Bow and arrow

A modern reconstruction, in fiberglass and wood, of a historical arch composed

The bow and arrow is a projectile weapon in use since prehistoric times by most cultures. It was used both for hunting and as an offensive weapon.

Description

A bow is a flexible weapon that shoots streamlined projectiles called arrows. A string or loop is attached to the two ends of the bow and when the string is stretched several times, the ends of the bow flex. When the string is released, the potential energy generated by bending the bow is transformed into the velocity of the arrow.

Today, bows and arrows are used primarily for hunting and the sport of archery. Although they are still occasionally used as weapons of war, the development of gunpowder and muskets, and the increasing size of armies, led to their replacement in warfare centuries ago in much of the world.

Someone who makes bows is known as an archer; and one who makes arrows is an archer or in the case of making metal arrow heads, a blacksmith or arrowsmith.

History

Paleolithic archer.

Stylish archers practising archery, Panticapea (known today as Kertch, Ukraine), the fourth century before Christ.

In the Stone Age, people used sharpened bones, carved stones, flakes, and chunks of rock as weapons and tools. Such items remained in use throughout human civilization, along with new materials used over time. As archaeological artifacts such objects are classified as stone points, without specifying whether they were intended to be projected by an arc or by other means of launching.

Such artifacts can be found all over the world. Those that have survived are generally made of stone, mostly flint, obsidian, or chaillé, but arrowheads of bone, wood, and metal are found in many excavations.

In August 2010, a report was published on lithic stone points, dating back 64,000 years, excavated from ancient sediment layers in Sibudu Cave, South Africa, by a team of scientists from the University of of Witwatersrand. Examinations led by a team from the University of Johannesburg found traces of blood and bone residue, and adhesive made from a plant-based resin used to attach the tip to a wooden rod. This indicated "cognitive demanding behaviour" needed to make glue.

"Hunting with a bow and arrow requires complex multiple stages of planning, material gathering, preparation tool and involves a series of innovative social and communication skills".

The bow and arrow appear around the transition from the Upper Paleolithic to the Mesolithic. After the end of the last glacial period, the use of the bow appears to have spread to all continents, including the New World, except Australia.

The oldest surviving single-piece bows are the carved elm Holmegaard bows, originally from Denmark, which were dated to 9000 BC. High performance wooden bows are currently made following a design similar to Holmegaard's. The North German Stellmoor arch fragments were dated to about 8000 BC, but were destroyed in Hamburg during World War II, before radiocarbon dating was available; its age is attributed by archaeological association.

The bow was an important weapon for both hunting and warfare from prehistoric times until the widespread use of gunpowder in the 16th century. Organized bow warfare ended in the mid-17th century in Europe, but persisted until the late 19th century in Eastern cultures and in tribal warfare in the New World. It has recently been used as a tribal warfare weapon in parts of sub-Saharan Africa; one example was documented in 2009 in Kenya, when the Kisii and the Kalenjin clashed resulting in four deaths.

In the Andean world, the bow was an unpopular and infrequent weapon (unlike the slings and slingshots), being more typical of the Amazonian ethnic groups.

Wari Archer embarked on a totora horse

The British upper class led a revival of archery in the late 18th century. Sir Ashton Lever, an antiques dealer and collector, formed the toxophilite society in London in 1781, with the patronage George, Prince of Wales.

Construction

Small-scale polychrome model of the XI archer west front of the Aphaea Temple, ca. 505-500 before Christ.

Parts of the bow

The basic elements of a bow are a pair of curved flexible limbs, traditionally made of wood, joined by a spigot. Both ends are connected by a string known as the bowstring. By pulling back on the string, the archer exerts a compressive force on the front section of the string, or belly, of the limbs, as well as along the length of the string. of the outer section, or on the back, under tension. While the string is held, it stores energy that is later released when the arrow is released. The force required to hold the string still at full draw is often used to express the power of a bow, and is often used to express the power of a bow. known as its weight draw, or the weight. Other things being equal, a higher weight draw means a more powerful bow, which is capable of projecting heavier arrows at the same speed or the same arrow at a speed elderly.

The various parts of the arch can be subdivided into other sections. The upper limb is known as the upper limb while the lower limb is known as the lower limb. At the tip of each limb is a nock, which is used to attach the bowstring to the limbs. The riser is generally divided into the grip, which is used by the archer, as well as the rest of the arrow and the bow window. The rest of the arrow is a small ledge or extension above the grip on which the arrow rests when directed. The bow window is the part of the riser above the grip, which contains the rest of the arrow.

