Sorry to return to a pet theme of mine. The basic passage for ranges in the ancient classical world-- one of the ages of slinging, at least in the old world-- is Xenophon, Anabasis, 3.3.16 and 3.4.15ff. It seems that Persians on foot, with, I assume, recurve bows, and Iranian slingers with big stones outrange Cretan archers (and, unsurprisingly, hand thrown stones); Rhodian lead-armed slingers outshoot Persian bows and slings.

At a guess (I'm kind of making the figures up and many can correct them)

-Cretan archers with selfbows (I owe the term to David Morningstar) shoot perhaps 150m engagement range

-Iranian archers with recurve bows outshoot the Cretans-- say 200-250m engagement range (not the max flights you can get)

-Iranian slingers with big stones outshoot the Cretans and fight alongside archers-- say 200 m engagement, perhaps more-- I understand this to be a realistic slinging range with stones, and many people on this forum can reach this easily (I can't, I can probably send a golf ball 100m)

-Rhodian slingers can outshoot recurve bows and stone slingers. Xen. says they can shoot twice as far. 400-450m ?? Should we take this seriously ? M. Korfmann did, and thought 400 m was routinely achieved by people slinging aerodynamically shaped bullets of light weight (30-45 g).

I know people here do a lot of experimenting with bullets, etc. I've never slung lead. I know (Aussie says) that lead bullets sink deep in the earth when they land. He's often stated that their point is that the conserve velocity (not that they start off faster).

Does anyone have any first hand data on how far a good slinger can shoot with lead ?

Thearos wrote on Dec 15^th, 2010 at 4:29pm:

I know people here do a lot of experimenting with bullets, etc. I've never slung lead. I know (Aussie says) that lead bullets sink deep in the earth when they land. He's often stated that their point is that the conserve velocity (not that they start off faster).

I've slung irregular chunks of steel which sink into the ground when they land. Lead will definitely sink in.

I would like to invite you to come to Germany and watch some ranges. Once in a while I shoot lead with a weight up to 140 g, and I manage to shoot quite far with it. 400-450 m is very realistic. It is even possible to throw farther. Most people, however, only believe it after they have seen, hence the invitation.
I throw a stone with up to 180 g between 300 and 350 m. Lead flies significantly farther.
At our last slingfest in the Lüneburger Heide, we had a fellow slinger visiting us from Switzerland, Teg (hello to him). We also did some distance shots, unfortunately with bad weather conditions. He can confirm that the effectiveness of a sling depends very much on the technique which is used.

Your stone ranges sound about the outer range of the "fist sized stone" which the Iranians use as their combat ammo.

It is beyond doubt that a range of 450 m is achievable with leaden projectiles as Larry Bray's record of 437 m was achieved with a fairly ordinary stone. Yurek has posted a record distance of 505 m with lead glandes though I don't know what weight or any other details.

IF it was possible to ignore air drag, a projectile's theoretical maximum range would be governed by the formula  d = (v)^2/g for a launch angle of approx 45 degrees. However, from this formula we can calculate that the absolute minimum launch velocity to attain 450 m would be just over 65 m/s. This is quite attainable for a good slinger.

It is surprising that Korfmann says such light projectiles were used in the past as the heavier the projectile the better it retains its velocity. For example, a leaden sphere the size of a softball would weigh around 5 kg, which would make it impossibly heavy to sling but its flight at "attainable slinging velocities", (ie less than 100 m/s), would be almost entirely unaffected by air drag.

The object is to get the heaviest, densest and most streamlined projectile going at the fastest possible speed. The densest normally obtainable material is lead. (Let's ignore gold, depleted uranium, etc. for the moment.) The optimum shape is an ovoid with an L/D ratio probably around 2 or a bit more. So now it's a question of experimenting to find the peak velocity, this being governed by the strength and skill of the particular slinger.

BTW 1. Lead and other dense projectiles will bury themselves on impact, but that's assuming soft ground and a reasonably high angle of impact, of course.

2. In the past I have said that launch velocity of lead projectiles would not be higher than stones of similar mass. You pointed out that even during the actual throw the drag of the smaller lead projectile would be less, resulting in a higher initial speed. Your observation is undoubtedly correct though I think the percentage difference would be small. My assertion was made on the assumption that the projectile was fully enclosed in the pouch and all the drag was caused exclsively by the sling itself.

I've shot dozens of lead glandes and it's difficult to measure but having my reference points I know that I can pull out 350m,maybe more.For expert slingers with low air drag long slings and well shaped glands 500m is truely possible.If Larry Bray got 437m with a nice stone,than a gland would've got 600m.I think 600m is around the extreme maximum range of the best of the best.I'm just an amateur slinger and I can outrange the best bows,so we can imagine why pro slingers like balearic and rhodians were recruited as mercenaries.

Thanks. 500+ m as a tactical range ? Of course, the shots aren't going to be very aimed, but at a large body of men (say 500 archers, arranged in two lines, loosely staggered-- maybe a box 300 m long, 1.8 tall, 3 m deep, a good slinger is going to get hits or at least land his shot in the general area, controlling his trajectory so that the "beaten zone" of shot lands smack against the face of the box. I still think that's amazingly far (seeing how far, in the field, 200 m is). The upshot must be-- if you sling recreationally with lead, you better have a really long shooting range. Has anyone tried slinging at a rifle range ?

