"You know the old saying: never bring a knife to a sword fight... unless it's concealed."
— Wednesday Addams, Wednesday, "Wednesday's Child is Full of Woe"
Historically, the dagger (along with its cousins the knife and short sword) had complementary strengths and weaknesses. Despite the dagger being concealable, cheap, and quick on the draw, it was equally short-ranged and lacked stopping power. The sword, axe, spear, etc., provided far greater reach and could land debilitating blows more readily, with the sword in particular being built on the benefit of advanced forging.
Hence, a common practice was to carry a short blade as a last-ditch attempt to win a fight or to escape one alive. In historical fiction, this often comes in the form of a character carrying a sword or spear as their main method of attack and defense, while also keeping a dagger if the longer weapon is lost, if a cheap shot is needed, or if, for some reason, the longer weapon cannot deal with the problem at hand on its own. In some cases, a character can also throw their dagger at an enemy before approaching with the primary weapon. Against particularly serious threats, the character may resort to using their primary weapon and dagger in conjunction if neither is enough to finish the job. In modern settings, a dagger can be a backup option for a rifle or even a handgun.
Subtrope of Choice of Two Weapons and Emergency Weaponnote . Compare Sword and Gun, where a character starts off alternating between a blade and a gun instead, and Sword and Fist, where a character uses both sword techniques and bare-handed blows at once. Can overlap with Devious Daggers or Psycho Knife Nut, depending on the character's personality. See also Hidden Weapons for a concealed dagger, Nothing Up My Sleeve for when a dagger is stored inside the wielder's sleeve, and Chastity Dagger, a female-specific weapon of last resort. Often involved in an Underequipped Charge. Contrast Ranged Emergency Weapon.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Afro Samurai: Justice normally fights with his pistols, being a gunslinger, but he has a third arm behind his back that wields a kodachi. This is how he managed to catch Afro's father off guard in their fight at the beginning of the series to kill him. When Afro faces Justice years later, he tries this trick again. But Afro, having long memorized the move, is ready for it and manages to disarm him.
- Berserk: After the death of his friend Judeau, Guts began wearing a bandolier of similar knives to the ones Judeau carried in his memory. Although Guts primarily wields his BFS and prefers his Arm Cannon and crossbow as ranged options, he's almost as good as Judeau was at throwing knives to catch enemies off guard.
- Blade of the Immortal: Discussed and deconstructed. In the past, the Mutenichi-ryu dojo members were attacked by bandits. The Greater-Scope Villain Saburo Anotsu killed eightnote of them, most with his normal katana, and two more by pulling a short, non-Japanese blade from his robe and hitting both assailants at once with one throw. However, he was expelled shortly thereafter for not following the dojo's rules of swordplay, even to save his teacher's life. The manga's plot is kicked off by Saburo's grandson, Kagehisa Anotsu, preparing his plan to eliminate the Mutenichi-ryu and other schools after getting through his grandfather's cruel tutleage.
Master Takehide Asano: We have no tradition of using two swords in combat. Furthermore, you know well enough not to use a barbarian blade in combat....[Saburo] Anotsu, you are a cloth maker's son. Maybe these concepts are too complicated for a commoner.
- Cowboy Bebop:
- In "Pierrot le Fou", Spike's first encounter with Mad Pierrot ended with getting a knife thrown into his shoulder before he barely escaped with his life. In the rematch, Spike is disarmed and the only weapon he has on him is the knife he held onto. In the standoff, Pierrot hesitates due to a gleam in Spike's prosthetic eye (which reminds him of the cat that was there during his experimentation), allowing Spike to throw the knife. And, since it wasn't a ballistic weapon, it bypasses Pierrot's shield and hits him in the leg. Having been wounded for the first time since the experiment, Pierrot's childlike mind can't handle the pain and he writhes on the ground begging for his mother before being stepped on by a robot in a passing parade.
- The gangster Big Bad Vicious uses a katana as his primary weapon for most of the series. Before the final fight with Spike begins in earnest, however, he switches it up a bit by pulling out a hidden knife and throwing it into Spike's shoulder before attacking with his sword, although the small blade barely slows Spike down.
