Machete History

Variations on the machete have been in existence since Prehistory

Generally speaking, the machete is a cross between a knife and an ax; a blade fixed to a handle and swung. The machete blade is used for slicing, while the weighted upper blade provides force for chopping.

Before the advent of metal tools, man swung long or multiple pieces of sharp stone (flint and obsidian, for example) attached to bone, wood, or antler handles to reap wild, and later domesticated, grains. In Pre-Columbian cultures, which never developed metal weapons, wooden clubs with obsidian or flint insetting were used for both agriculture and war.

In China, fragile jade reaping blades have survived in burials from the Neolithic.

Neolithic sickle with flint insets for cutting grain stalks. Wood handle.

Aztec Macuahuitl

Chinese jade Reaping Blade

Metal machete-like tools date back to the Bronze Age. Made out of bronze and later iron, these tools were used for cutting herbaceous plant material, small branches, and saplings.

Many of these tools also doubled as weapons, and ritualized versions of common tools developed symbolic status. Examples include the kopesh of Egypt and the Greek kopis. Interestingly, the stylized versions tend to be better preserved in the historical record, being the possessions of kings and rulers, and thus carefully preserved in burials. Often, these symbols of power give us the best insight possible into the more ordinary tools of the time, as workaday tools are used heavily and discarded once broken.

The billhook, an agricultural tool with a forward-curving blade connected to a wooden handle of varying length, is still commonplace today in parts of Western Europe and surely ubiquitous at earlier times. This implement is swung much like a machete and used for many of the same tasks.

Modern machetes also share characteristics with many older military weapons. The medieval European falchion, the Persian scimitar, and the Chinese dao all share a similar, single-edged sword design with a curved blade reminiscent of modern machetes.

Few of their humble agricultural cousins have survived to the present day, once again causing us to speculate that they were work implements used by the rural population for daily chores in forest and field.

European Billhook

European Falchion

Chinese Dao

In the 19th and 20th centuries, many Armies developed a field knife that was used as both a personal weapon, as well as a tool. These tools also worked for clearing foliage and building fortifications. The Spanish Army called these knives machetes, from which the English word is borrowed. Concurrently, bill hooks, sickles and corn knives were part of everyday rural life even here in the US, and were only replaced by mechanized harvesters within the last few hundred years.

With the advent of cheap steel, the machete became the tool of the campesino, or rural laborer, everywhere. For in parallel to the development of the machete in Europe and the Americas, Arab traders had long-before brought the machete to Southeast Asia and Africa, where hundreds of local variants developed.

The development of better machetes continues to this day with the advent of exciting new materials. Here in the US, this overlooked tool is likely to spread in popularity once again with the increase in organic and small-scale agriculture.

Cutting Grass with a Machete

Che Guevara cutting sugar cane with his machete.