Épi is a French bread shape that starts out its life as a baguette. The dough is then cut all down its length at an angle with scissors, making gill-like incisions. The flaps of dough this creates are pulled out to either side, alternating left and right. The resulting shape looks like an ear of wheat, with teardrop-shaped sections all lined up to form a long loaf. The "tails" of these teardrops, which point away from the center of the loaf, can be twirled at their tips after the bread has risen to make thorny points. This bread is great for sharing, since it breaks off into equal sections.
Let an épi loaf get real stale and hard. You now have an excellent spiked mace.