- The Legend of Zelda (Akira Himekawa):
- The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords (2004): Vaati uses his magic to have the Hylian Captain of the Guard Reforged into a Minion. When the four Links are forced to fight their brainwashed father, Blue finally manages to turn the tide in their favor by launching a Sword Beam and making him drop his sword. The Captain then draws a knife, but at the last minute musters enough willpower to throw it at Vaati rather than use it on the Links.
- The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (2005):
- Although Agahnim generally relies on his magic blasts for offense, he surprises Link's uncle in the waterworks and stabs him with a dagger.
- The first scimitar used by the bandit girl Ghanti breaks during the encounter with the Armos Knight. When she learns Link is a descendant of the Hylian Knights, she nearly stabs him in the back with a dagger she'd been concealing up until that point, but she is foiled by Sahasrahla.
- The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2016): As in the original game, the swordsman Rusl begins carrying a short machete on his lower back after the attack on Ordon Village. But while the game made it an Ornamental Weapon, the final battle has Rusl having to use both blades to help fend off the monster hordes.
- One Piece:
- Played with. Dracule "Hawk Eyes" Mihawk, the world's greatest swordsman owns the world's best sword, a BFS named Yoru. note He also owns the world's smallest sword called the Kogatana. note He initially inverts the typical setup by using the Kogatana against Roronoa Zoro before finally using Yoru to end their fight. In subsequent appearances he starts off encounters with Yoru while keeping the Kogatana in reserve.
- Crocodile's Hook Hand is his primary weapon, having both a heavy golden shell and a poisonous core hook. In the event he loses both, he can have a short knife blade project from the base of the hook.
- Samurai Champloo:
- The ex-pirate and rogue Mugen has a unique sword with a sai-shaped handle as his weapon of choice. Unbeknownst to most, his scabbard also contains a knife, which he uses to fatally wound Shoryu and catch Umanosuke off guard, with both cases occurring after they disarmed him of his sword.
- Jin carries both a katana and a wakizashi, although he prefers the former for his orthodox sword style. His final fight against Kariya, a much greater swordsman than himself, ends with him pulling a Deliberate Injury Gambit, drawing the wakizashi with his free hand, and stabbing his opponent.
- Sword of the Stranger:
- The aggressive and bloodthirsty Dragon-in-Chief Luo Lang spends most of his fights wielding a dao, although he keeps at least one knife on his person too, as most notably shown when he uses the latter to kill his boss Bai-Luan.
- The Ming warrior Jin-Hai uses a bullwhip as his main weapon, but he also has an assortment of knives under his cape just in case. He ends up managing to cut Tobimaru after his whip gets caught, but Nanashi gives him a Neck Snap.
Fan Works
- Bait and Switch (STO): Kanril Eleya commonly carries a knife-style bayonet she kept from the Bajoran Militia as a backup weapon, and uses it when disarmed of her phaser by a Klingon during an away mission in "All of My Scars".
- Dungeon Keeper Ami: For Ami's duel, she trains to use a sword and magical Homing Projectile daggers, while her real power is tricking the magical restrictions on her duel.
- God Bless This Wonderful Hero: Invoked. Link makes Megumin carry around a pair of daggers so she can defend herself without her Explosion magic.
Film — Animated
- Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker: When Batman begins brutally beating the Joker for torturing and brainwashing Tim Drake/Robin, the Joker reveals a dagger from his sleeve and stabs Batman in the leg, which explains why Bruce Wayne uses a walking stick in his old age.
- Mulan (1998): Despite Shang being one of the more straightforwardly honorable characters in the setting, often to a fault, he doesn't rely on just one weapon. During the mission to save the Emperor, Shang engages Shan Yu with his jian, and they temporarily disarm each other. While Shan Yu gets his sword back, Shang is forced to draw a dagger in a last-ditch attempt to attack, but Shan Yu knocks it away and is seconds away from dealing the finishing blow before Mulan intervenes.
- Pocahontas: Although he begins the fight against John Smith with an axe, Kocoum is disarmed and resorts to using a knife.
