The bayonet is a blade designed to be affixed to the muzzle of a firearm, transforming a gun into a close-combat spear-like weapon, and emerged in France in the mid-seventeenth century, with early "plug bayonets" inserted directly into the barrel, a design that had the significant drawback of preventing the weapon from being fired while the bayonet was fixed. The subsequent invention of the socket bayonet in the 1680s, which attached around the outside of the barrel via a metal sleeve, solved this problem and allowed infantry to fire and then immediately present a spear point without changing weapons, a development credited with finally rendering the traditional infantry pike obsolete across European armies by the early eighteenth century. The bayonet charge became a defining tactic of eighteenth and nineteenth century warfare, valued as much for its psychological shock effect on opposing infantry as for its lethality, and bayonet drill remained a standard element of infantry training even after the rifle's increasing rate of fire in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries reduced its practical battlefield role.
Facts
Weapon ClassBladed firearm attachment (melee weapon) 1 Introduced YearPlug bayonets were standardized for European armies in 1671; the term itself dates to the 1500s. Classification
Service Status Weapon Class
Weapon Class (category) Connections
Associated With
Napoleonic Wars, Wars The socket bayonet, fixed to the musket, was the decisive close combat infantry weapon of the Napoleonic Wars
Operated By
Source Wikipedia: Bayonet
Used In
Source Wikipedia: Bayonet
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Bayonet
WikipediaLead section
A bayonet (from Old French bayonette, now spelt baïonnette) is a knife, dagger, sword, or spike-shaped melee weapon designed to be mounted on the end of the barrel of a rifle, carbine, musket or similar long firearm, allowing the gun to be utilized as a spear in close combat.
- Weapon class classified from the entity's own sourced description text.
- Introduced circa 1671 per the entity's own sourced description text; no pre-1900 weapon system remains in current active military service.
Article text
The bayonet is used for controlling prisoners, or as a weapon of last resort.
Lead: In contemporary times, the armed forces of many countries armed forces
In contemporary times, the armed forces of many countries armed forces consider bayonets a weapon of last resort as they are rarely used in combat, although they are used regularly for non-combat purposes such as military parades, crowd control and as utility knives
History: it was not until 1671 that General Jean Martinet standardized and issu
it was not until 1671 that General Jean Martinet standardized and issued plug bayonets to new fusilier regiments of the French Royal Army
Lead: is a knife, dagger, sword, or spike-shaped melee weapon designed to be
is a knife, dagger, sword, or spike-shaped melee weapon designed to be mounted on the end of the barrel of a rifle, carbine, musket or similar long firearm
In Group: Early Modern Daggers, Lead sentence
A bayonet (from Old French bayonette, now spelt baïonnette) is a knife, dagger, sword, or spike-shaped melee weapon designed to be mounted on the end of the barrel of a rifle, carbine, musket or similar long firearm, allowing the gun to be utilized as a spear in close combat.
Operated By: United States Army, Article body
In 1870, the US Army issued trowel bayonets to infantry regiments based on a design by Lieutenant-Colonel Edmund Rice, a US Army officer and Civil War veteran, which were manufactured by the Springfield Armory.
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