Quote Originally Posted by Zaq View Post
My apologies if this has come up before.

Is there a generally agreed-upon explanation for why the sword is the de facto standard weapon in fantasy and (more interestingly) legend? I know that certainly not every legend has a sword in it, but to my (totally) untrained eye it seems like the number of legends in which swords feature prominently kind of outstrips the prominence of the sword as a historical weapon (compared to, say, polearms or bows). I repeat, there's plenty of exceptions, but it's still a pretty common thing, so far as I know. Is there anything at all that we can reasonably point to as a major contributor to this trend?
Adding a few more examples of mythologies in which the major characters didn't use swords:

1. Philippine mythology's warriors were mostly spear-wielders, as far as I can tell.

2. Hindu mythology has warriors who were excellent at many weapons, but the bow seems to be most common, since the Astras (divine weapons bestowed by the gods as special blessings on warriors of great virtue) were often channeled through ranged weapons. Heck, the Brahmastra is closer to a nuke than anything. Other weapons that appeared in the hands of heroes were the mace (Hanuman and Bhima), and the spear (Lakshmana and Indrajita). The only one I recall who actually had a named sword was Ravana, the demon king and primary villain of the Ramayana, who wielded Chandrahas (the Moon Blade). Having 20 arms, he wielded a whole bunch of other weapons too.

3. Fereydun in the Persian Shahnameh wielded a mace as well, if I'm not mistaken.