Was looking at images of jacks, and found this site. http://www.historiclife.com/Essays/Jacks.htm Scroll down to the period image gallery, third row down, far right. Click the picture and tell me what these guys arrows are tipped with? Some kind of cylinders, but for what purpose? Do we have any idea?

Wish I knew the answer to this.

Please link to the photo itself so that others don't have to do a scavenger hunt to get there.

Here you go:

http://www.historiclife.com/images/Research/j...lling2.jpg

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My first impression is that they are messages - scrolls secured to the arrow's shaft.
Perhaps it is even a seal we are seeing represented along the cord on the rightmost one?

In 'The Book of the Firework' a 15thC treatise on fire and powder and its use in war; fire arrow charges were made by stuffing a linen tube with the compound and spiking it on the end of a standard point, light and let go.

There is no smoke visible here, but otherwise they fit the description and my experience pretty well.

That said, they do look like scrolls as Eric suggests

Tod

Since it's obvious from the drawing that there where firearms being used by the defenders on the walls we can safely assume that the besiegers also have access to gunpowder. ;)

So at a guess it might be incendiaries or gunpowder " arrow grenades " ?

Since there is no sign I can see of the exterior having a fuze or a lit match there might be some primitive form of impact ignition: What this could be I have no idea and certainly no historically known form of impact fuze in this time period but just using my imagination I wonder if one couldn't devise a flint and steel ignition system causing sparks on impact ?

Wild guessing here but if I was trying to design such a thing I might fill a fragile external tube with metal chips mixed in with flints and an inner tube filled with gunpowder, when the whole thing hits something hard it would crush both tubes with the odds of a few sparks being high and gunpowder only needing one spark to explode ?

Maybe more fantasy than history here and maybe a little off on a tangent but I wonder if my idea would have a decent chance of working ?

Alternatively: An A & B chemical where impact would mix the chemicals and produce heat or flame to set off the gunpowder might also work and would such have been know in period ? Maybe something similar to Greek fire set off by contact with water ? Fragile glass vial of water surrounded by the chemical as an impact fuze inside or in front of a black powder charge maybe

Sorry about not posting the picture, was pretty tired when I did it.
Some sort of gunpowder/incendiary device was my first thought, but didn't know if that were simple fantasy or not.
If the devices in question are explosive tubes, such as Mr. Todeschini mentioned existed, what sort of range would they likely have? This almost looks like it's shaping up into a Mythbusters episode. :)

-Pete

In H. D. H. Soar, Secrets of the English war bow, this is captioned "English archers shooting messages into a besieged town."

If they're explosive/incendiary tubes, they could weigh up to about 100g, which would double the weight of the arrow. As a rough approximation, this would halve the range. So, they should still exceed 100 metres in range, but I doubt they'd get to 150m. If the size is exaggerated in the picture, the range wouldn't suffer so much.

If they are messages why have two guys shooting them at once ? Two different messages or did the bureaucracy even in this period insist on duplicate copies. ;) :p

There does seem to be a small " something sticking out of the side of the one on the right at least that could be a very short fuze but there is no indication of a flame which may not mean much since a fuze might just glow a bit and not really have a visible flame, but a period artist might show a flame just to show that the fuze is lit. :?:

As far as impact devices to set the explosives off that is just totally unsupported speculation by me and just because I can't help imagining ways I could do it but it seems that this idea wasn't exploited until the invention of percussion caps in the early 19th century: It's just that it would have been possible technically if someone had thought of the idea.

In the later flintlock 17th-18th centuries I could imagine a simple mechanical device where a steel plunger could strike a flint on impact since use of flint and steel to ignite powder would have been acquired technology, but here again nobody seems in period to have had this idea also.

But then these ideas would be good for Alternate history or Fantasy/Sci-fi set on a fictional Medieval technology World.

Well, if you fire just one and it gets stuck on a roof somewhere where nobody can get to it or can't even find it, the defenders are unlikely to respond to specific demands or requests. Two or more messages shot in makes this a little more likely to work.

I have now misplaced my copy of the firework book, but from memory the fire charges were about an ounce = 30grams and is about the size of your index finger.

The compound is a mixture of sulphur, saltpetre and pitch in gunpowder proportions, but because there is no surface area like with grains and no very intimate mixing of the materials (as there is in powder milling operations) there can only be a very small flame front and so the burn is slow. The linen bag is stuffed with warm compound and then dipped in rosin to seal it.

They are really quite interesting things to use. They are very hard to light and you stick the end in a very hot brazier, but when they are lit they are very hard to put out as they carry their own oxygen. They spit out red hot liquid salt petre (oxidiser) and burn slow and steady with little 'gas jet' blow torch type flame extrusions for about a minute and a half. A flash will rarely start a fire, but a sustained and very hot heat for a considerable time stands much more chance and that is what these produce. Neither shooting them or standing on them, even on damp soil and grinding them underfoot, will put them out.

A few years back when I used to work for somebody else and I was learning how to make this stuff I once set off 3kg/6.5lbs by mistake inside his workshop. He was surprisingly understanding, but there was no question that we were going to try and put it out. Fortunately it was in the weld bay and little damage was done.

Wear gloves and use long shafts or draw short as they do spit some.

Tod

Quivers?

If you look closely, both cylinders appear to have small loops on the ends. Fuses perhaps? It's hard to tell.

Quote:

They are really quite interesting things to use. They are very hard to light and you stick the end in a very hot brazier, but when they are lit they are very hard to put out as they carry their own oxygen. They spit out red hot liquid salt petre (oxidiser) and burn slow and steady with little 'gas jet' blow torch type flame extrusions for about a minute and a half. A flash will rarely start a fire, but a sustained and very hot heat for a considerable time stands much more chance and that is what these produce. Neither shooting them or standing on them, even on damp soil and grinding them underfoot, will put them out.

That is definitely the coolest piece of information I've received in a while. :)

As for the cones on their hips, I had figured they were arrow bags.

-Pete