Tawnos Weaponry (Original Art)

Tawnos’s Weaponry is a two-mana artifact, first printed in Antiquities (1994). By paying two colorless mana and tapping it, target creature gets +1/+1 for as long as Tawnos's Weaponry remains tapped. You may choose not to untap Tawnos's Weaponry during your untap step. Tawnos, the apprentice of Urza, was a master artificer – practical and inventive rather than power-hungry. Tawnos’s Weaponry captures his style perfectly: a device that boosts others rather than dominating on its own. It reflects Magic’s experimentation with “continuous effect” artifacts, where you could keep something tapped to maintain an effect. This same concept appears in cards like Howling Mine, Winter Orb, and Meekstone – the idea that an artifact’s “state” (tapped or untapped) determines its function. Thematically, it represents Tawnos’s craftsmanship – weapons that empower others, but which must remain in use (tapped) to be effective. It’s a repeatable but expensive creature pump effect. In 1994-1995, casual players sometimes used it as a reusable “buff” tool for big creatures. Before Equipment existed, this was one of the few ways to permanently boost creatures through artifacts. Tawnos’s Weaponry is not on the Reserved List