Mere (weapon)

The mere is a short, broad-bladed hand weapon of the indigenous Maori of New Zealand, shaped like an enlarged tear drop and best known when carved from nephrite jade, called pounamu or greenstone. It is a leaf-shaped form of short club, usually between 25 and 50 centimetres long, with a rounded top ground to an edge and a handle ending in a grooved butt. A wrist cord of plaited flax passed through a hole in the handle kept it from slipping. In close fighting it was used one-handed, mainly for jabbing and thrusting at an opponent at the ribs, neck or temple, which is unusual among clubs that are normally swung downward. Greenstone examples were slow to make and could take more than a generation to finish. The mere pounamu was the weapon of a chief, was given its own name, was handed down through families and was regarded as carrying its own spiritual power or mana.