Vorpal Swords

When I was a teenager, one of our weekend hobbies was to get together and play Dungeons & Dragons. I never imagined I would receive so much form these sessions. Sitting with friends, mixing a created world with our own imaginations.

This semester I'm taking a poetry analysis course, and last week we looked at Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky." Mentioned twice within the poem are references to a "vorpal" sword. I remember my weekends as a teenager. I remember role-playing in relation to a "vorpal sword."

Naturally, I began to investigate what exactly is a "vorpal" sword. It turns out that the first reference to anything "vorpal" comes from this poem.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought --
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

According to Wikipedia, the sword has been mentioned and used in other sources, including Dungeons & Dragons. And now we are all a bit more vorpal in our knowledge.