A spear or a piece of gate?

[scordes]

Hello everyone. My first posting on here, lets hope it is many more.

I found this on the River Thames today (i'm licensed) and wondered whether it was a medieval spear, cross bow, or just a piece of ornamental gate!!

Thoughts grateful appreciated.

 

[dig kzoo]

Neat find, not sure what it is but its cool.HH !

 

[wvwildman]

nice find congrats

 

[surf]

Hello scordes,

Welcome to the Tnet, and thanks for bringing the mudlarking mystery.

What does it weigh?

 

[wayne91101]

Welcome to the best site on the WWW From Georgia and Happy Hunting.

 

[capt-zero]

From the first picture, it doesn't look like it has any way to mount onto a longer piece; which it would need to be a functional lance. So, unfortunately, I'm betting on a piece of fencing. Not sure where you're from, but I suppose you could tell people who don't know any better that it is the head of an old whaling lance from Nantucket. By the way, welcome to T-net!

 

[scordes]

thank you everyone for the warm welcome. It's about 2 1/2 feet long, maybe three. Been mudlarking about 6 months and had a few 'nice' finds but this is probably my most interesting. Will be spending a lot more time on here!

 

[Curious The George]

I'm thinking the iron of a whale harpoon. They were only about that long and then mounted in a longer wood handle for throwing.

 

[MNcoinhunter]

At first glance it looked to me like a large drill bit. But now I'm thinking that it could literally be anything ... You can hope that it's old anyways .. nice find !

 

[scordes]

Thanks everyone. I might pass it off as a whale harpoon - sounds pretty cool!