On drawn and real bows, the maximum draw weight is determined by the strength of the archer. The maximum distance the string could be moved and therefore the longest arrow could be shot from it, the Draw for the length of a bow, is determined by the size of the archer.

A compound bow uses a combination of materials to create the limbs, allowing the use of specialized materials for the different functions of a bow limb. The classic compound bow uses wood for lightness and dimensional stability in the core, the shaft to store energy in compression, and tendons for their ability to store energy in tension. These typically Asian bows used a stiff end at the limb end, which has the effect of a recurve. Paterson In this type of bow, what is known by the Arabic name, "siyah".

Modern construction materials for arches include laminated wood, fiberglass, metals, and carbon fiber components.

Arrows

Scheme of an arrow showing its parts.

An arrow typically consists of a shaft with an arrowhead attached to the front end, with vests and a nock at the other end. Modern arrows are generally made of carbon fiber, aluminum, fiberglass, and the like. wooden shafts. Carbon shafts have the advantage of not bending or warping, but can often be too light in weight to cast from some bows and are expensive. Aluminum trucks are less expensive than carbon trucks, but they can bend and warp from use. Wooden shafts are the least expensive option but they will often not be identical in weight and size to each other and break more often than other types of shafts. Arrow sizes vary greatly between cultures and range from very short to very short. They require the use of special equipment to shoot those used in the jungles of the Amazon River that are 8.5 feet (2.6 meters) long. Most modern arrows are 22 inches (56 cm) to 30 inches (76 cm) long.

Arrows come in many types, including buttoning, tail flick, barrel, power, and direction. A buttoned arrow is thicker in the area to the right behind the shirts, tapering towards the left. nock and point. A tail flick arrow is thick just behind the point, tapering to the nock. A cannon arrow is thickest in the center. Directional arrows are those arrows used for shooting target rather than war or hunting, and usually have simple arrowheads.

For safety reasons, a bow should never be used without a nocked arrow; without an arrow, the energy that is normally transferred into the projectile is instead directed back into the same bow, causing damage to the limbs or along the length of the bow.

Arrowheads

The end of the arrow that is designed to hit the target and is called the arrowhead. Usually these are separate elements that are connected to the arrow shaft by any tang or socket. Materials used in the past for arrowheads include flint, bone, horn, or metal. Most modern arrowheads are made of steel, but wood and other traditional materials are still used from time to time. A number of different types of arrowheads are known, the most common being bodkin, broadhead, and stacked. Bodkin heads are simple metal spikes of various shapes, designed to pierce armor. Hunting is usually triangular or leaf-shaped and has a sharp edge or edges. Broadheads are commonly used for hunting. A pile arrowhead is a simple metal cone, either sharpened to a certain point or somewhat blunt, used primarily for target shooting. A pile head is the same diameter as the arrow shaft and usually only fits over the arrowhead. Other well-known heads include the blunt head, which is flat on the end and is used for hunting. or to kill birds, and is designed not to pierce the target or embed itself in trees or other objects and still make recovery difficult. Another type of arrowhead is a barbed head, usually used in war or hunting.

Strings of the Bow

Bowstrings may have a nocking point marked on them, which is used to mark where the arrow rests on the bowstring before shooting. The area around the nocking point is often tied off. with thread to protect the area around the nock point from wear by the archer's hands. In this section there is a part that is called a portion. At one end of the bowstring a loop is formed, which is permanent. The other end of the bowstring also has a loop, but this is not permanently formed into the bowstring but is constructed by tying a knot in the string to form a loop. Traditionally this knot is known as the archer's knot, but it is a way of hooking the wood. The knot can be adjusted to lengthen or shorten the bowstring. The adjustable loop is known as the "tail". The string is often twisted (this is called the "flamingo twist").

Bowstrings have been made from many materials throughout history, including fibers such as flax, silk, and hemp. Other materials used were animal gut, animal sinew, and rawhide. Modern fibers such as Dacron or Kevlar are now used in the construction of commercial bowstrings, as well as steel cables in some compound bows. Compound bows have a mechanical pulley system with cams on which the bowstring is wound. bowstring. Nylon is useful only in emergency situations, as it stretches too far.

Types of arches

Arc and arrow in the herald.

There is no accepted classification system for bows. Bows can be described by several characteristics, including the materials used, the length of the tie they allow, the shape of the bow when viewed from the side, and the shape of the bow. the limb in cross section.

