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Different carbon content in the cutting edge (forge welded into the "split") than the body of the axe. The body is relatively soft to withstand the shock of repeated chopping, the inserted, high carbon edge is relatively harder to take and hold (the proper for an axe) edge. A technique for smithing 'hawks consists of folding a piece of low carbon steel around a mandrel to form the poll/eye, forge welding the cheek/blade together and then inserting the high carbon cutting edge between the two halves before final forge welding them together. It's all finished with a differential temper to harden the cutting edge without hardening the body.
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A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.
~ Marcus Tullius Cicero (42B.C)
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