This, indeed, is a honing stone. Definitely iron sharpening iron. But is that all it is?
I'm not a weapons person, by nature. (As in, I get a kick out of there being both a gun and knife thread on Misc. forum specifically because I consider both things about as often as I consider pillbugs and silverfish -- not very often at all. Not that it's "wrong," just comes under "stuff I don't consider often.") And, yet, somehow, I keep reading both fiction and nonfiction things that reference weaponry. Among it is a chick-lit series that had a flint-napper as one of the main characters.
But he really was a flint-napper back in the days of cave dwelling Man, so he was literally sharpening and hardening flint. He did know how to harden it enough to use the spearheads to penetrate mammoth hide, so it wasn't a weak substance. But he was constantly making more spearheads, because they chip.
Iron chips as a weapon. All metal chips. Minutely, but they chip. They don't really get "dull" so much as they get micro-chips in them when used, that have to be honed away until the instrument is sharp again.
Hubby's favorite instruments in the kitchen is his knife set. (Butcher knives, not merely steak knives.) He uses. He hones. I wash. They're steel, so I have to wash enough to get rid of rust and that black corrosion that's on them.
And, after 30+ years of doing that, I've noticed the middle of the knives -- the part most often used -- is thinner than the rest now. And, if you look closely, it's beginning to curve inward.
He's honed it often enough that there is less knife than there used to be. Iron sharpens iron by chipping away at each other. But God's word said he would turn swords into plow sheaths. (Which, for the record, are also sharp.) Is there any concept of sometimes it's good to get out the sword for a good fight, but sometimes it's good to get out the sword to rest on?
Do you ever sit by the fire at night with your fellow warriors and enjoy the company, instead of look forward to the next battle?
Now, I'm a chick who doesn't consider weaponry all that often, so I'm really asking that too. It is quite possible you are all about the battle and not the campfire at night, and that's okay. I'm just curious if it is always only about the battle for you?