The medieval batons are used by foot soldiers in the Middle Ages.  It is also known as a cudgel, baton, truncheon, nightstick, or bludgeon and is among the simplest of all melee weapons.

A baton is usually a short stick, commonly made of whalebone or wood, and used as a weapon since prehistoric times. These simple thick sticks were quickly substituted by blade weapons. However, some tribes continued to use batons as throwing weapons.

Others gave batons to their leaders as a symbol of command. Still, other tribes placed spikes on the ends of the batons, turning them into maces.

Types and Uses of Baton

Though the baton is the simplest of all weapons, it has many variations, including aklys, cudgel, crowbar, flashlight, gunstock war club, jutte, Kanabō, Knobkierrie, mace, mere, nulla-nulla, rungu, sally rod, shillelagh, and telescopic batons.

Telescopic batons are portable and concealable. They are banned in England and in many other countries. Telescopic batons are called Vipera in Hungary. Though Vipera is officially illegal, it is seen to be used by riot police units.

Knobkierrie also spelled as knobkerry, is a powerful and short wooden club with a heavy rounded knob on one end, mainly used by Southern African ethnic groups including the Zulu, as a weapon in warfare.

Indigenous people of Australia use nulla-nulla for hunting and tribal in-fighting.

Batons Training and Tournaments

Batons were predominantly used in training and tournaments. They were decorated to give the appearance of real weapons at these special tournaments or behourds.  A blow from a baton could apply tremendous force. Certain blows or maneuvers using batons were allocated set numbers of points.

• Three points for thrust to the body shoulder and face.
• Three points for immobilization and disarming.
• One point was assigned for thrusting into the rest of the body including the wrists
• Strikes made with the use of the pommel or quillon were counted as one point.