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[474] ἀμφιγύοισι. It is uncertain, according to Helbig (Das hom. Epos^{2}, p. 245), whether this epithet means that the spears were sharp at the butt end as well as the point, or that the spear heads were sharp on both sides (like the blade of a two-edged sword). Mr. Myres decides in favour of the second alternative. ‘There are some specimens of the Mycenaean “σαυρωτήρ”, but they are rare, and not the least like the head of the lance. Nor do the monuments show Mycenaean spears as double-ended, but rather with a butt. On the other hand the Mycenaean (and especially the late Mycenaean and Iron Age) lance-head is decidedly two-edged, with two “hollowground” cutting blades and a tubular mid-rib’ (see Tsountas and Manatt, fig. 90). It may be noticed also that in Homer the word “σαυρωτήρ” only occurs in the Doloneia.

Homer's Odyssey. W. Walter Merry. James Riddell. D. B. Monro. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1886-1901.

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