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Atrocious Historic Weapon Designs That Left a Lot to be Desired

Khalid Elhassan February 6, 2025 16 min

Weapon - An American general with a captured Krummlauf — An American general with a captured Krummlauf. Sandboxx

11. Literally Mixing Oil and Fire

Some of the more sophisticated lantern shields, which could include built-in spikes, sword blades, and gauntlets, also had a mechanism to dim or brighten the lamp’s light. It was a stylish contraption that bestowed upon its bearer an air of elegance, urbane classiness, and refinement. A drawback – and a significant one at that – was that the era’s lanterns were oil lamps. That meant that lantern shields suffered from an unfortunate design defect: they literally mixed oil and fire, strapped to the user’s arm and in close proximity to his face and torso.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.