- Pocahontas II: Journey to a New World: When the cowardly, conniving Ratcliffe and a surviving John Smith have a Sword Fight in the climax, the former tries to take advantage of a Blade Lock to pull out a dagger to stab the latter, but misses by a few inches. Smith then gives Ratcliffe a left hook hard enough to make Ratcliffe drop both his sword and dagger.
- Puss in Boots: The Last Wish: Puss In Boots is known for his swordsmanship and doesn't tend to use tiny weapons. Early in the movie though, he loses his sword in a fight against the Wolf, which Kitty notices while they are on a journey for the wishing star, prompting her to give him a dagger as a means to defend himself. The size of the dagger offends Puss. Despite this, the dagger proves to be a Chekhov's Gun as Puss pulls it out after losing his sword again during his rematch with Death, allowing him to reclaim the sword and use both in the fight.
Film — Live-Action
- Avatar (2009): Miles Quaritch enters the final fight in his AMP mech suit, which carries an appropriately sized gun with a bayonet attached. After first losing the bayonet and then the barrel, he has his mech pull out a large knife.
- The Death of Stalin: When the coup to arrest Lavrentiy Beria kicks off, Malenkov, who up until now has been a reluctant supporter of him, meekly withdraws his protection by telling the Army officers arresting Beria that Lavrentiy has a hidden knife by his ankle. Marshal Zhukov, after finding it, snarks about its size.
Beria: I'm going to enjoy peeling the skin from your self-satisfied face!
Zhukov: [holds up knife] Not with that, you won't. - Gladiator (2000): In the film's climax, The Usurper Commodus forces the hero Maximus to publicly duel him in the arena, but only after stabbing him in the side with a dagger first. When the two men lose their swords partway through the fight, Commodus draws the dagger from before in another attempt to kill Maximus. Even half-dead, Maximus manages to fatally stab him with his own blade.
- Hook: After being disarmed and defeated, Captain Hook tries to kill Peter one last time with a spring-loaded dagger hidden in his sleeve designed to shoot out into his hand.
- Kill Bill: The Bride plans to attack her former fellow assassin Budd in his trailer with her iconic katana. However, Budd already anticipated her coming and paralyzes her with a blast of rock salt from his shotgun. After he kicks her sword away, he waits for a bit to find a dagger on her person and throws that one away, too.
- The Lord of the Rings Film Trilogy: Aragorn's main weapon throughout the trilogy is a two-handed sword (initially a generic longsword, then Andúril in The Return of the King), but in a Deleted Scene in The Fellowship of the Ring, Galadriel gifts him a short, curved elvish knife, which he carries as an Emergency Weapon for the rest of the series: he draws it while dueling Uruk-Hai Captain Lurtz at the climax of Fellowship only to have to deflect it with his sword after Lurtz pulls it from his own thigh and throws it at him, then uses it in the battle at the Black Gate in Return of the King to stab the foot of a troll who's standing on him.
- A Minecraft Movie: Mocked in the finale. Malgosha attempts to lure Steve close enough by claiming she has something to whisper, only to pull a dagger on him. Steve casually slaps it away. Then she tries it again. And a third time.
- The Princess Bride: Prince Humperdinck's personal Torture Technician, Count Rugen, responds to Inigo challenging him to a Sword Fight by running away, pulling a dagger from his boot, and throwing it into Inigo's gut before trying to attack him with a rapier. However, Inigo musters up enough willpower to kill Rugen with the six-fingered sword.
- Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves: When Marion goes to Sherwood to see Robin, she gifts him a dagger, ostensibly to be sold and the money it fetches given to the peasants. He ends up keeping it tucked in his belt from then on, which proves handy when the Sheriff disarms and backs him into a corner in their final duel; Robin smoothly draws the dagger and stabs him in the heart.
- Rob Roy: Discussed; after multiple characters end up stabbed or threatened with knives, the final fight is a duel between Rob Roy and Archibald Cunningham, and each is given a sword. The referee, among other restrictions, pointedly warns both men not to use any weapons other than those already selected for the duel.
- Scream: Inverted with the various incarnations of Ghostface, who use a Buck 120 knife as their main weapon. Several only resort to drawing a pistol when their identities are revealed.