Common types of arches include:

1. Arc recurvo: it is a bow with the curved tip away from the archer. The curves are straightened as the bow is stretched and the tip returns to its curved state after the release of the arrow, adding extra speed to the arrow.
2. Arc reflex: it is an arch whose members are completely curved and they move away from the archer when they are undone. The curves are opposed to the direction in which the bow bends while stretched.
3. Simple arch: is an arch made of a single piece of wood.
4. Long Arc: is an arch with rounded extremities in cross section, of the same height as the archer to allow a full tense, usually has more than 5 feet (1.5 meters) long. The traditional European long arch is usually made of weave, but other types of wood are also used.
5. Flat arch: is an arch whose extremities are approximately rectangular in cross section. This was traditional in many American native societies and it was found to be the most efficient way for the extremities of an arch by American engineers in the twentieth century.
6. Compound Arc: is an arch made of more than one material.
7. Detachable Arc: is an arch that can be disassembled for transport, and usually consists of 3 parts: 2 extremities and a vertical section.
8. Bowling of pulleys: it is an arch with mechanical supports to help with the stretching of the bow rope. Usually, these supports are pulleys on the tips of the extremities.

Crossbow

In a crossbow, the ends of the bow, called spikes, join at right angles to a crossbar or handle to allow mechanical pulling and stretching of the string. The mechanism that keeps the string stretched has a launcher or trigger that allows the string to be released. A crossbow fires a "bolt" or "camorra", instead of an arrow.

Related expressions

• Arm the bow: prepare it or shoot it to throw.
• Arc de tejo y cureña de serval, cuando disparan, hecho han el mal: it denotes weightily the brittle of both matters, which makes it usually receive more damage than the enemy.
• Arch of wet, hard to arm and lazy left: the weaving wood is not appropriate to make arches.
• Arc that much brega, or him or the rope: a lot of work breaks the strength; in another sense, greed breaks the sack.
• Always armed, or loose or broken: as well as the arch that is always pulling or breaks or relaxes and loses strength, so also human things can not subsist long in extremely violent position, in a rigid state of tension, etc...

Additional citations

• Collins, Desmond (1973). Cambridge University Press, ed. Background to archaeology: Britain in its European setting (Revised edition). ISBN 0-521-20155-1.
• Elmer, R. P. (1946). A. A. Knopf, ed. Target Archery: With a History of the Sport in America. New York. OCLC 1482628.
• Heath, E. G. (1978). Faber and Faber, ed. Archery: The Modern Approach. London. ISBN 0-571-04957-5.
• Paterson, W. F. (1984). St. Martin's Press, ed. Encyclopaedia of Archery. New York. ISBN 0-312-24585-8.
• Sorrells, Brian J. (2004). Stackpole Books, ed. Beginner's Guide to Traditional Archery. Mechanicsburg, PA. ISBN 978-0-8117-3133-1.
• Stone, George Cameron (1999) [1934]. Dover Publications, ed. A Glossary of the Construction, Decoration, and Use of Arms and Armor in All Countries and in All Times (Reprint edition). Mineola. ISBN 0-486-40726-8.
• Chamussy, Vincent (2012). "EMPLEO DE LAS ARMAS ARROJADIZAS del ÁREA CENTRO-ANDINA: ARMAS DE CAZA OR DE GUERRA?" Archaeology and Society (24): 43-86. ISSN 0254-8062. |fechaacceso= requires |url= (help)

To read more

• Gad Rausing, "The Bow", Lund University Acta Archaeologica Lundensia Series in 8° No 6, 1967
• The Traditional Bowyers Bible Volume 1. 1992 The Lyons Press. ISBN 1-58574-085-3
• The Traditional Bowyers Bible Volume 2. 1992 The Lyons Press. ISBN 1-58574-086-1
• The Traditional Bowyers Bible Volume 3. 1994 The Lyons Press. ISBN 1-58574-087-X
• The Traditional Bowyers Bible Volume 4. 2008 The Lyons Press. ISBN 978-0-9645741-6-8
• U. Stodiek/H. Paulsen, "Mit dem Pfeil, dem Bogen..." Techniken der steinzeitlichen Jagd. (Oldenburg 1996).
• Gray, David, "Bows of the World." The Lyons Press, 2002. ISBN 1-58574-478-6
• Comstock, Paul. "The Bent Stick"