Collected Illustrations of the Three Realms: Implements, Book 6
Page Two

Ancient Dagger-axe

Original: Gu Ge (古戈)

This specimen was recovered from the former palace of the Han dynasty Prince of Huainan Liu An (c. 179–122 BC), a famous scholar-prince in Shouyang. When compared to the measurements of the ancient crossbow trigger mechanism illustrated previously, the proportions of this piece precisely correspond to the descriptions in the Artificers' Record Kao Gong Ji; a classical work on manufacturing and technology regarding how the neck hu of a halberd passes through its mounting.

Where the neck meets the blade yuan at a right angle, the outer hook forms an angle like that of a chime-stone a qing, an L-shaped ritual lithophone; the term qingzhe implies a specific obtuse angle of roughly 135 degrees. Master Zheng Zheng Xuan, a prominent Han dynasty commentator states: "The dagger-axe is called a 'hook-child halberd' juzi ji." Another name for it is the "crowing cock" jiming zi, because it is inserted horizontally and slants slightly upward. Yang Xiong’s Book of Dialects the Fangyan, the first Chinese dictionary of regional terms notes that the "hook-child halberd" is the term used in the state of Chu for the "dagger-axe."

Diao Lü original: 弔吕; these characters likely represent an inscription or a name found on the artifact itself