PIKE

, an offensive weapon, consisting of a shaft of wood, 12 or 14 feet long, headed with a flat-pointed steel, called the spear.

Pliny says the Lacedemonians were the inventors of the Pike. The Macedonian phalanx was evidently a battalion of Pikemen.

The Pike was long used by the infantry, to enable them to sustain the attack of the cavalry; but it is now taken from them, and the bayonet, fixed to the muzzle of the firelock, is given instead of it.—It is still used by some officers of infantry, under the name of spontoon.

Half Pike is the weapon carried by an officer of soot; being only 8 or 9 feet long.