- Starship Troopers (1997): When they're trapped in Bug City by the Brain Bug, Zander passes Carmen a dagger that she uses to slice off the Brain's sucking appendage.
- Total Recall (1990): While fighting Melina, Lori takes out a dagger concealed around her ankle before Quaid blasts it from her hands and shoots her, too.
- Yojimbo: Sanjuro, as with most samurai/ronin at the time, carries a daisho, using his katana as his primary weapon while keeping a wakizashi in reserve. After losing his original weapons near the climax, Sanjuro goes to confront the remaining gangsters with a scavenged sword and a cooking knife. He walks close to Unosuke, the gang's lone gunman, and disables his gun arm with the knife before cutting down him and most of his fellows with the sword, sparing only the youngest gangster present.
- Zatoichi: In Zatoichi the Fugitive, Tanakura manages to break the blade of Zatoichi's Sword Cane with his katana. However, he realizes too late that Zatoichi has a secondary knife blade in the cane too, and he ends up fatally stabbed.
Literature
- In The Cleric Quintet, the guard golems in Castle Trinity (a temple to a poison god) are armed with huge swords, which draw the eye away from the inconspicuous daggers each carries in their other hand. When a pair of them almost activate to fight Cadderly, his Aura Vision reveals that the magical energies they were charging up were centered around the daggers.
- In Dragonlance, Raistlin resorts to a knife in a Wizard Duel to kill Fistandantilus when the latter attempts a Grand Theft Me. It even fools Takhisis.
- The Vorkosigan Saga mentions Vorfemme knives, designed to be hidden in boots and meant to be used by Vor ladies as a final recourse (contrasting Vor Lords' permission to carry paired swords). There are enough mentions of Vor ladies successfully getting the drop on their husbands to make this limitation seem reasonable, especially as it's mentioned expert wielders are a very real threat in close combat.
- Words of Radiance: In his fight against Moash and Graves, Kaladin's spear gets shattered. With no other recourse to defend King Elhokar, he resorts to trying to fight against a Shardblade using only a dagger. Luckily for him, Syl intervenes and grants him a Shardblade of his own.
Live-Action TV
- The Acolyte: The conniving, unorthodox Sith antagonist known for most of the series as The Stranger naturally carries a red lightsaber like every other Sith in the setting. However, his hilt conceals a second, smaller lightsaber that he first reveals in a surprise attack and later uses as an off-hand weapon once the element of surprise is lost.
- Cadfael:
- "One Corpse Too Many": Brother Cadfael gave up most of his weapons when he retired as a soldier and took the cloth, but kept a finely made dagger, which he loans to Torold Blund while the man is hiding in Cadfael's workshop. That dagger is then stolen by Adam Courcelle, who, to Cadfael's horror, draws it as a backup weapon when Hugh Beringar disarms him in their Duel to the Death. In order to keep the fight fair, Beringar drops his sword and shield and draws his own dagger, and Courcelle ends up dropping Cadfael's dagger and then accidentally rolls onto it, killing him.
- "A Morbid Taste for Bones": The monks of the abbey are all issued knives as emergency weapons before heading out into Wales to try to obtain the bones of St. Winifred on a supposed divine revelation.
- Once Upon a Time (2011): Discussed in the Flashbacks to "An Apple As Red As Blood"; as Snow is disarming as agreed to meet Regina to negotiate Prince Charming's release, Grumpy advises her to keep "the little knife between your tuffets" just in case, but Snow is resolute that she will follow the terms as agreed.
- A Song of Ice and Fire:
- Game of Thrones:
- In the first season, Jaime kills Jory in their brief Sword Fight by locking blades with him, then drawing a dagger and stabbing Jory through the eye, making sure to look right at Ned while he does it.
- Discussed later on when Bran witnesses a vision of the past battle between the remaining Targaryen loyalists and his father Ned Stark's party. Despite being seriously wounded by Ser Arthur Dayne and dropping his sword, Howland Reed managed to muster up enough strength to get up and stab Dayne from behind with a dagger, allowing Ned to land the finishing blow. Bran is disturbed by this, even though it was the only way to save his father.
Bran: He stabbed him in the back...
