Did the Green Dragon Crescent Blade (關刀) exists?

By Oregon Chang

There are much legends and stories behind the mystries of one of the most legendary weapons of China! Which is the GUAN DAO!



This weapon is comparable to the European fauchard or glaive





This weapon is known by many names.
commonly known as Guan Dao (關刀) but also but by other names such as :
1) Green Dragon Crescent Blade (青龍偃月刀 qīng lóng yǎn yuè dāo)
2) Frost Fair Blade (冷艷鋸lěng yàn jù)



In some stories and believes, it has been said that this Guan Dao (關刀)is a bestow weapon down to earth from the heavens. This weapon has magical properties that can be used to slay all sorts of demons, monsters and evils. It is a weapon feared by dark. Since this weapon was rightfully the owner of Guan Yu (關羽) which is meant to be his by the will of the heavens, this is hence the Guan Dao (關刀)



According to myths, this weapon was forged by the best blacksmith on a full moon night and when this weapon was about to be borned, there was a sudden rising wind howling and blowing strongly and the clounds were gathering closely together tightly clustered. Following next, Nothing more , Nothing less there was exactly 1780 drops of blood dripped from the air.

According to the Local wizards of that time, they explained that it was the blood of the green dragon which flew pass. Therefore this weapon was named as the Green Dragon Crescent Blade 青龍偃月刀 qīng lóng yǎn yuè dāo)

As to why this weapon was also called as the Frost Fair Blade (冷艷鋸lěng yàn jù), some would say that it is because when in battle when there is snow, this blade continuously always had blood fully smeared on it and that a layer of frost blood resulted on the blade.

However, according to findings and researches made by people years later, whether or not this weapon existed during his time raised several doubts and became into a very questionable issue.



During the late Han dynasties, although several weapons came into existance, however most people were riding on horses and fighting with swords. Commonly, there were many short weapons created and popular type would be the Huanshoudao. This led to some into beliving that it could have been a short weapon that Guan Yu had used and that this Guan Dao is being build for Guan Yu martial image.



Historically speaking, it could also have been a dagger-axe that was used by Guan Yu. Similiar Guan Dao like weapons only came into existance during the TANG and SONG dynasties historically and it have been some pop-culture of Guan Yu and the Guan Dao. But again this is no historical proofs that confirms that the GUAN DAO did not exists during his time except for mere speculation.

Typically,Guan Dao (關刀) is a very heavy weapon in which it is commonly potraied that it takes 3 normal size soldiers to carry this one weapon to him but Guan Yu would however hold it without any difficultly with just one single hand.



However, this may not be that exggerating. This weapon is probably in actual fact, weighing 82 Chinese jin (estimated 18.263 kg. a Han Dynasty jin equals 222.72 grams in metric system). But there are however much historicans who believed that the GUAN DAO weighted much heavier than that. In fact during the Qing dynsty there are even heavier ones which is up to 80, 100, or 120 jin (48, 60 or 72 kg, using the modern value for 1 jin = approximately .6 kg). For a candidate to pass, the Guan Dao was first weapon used by them before advancing to heavier ones.

This weapon is can be both used on by a horseman and by the infantry as an anti-personnel and anti-cavalry weapon.

This awesome and legendary weapon to present still remains as a historical mystry if it ever exists.