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George Hill
Location: Atlanta Ga Joined: 16 May 2005
Posts: 614
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 Posted: Mon 08 Jan, 2007 6:12 pm Post subject: |
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| Richard Fay wrote: | Hello all!
Hey George!
I just saw the image at the link you posted of the reconstructed plumbata and the first thought that crossed my mind: lawn darts! |
Very true. I've herd the comparicent before. But doesn't the look like the things in the air? Admittedly the tapestry shows then with out the long thing behind the fins, but that could be either they made them shorter, or just lost it in the art.
To abandon your shield is the basest of crimes. - --Tacitus on Germania
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Roy K.
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| Posted: Tue 09 Jan, 2007 12:46 am Post subject: |
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There is also the SLUNGshot. I know of them from Gilkerson's "Boarders Away", but they have to go way back. He describes them as primarily as a "personal sidearm of merchant sailors ashore". I have also seen a reference to a slungshot in the inventory of some folks heading west. But what it is, is a one and one quarter inch iron grape shot attached (or slung) to about an 18 inch lanyard terminating in an eye splice for the hand. These could also be thrown.
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Richard Fay
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| Posted: Tue 09 Jan, 2007 9:54 am Post subject: |
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| Martin Forrester wrote: | | Does anybody know of evidence of Hurlbats or similar in the Wars of the Roses? I know they were being used in Germany at that time, but would like to know if they were used in England. ta |
Martin,
It's unlikely that hurlbats were used to any great extent in England during the Wars of the Roses. The usual tactic seemed to be an exchange of volleys of arrows followed by the lines marching together to meet in hand-to-hand combat. I don't recall too much talk about thrown weapons (except maybe petards) in descriptions of 15th century English battles.
I believe that the hurlbat and the related throwing hammer were mostly Central European weapons. I think that's where most surviving specimens were found, and are still to be found. Here's what was said about the throwing ax (aka hurlbat) in The Complete Encyclopedia of Arms & Weapons, edited by Claude Blair and Leonid Tarassuk:
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Throwing ax. A missile weapon shaped as a cruciform hatchet, made of steel. Its blade was forged into a sharp tip and balanced by a pointed fluke; the short handle was similarly pointed at the bottom and often extended into a spike on the top. Analogous in use to the WAR HAMMER (the throwing type), throwing axes were quite popular in central Europe between the 14th and 16th centuries. |
I hope this helped!
Stay safe!
"I'm going to do what the warriors of old did! I'm going to recite poetry!"
Prince Andrew of Armar
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This is a standard topic