- A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: During the Trial of Seven, a form of trial by combat, Dunk faces off against Prince Aerion Targaryen and the first time Dunk manages to throw Aerion to the ground and overpower him, Aerion fights back with a dagger. He stabs Dunk in the hand and strikes at the eyehole in Dunk's helmet to, temporarily, regain the upper hand.
- Game of Thrones:
- Stargate SG-1: "Emancipation": When Carter duels Turghan at the end of the episode, she initially expects it to be an unarmed fight (and therefore discards her MP5 and M9), but then he draws a scimitar. So she pulls out her KA-BAR knife and wades in.
- Wednesday: This trope is invoked twice by Wednesday Addams.
- The Quote Source is a scene from "Wednesday's Child is Full of Woe", the first episode. At the beginning of the show, a group of normie bullies stuff Pugsley into a locker, with Wednesday responding by dumping piranhas into a pool, leading to one of the bullies getting seriously injured and Wednesday herself getting transferred to Nevermore Academy. When Dr. Kinbott, the therapist, brings this incident up in their first therapy session, Wednesday invokes this trope by saying "never bring a knife to a sword fight... unless it's concealed."
- This becomes a Brick Joke in "Call of the Woe", when Wednesday and her mother perform a joust called el duelo-a-ciegas (the blindfold duel). At one point, Wednesday throws a hidden knife at Morticia, leading her to remark "Still bringing knives to a sword fight?".
Mythology & Religion
- Celtic Mythology:
- While he's more known for his Cool Sword Mac An Luin, venomous spear Birga, and his Storm Shield, Fionn Mac Cumhaill also possessed a magic scian called "Knife of Victory"/"Knife of The Victories". A notable use of it comes from The Battle of Ventry, when he fought the Amazon Queen Ogramach. Ogramach was the second greatest warrior in the world and a Lightning Bruiser to boot, so much so that Fionn struggled to land a hit on her. To fix this, Fionn threw his sword, shield, and spear aside and fought her with just his knife. This gave him enough of a speed boost to crush her in a Killer Bear Hug then finish her off with the knife, which he sticks in her skull.
- In another story, Fionn Mac Cumhaill hires a man from Scandinavia, whom he puts under the supervision of Goll Mac Morna, his second-in-command. Unfortunately, Goll and the stranger develop a rivalry and decide to settle things with a duel. On the night before, Goll encounters a faerie woman who gives him a special knife to aid him in the fight, as a reward for having dinner with her. On the day of the duel, the stranger starts to get the better of Goll, having knocked him off his horse, and is about to finish him off, when Goll draws the dagger and uses it to defeat him. Some versions claim that Goll later gave the knife to Fionn as a gift, and that this was The Knife Of Victory.
Tabletop Games
- Dungeons & Dragons: Despite being one of the most powerful mortal spellcasters in existence, Mordenkainen the archmage is noted as always carrying a dagger as a backup weapon.
- The One Ring: Daggers have the worst combat stats of any weapon. However, they have no Encumbrance cost, plus every adventurer starts with a dagger and one point of proficiency in addition to their specialized weapons, so they're always available as an Emergency Weapon.
Theatre
- Romeo and Juliet: Romeo Montague keeps a dagger on his person, likely to deter thieves, as he's the son of a nobleman. Whether Romeo also carries a sword depends on who's producing Shakespeare's play. This dagger is critical to the mutual suicide in Act V:
Juliet: [finds the bottle of poison that ended Romeo empty] Oh, churl, and none for me?
Juliet: [plucks a dagger from Romeo's outfit] O happy dagger! Here is thy sheath! There rest, and let me die!
Video Games
- The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim: Discussed; one of the idle speech lines for bandits is "...gonna start keepin' a knife in my boot... tired of gettin' disarmed..."
- Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse: Revelations in Chapter 10 show that detective Choushiro Kirishima chased You Haibara through the hospital to the roof. While searching among the blankets and the bedding, You suddenly stabs him in the belly with a knife. In his final moments, Kirishima takes You and both plunge to their deaths from the roof to the road below.
