Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Brown bill
Brown′ billˊ
.[
Brown
+ bill
cutting tool.] A bill or halberd of the 16th and 17th centuries. See 4th
Bill
. Many time, but for a sallet, my brainpan had been cleft with a
brown bill
. Shakespeare
☞ The black, or as it is sometimes called, the brown bill, was a kind of halberd, the cutting part hooked like a woodman’s bill, from the back of which projected a spike, and another from the head.
Grose.