It is a "pugio", a sort of small dagger sidearm for Roman soldiers. I can't think of any reason to refer to it as a short sword in English as that conjures up t

It is a "pugio", a sort of small dagger sidearm for Roman soldiers. I can't think of any reason to refer to it as a short sword in English as that conjures up the image of a much larger weapon. These are essentially the same as the daggers used to kill Julius Caesar, for example.