- Fire Emblem: Three Houses: Edelgard carries a dagger that she got from Dimitri when they both were children. It can't be used in regular combat, for which she generally uses axes, but she does draw it in two prominent story moments. First in the prologue, in which she defends herself against a bandit, which leads to Byleth Taking the Bullet. And in the ending cutscene of the aptly named chapter "Oath of the Dagger," which is the finale of Dimitri's route Azure Moon, she stabs Dimitri in a last-ditch attack, for which he impales her immediately with his lance.
- King's Quest VI has an unorthodox example: Alexander must slip a dagger to princess Cassima before the endgame in the room where she's being held captive. During the climactic Sword Fight between Alexander and Alhazred, Cassima will stab the villain In the Back, which doesn't seem to cause any harm but distracts him long enough to let Alexander win.
- The Last of Us: A shiv can be used for stealth kills, but is also the only fallback option if grabbed by a clicker. Joel can make a desperate stab at its face to avoid a One-Hit Kill.
- The Legend of Zelda:
- The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword: The Fighting Narcissist Ghirahim primarily wields an elegant sword, similar to Link, but sometimes jumps back to prepare a Flechette Storm with daggers after taking hits. When forced to fight Link a second time, Ghirahim tries to start with the daggers first.
- The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom: Although Phantom Ganon is a Walking Armory who cycles between a sword, polearm, club, and bow, an obtainable memory shows he tried to attack Queen Sonia with a thrown knife when he had to infiltrate her castle and could not use any of his usual weapons.
- Mass Effect: Tali has a knife strapped to her boot, even all the way back in the first game. The only time she ever uses it is in Mass Effect 3, if Shepard chooses to allow the Quarians to destroy the Geth, stabbing Legion when they attack Shepard.
- Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time: The Prince, who has some stretches of being a '90s Anti-Hero, starts off wielding a single-handed sword, and once he obtains the Dagger of Time, he also uses that in his off-hand. Justified, as while the sword may knock down the sand creatures, the dagger is the only thing that can actually kill them.
- Resident Evil (Remake): The defensive dagger is available as a way to escape the clutches of a zombie, Cerebos, or hunter should you be locked in their grasp. And with the zombies and dogs, blowing their head off lets you reuse that dagger.
- Wolfenstein: Despite the emphasis on gunplay, B.J. Blazkowicz sometimes has a knife as his Emergency Weapon, starting with Wolfenstein 3-D. It backfires on him in Wolfenstein: The New Order, where he repeatedly stabs Deathshead with his knife and almost dies himself when Deathshead detonates a grenade point-blank.
Webcomics
- Gunnerkrigg Court: Jeanne, the Ghost of the Annan Waters, is a dangerous enough Lightning Bruiser with a soul-cutting rapier to hold even a god at bay. The one time she fights someone who can keep up with her, she unexpectedly draws
a main-gauche in her off hand and lands a deadly blow.
Western Animation
- Avatar: The Last Airbender: Subverted by the Anti-Hero of the series, Prince Zuko; aside from his firebending, he carries two broadswords and a dagger. He actually carries the dagger for sentimental reasons, it being a gift from Uncle Iroh, and he never ends up using it against anyone.
- The Legend of Korra: After finding out the hard way that his punches can't hurt a dark spirit, Bumi resorts to throwing one of these to little effect. His flute on the other hand...
- Samurai Jack: The Fallen Princess-turned-Bounty Hunter, Mira, is (by the standards of her homeworld) a skilled fencer who uses a shirasaya katana. After Jack defeats her entire bounty hunter crew and breaks her sword, she manages to get back up on her feet and pull a knife, readying herself for another go at Jack before ultimately deciding against it.
- ThunderCats (2011): The Duelist is a Master Swordsman and an Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy who likes taking the swords from the warriors he defeats as trophies. After Lion-O disarms him in their Heroic Rematch to get back the Sword of Omens, though, the Duelist draws a knife and tries to stab Lion-O in the back, only for the Drifter to save Lion-O in the nick of time.
Real Life
- The "daisho" setup with samurai consisted of carrying both a long katana and a short wakizashi, the latter of which would be used if the former was lost or unavailable. Although this was supposed to be a symbol of status, in practice the samurai included a number of characters considered unsavory by society, such as kabukimono.