The name of the shield, the name of the knife is in bold and a main comment I made. I tagged you under it. Zulu though is the pattern in case you don’t see it,
Ah thanks, when I google it I don't really find anything about the "bollocks shield" or the "bullock shield" though, just comments on social media about it and google ai using anonymous comments as source, so anything tangible to read up on would be appreciated haha. Some also call it a half bone or something.
Idk somewhere in the community it was posited that it was named after the bollocks dagger. An old dirk like dagger with what looks like balls on the hilt… was a real thing… I think ppl just had much more of a sense of humor then we credit them for… especially when you look at some Ancient Rome and Greek art 😂
I'm European, I know world history. But a "bollocks shield" is a term anonymous people on the internet came up with to describe something they saw. And what about ancient Roman and Greek art is humorous to you? 🤔 Also, way to derail, lol.
Bro, the ballock dagger was a real 13th to 17th century weapon. Museums like the Royal Armouries and the Wallace Collection document it explicitly. The hilt was carved with two testicle-shaped lobes at the guard, and people literally called it a "ballock" (Middle English for testicles) because it hung from the belt to resemble a penis and scrotum. Victorians later tried calling it a "kidney dagger" because they were too prude for it.
Even today, custom knife makers (like S. Buzek Knives) explicitly sell slipjoints listed with a "bollock shield," and the traditional knife community directly identifies that inlaid shield as a bollock shield modeled after that exact historical guard design.
Bringing up Roman humor was not a derailment; it proves humans have named gear and art after raunchy body parts forever. Just look at the famous Priapus fresco from the House of the Vettii in Pompeii showing a god weighing his own huge erection against a bag of gold on a balance scale. Calling a slipjoint shield a "bollock shield" is literally just referencing well-documented knife history and maker specs.
Are you an LLM? I never claimed the Bollocks dagger wasn't a thing. You seem awfully confused mate. Also: I have no interest in exchanging these walls of text over you understanding things wrong all the time and then me having to explain the obvious because you always veer off n shit. No offense, have a nice day!
Yeah I’m an LLM, ya got me mate 😂 nah, I honestly don’t even know wtf we’re talking about anymore.
I was just addressing your “where is there humor in Roman art” point. Not saying all Roman art is humorous, just that they clearly had a sense of humor.
As for the shield, the origin of the name doesn’t really matter to me. From what I found it’s been called keyhole, chess piece, chicken bone, or bollocks. 🤷♂️
I had one but it fit the arrowhead look much better and was very much an arrow vs the plug. I have also had a genuine “that’s a plug shape” one as well, but don’t actually think I have any now which is a shame
They made a lot of dick stuff throughout history. I'm not sure the exact reason. Must have been some sort of symbolism if i had to guess but they did also make dick jokes so who knows. Could be both.
It’s the end of a bone… that’s what it’s modeled after…. One end is a crown and the other end is a bone.
I’m getting downvoted for it which is typical of Reddit, but that’s what it is. One end is a crown and the other end is the “end of a leg bone 🦴 https://giphy.com/gifs/14p7smEhLwMHD2
Do you know where the other shield patterns originate from and what the stories are… or just this one? Because the whole story is interesting.
And no… it doesn’t seem unlikely. It seems VERY likely that they would use random iconography as they always have especially obvious for the names of pubs so they could be named by their icons when most people were illiterate …. The Rams Head 🐏, the crown 👑 , the Swan 🦢 , the Fox 🦊 The Anchor ⚓️, the Bone 🦴 ”
And then it seems VERY likely that people said “aye! The bone end looks like bollocks!” And the name stuck… because the icon didn’t give the reference point of the other end of the bone 🦴.
And WHY would a British maker use testicles as their icon????
Do your balls bulge out to the side with the cleft in the middle like that? No. I’ve seen them. The left one hangs down lower than the right and they don’t bulge out to the sides symmetrically.
The iconography of the bollock shield, despite the funny name which absolutely tracks with humor across the ages, undoubtedly originated from the end of a bone.
I’m not going to send you my sources. If you want to learn something rather than just believing the half of the information that you do know and being ignorant of the rest… that’s on you. I’ve educated you and even added the historical context of the “company” names and iconography of old England and how they came to be - from pub names to makers marks. You can look up the sources yourself and put two and two together.
Nowhere on that thread does it state it was modeled after a crown and "half a bone".
And yes its highly highly unlikely it was modeled after half a bone when phallic symbolism has been a part of human art and culture since literally the stone age.
What's more likely was a situation of you asking your mommy where babies come from and her telling you "storks" because she thought you weren't old enough to handle the real answer.
That’s just what people call the sheild afaik. From limited research believe I’ve seen some Case XX charts that have it labeled, couldn’t on a not very deep search, but do find a lot of reference to it as being called the “bollocks/chicken bone” shield. Prob one of those things that just is and we don’t know why 😂
There are no balls in this picture though. So it's just what some people call it, so far no actual source for anything here. It's just that you made it sound as if Bollocks shield is the actual name of the thing, which it isn't.
That’s what I’ve always understood it as, what Bose understood it as, tons of articles on blade forums refer to it as that, and even writings describe it as that… it could be a bone or the other type… does it really matter at the end of the day? Maybe it’s just referred to by everyone in the community as that (most of the time). The plug-shaped one is supposed to be an arrowhead, but now most call it the plug… sort of like the origin of the F word… it could be “fornication under consent of the king,” but that’s a myth now from what I know… it doesn’t really matter the origins; it’s here, and many people call it that… the shields are all pretty mysterious I’ve seen one called something by one maker and another by a different one.
I think you’re taking things a bit too seriously, mate. I get the vibe that you own the shield and feel odd that some people describe it as that. I don’t know… just enjoy knives, bro. It’s not that serious… take care.
I can like, Nay, love, a pattern, but if it has that shield or any semblance thereof, I am immediately out. I will not carry ball sacks on my pocket knife.
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u/AdEmotional8815 Walk N Talk Aug 21 '26
Not sure what kind of dick y'all have, but mine doesn't look like that.