And not just cold steel, but firearms as well.

Tribal peoples decorate their weapons with color, feathers, bits of bone, shell and fur. And who hasn't admired the exquisite workmanship of a matched pair of flintlock dueling pistols, or a fine English shotgun. My personal favorite, the M-1 Garand: perfectly functional and undecorated, but finished to an extreme (and probably unnecessary) level of quality and precision.

Men are boys, and we have our toys. But we prefer to call it "collecting", or paper over our simian behavior under layers of philosophical or political justifications. We admire the smooth mechanical craftsmanship of precisely machined actions and the highly evolved form and shape of our weapons, perfectly adapted to their intended use.

Over and above the form and function of the piece, they are often decorated with engraving and carving, and even their accessory scabbards and holsters are often things of beauty. This is clearly not done for military or harvesting efficiency. There is clearly something else going on here.

Modern military weapons are sometimes designed to be mass produced as cheaply as possible, with stampings instead of machined forgings, and cheap wooden or plastic stocks rather than milled and polished wood. But even Saddam had one of his AK-47s (the 20th century equivalent of the Roman gladius) gold-plated. Go figure. The legionaire's sword was no doubt a roughly shaped piece of standardized military hardware, mass-produced to be identical for uniform training purposes. But I bet the Centurion's personal blade was the highest quality he could afford, and the officers no doubt carried works of art.

I'm not knocking it, I confess I am bitten by the bug as well. But its important we recognize this obsession for what it is.