. What is the purpose of this weapon? How and where is it going to be used? I you can give me specifics, I can tell you what I think would be the best weapon for that specific scenario…
That makes sense
Let’s say plain battlefield, I guess dry ground, Only a slight downwards hill towards the enemy ‘army’. Let’s say 500 each side, if you was on top of this ‘slight’ hill and an enemy force (mainly equipped with Bows, Pikes, and Longswords, With a few men 50? on horseback) If you had to kit your ‘army’ with one standard weapon (as in every soldier must be kitted out with the same gear) Hm to make it interesting, As much weapons, armour whatever can be on your force, but this has to be practical, As in I can’t see a force being able to carry two longswords and a crossbow around.
As you can see I like this kind of stuff xD
And oh bugger, Rememebered another question.
I was recently having a discussion about the Advantages of Flechettes and bayonets, kitted on guns.
I and now I am really interested, what do you think is the longest a bayonet can get without losing practicallity? And I know you’re not a gun man but what do you think about Flechettes.
Sorry for the wall of text, I just don’t really know many other people who are interested in blades as me and you
That’s an interesting battlefield scenario, though I was kinda hoping for a practical applications upon which to base a weapon design instead.
What you are asking here is really a questions of tactics. There really isn’t any single perfect “weapon” for the situation you describe. If I absolutely *had* to give everyone a *single* weapon, and they were had no other restriction, they would probably all get repeating crossbows, but those are a really unrealistic set of restrictions.
With respect to bayonets, I think anything with a blade longer than about 18″ will become unwieldy. However I also think the answer is a little more complex than that. It also depends on the kind of bayonet, (full blade bayonets are apt to become problematic at shorter lengths than spike bayonets) as well as the rifle it is being attached to (the longer the rifle, the more important the length/weight of the bayonet becomes).
Incidentally, I am also a fan of firearms. Not as much as blades, obviously, but guns are kind of a side hobby.
Anyway, what exactly do you want my opinion about with respect to flechettes? Range? effectiveness? Advantages over other munitions?
P.S.
You may have noticed that I’m a big fan of details. As the saying goes, the Devil is in the details. So if I answer a question with more questions it’s usually because there is insufficient detail in your query for me to form an opinion. So try to be more specific when you ask my opinion about something. Just for future reference…
Aha I am going to leave that there, I just started writing a big essay
but I think it’s not needed!
And since you say you are a fan of firearms, and you supply me with Blade Eye Candy I give you the H & K G11. Definately one of the strangest designs I have ever seen. Unfortunately it never really made it out of prototype stage but it just comes to show that Firearms can be pretty wacky in design.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler_%26_Koch_G11
Remember seeing one that can fire Flechettes as a secondary.. Forgot the name though
Oh BTW I LOOOVE Flechettes, I think it would be pretty sweet if they took over ammunition, because I’m convinced that they are more effective at piercing Bullet Proof Armour then well Bullets xD. Never checked this up mind, but when I read and studyed bullet proof armour it seems it’s rather weak against everything else.
Oh yeah. Clean the drool from your keyboard because you will need to make way for more drool. =)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FAMAS
Mind you when I found out it was french I allmost cried. Still my alltime favourite.
Oh what the hell I’ve posted two wikipedia links so let’s even it out with a blade one.
I bet you’ve seen these before but I have yet to see one reviewed on here. Apart from polearms Short Swords, I find are pretty practical and the roman army agreed
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gladius
It can do pretty much all the basic things a sword can be expected of, Thrust, Cut, Slash….. Short and I imagine light weight, Looking at that replica wikipedia provides I don’t know if the hadles were that ergonomic, because everywhere I have seen one I don’t recall seeing that but hey, I have bad memory.
I hope you have time to kill
(really why aren’t there more blade blogs out there as good as this )
xD
Payment for all the enjoyment your blog has provided me
Went on a link spree there. But I know you love blades and now I know you love firearms =]
So I think you will enjoy all of them.
And I bid you good day Mr.Balrog
LOL no time killing necessary. I have an entire directory full of pics of the G11 in various stages of undress…
I also thought it was a very interesting design. Sadly, however, it had a lot of issues. The FAMAS I have run into also. Seems like a great weapon. Not too sure about it’s aesthetics though… lol. Regarding flechettes, it’s really a trade off in capabilities. As I understand it, they are much better penetrators, and can extend accuracy considerably, however they are much more sensitive to the how they are used and what loads they are subjected to, and they also tend to create very neat wound channels, which makes them somewhat less lethal than a lead slug.
Actually, I probably should have mentioned this earlier, but I do have a a blog specifically for unusual firearms like the G11. You might like it.
http://majorballistics.com
Go take a peek… The G11 will be on there eventually, as well as whole lot of other weird and cool firearms I’ve found over the years. I plan to do the same thing on that blog as I do on this one, just with firearms instead. That site is kinda still in beta, so forgive any weirdness you encounter over there. I figured you might enjoy one more site to flog with endless walls of text…