The weight of ancient shot is indeed very light (<50 g for most; a few outliers at 110g). Aussie and I talked about this-- perhaps the light weight was reached experimentally, as the lightest projectile that still produces satisfactory results (namely very high velocity) at the least inconvenience for the soldier who has to lug them into battle, and the logistics train that has to produce the ammo. The same principle as the adoption of 5.56mm ammo for modern battle rifles ?

80 bullets at 40 g per bullet makes a 3.2 kg pouch (or handbag, or whatever it was a slinger took into the actual skirmish line)-- I suppose perfectly luggable, even for light infantry

I believe the small weight quite simply explains itself. One used up these projectiles several at the same time.
However, there are also big projectiles. One used this in the close fight to 50 m.

I think slingers that were experienced with lead shot could land their ammo in a half football-football terrain area at 500m and alike shots.Which is perfect when hundreds of slings crack simultaneously and they want to kill their foes on the opposite side.As for weights I think that keeping in mind that arrows weight around 30-40g in general and are often enough to make one not interested in fighting and killing anymore.Especially when that object is much more aerodynamic and is traveling faster. Keep in mind that lead was something "pretty valuable" back in the days and I'm sure that they wanted the most shot for the buck as long is it is really convincing ammo.So yea I agree that this could've  been the case.And for the heavier ammo I think they used heavier ammo for different grade armor they were wearing.Even if the "enemy" soldier was wearing a helmet of let's say 1.5mm bronze sheet and a 100g gland arriving from a sling cracking at 400m,propelled by a furious slinger could make the "unfortunate" guy to stay out from that fight.

I'm not sure-- but can't really say why-- I can imagine slinging with 2-3 bullets in the pouch. But maybe it's a good way of fighting with a sling. has anyone tried ?

I like jlasud's idea that the heavy slugs are special ammo, which ancient slingers might have carried for heavy-duty work" cracking armour (killing elephants), breaking shields...

I'm still aghast: 450-500m range ? I mean that's further than a lot of modern firefights; it's in the range of bolt action rifles or MGs or even WWII-vintage tank fights. Really far for a muscle-propelled projectile. I'd love to see it.

Quote:

says they can shoot twice as far. 400-450m ?? Should we take this seriously ? M. Korfmann did, and thought 400 m was routinely achieved by people slinging aerodynamically shaped bullets of light weight (30-45 g).

Yep seems reasonable.

I think the general consensus is a lead bullet will add 50-100 % distance as opposed to a rock of similiar weight.
Again you need to bear in mind that these aren't slingers like us.
These would have been highly trained professional slingers.

It's also worth bearing in mind that yureks bullet was interrupted in it's flight by a big metal bridge thing. He never found the bullet but he and his wife did hear the clonk as it hit the bridge.

You would need 40-50 inch slings, excellent technique and bucket loads of training. But we're talking professional slingers - so why not ?

What's a selfbow ?

A 'selfbow' is one made out of a single piece of wood ie. not laminated in any way. Traditional English longbows were selfbows.

Thearos wrote on Dec 16^th, 2010 at 6:38am:

I'm not sure-- but can't really say why-- I can imagine slinging with 2-3 bullets in the pouch. But maybe it's a good way of fighting with a sling. has anyone tried ?

In the American Revolutionary war the American infantry troops used "ball and shot" which was a musket ball paced in with an equal weight of small pellets. The accuracy of muskets was low, so a direct hit from the musket ball would kill whomever it hit, but if the musket ball missed the pellets would spread out and a glancing blow from them would still temporarily incapacitate the British soldiers. It doesn't directly relate to slinging, but it is anecdotal evidence that a similar system of multiple projectiles would work.


Thearos wrote on Dec 16^th, 2010 at 6:38am:

I like jlasud's idea that the heavy slugs are special ammo, which ancient slingers might have carried for heavy-duty work" cracking armour (killing elephants), breaking shields...

Ditto, but would it be practical to carry multiple types of ammo? I'd want to split the difference so that I could be more flexible with how I use my glandes.


Thearos wrote on Dec 16^th, 2010 at 6:38am:

I'm still aghast: 450-500m range ? I mean that's further than a lot of modern firefights; it's in the range of bolt action rifles or MGs or even WWII-vintage tank fights. Really far for a muscle-propelled projectile. I'd love to see it.

Modern firefights aren't done with phalanxes that can be seen from a long way off. I imagine that visiblity has a lot to do with shrinking engagement distances.

Is gold denser than lead?

The upper class warriors in the Incan army had gold glandes.

Wow,  Imagine the Conquistadores...


"Por Dios, no es plombo, es una bala de oro ! De oroooo argh"

yep gold is slightly denser than lead.

Depleted uranium anyone ? lol

You can't really compare long distance slinging with even a basic firearm.
At 500 yards a modern firearm is pretty damn accurate.

At 500 yards a slinger will be doing extremely well to hit a decent sized house - anywhere.

It would have been of use only if slinging at a very large target.

So while range is good accuracy is abysmal :-)

He wouldn't mind me saying, but while larry bray is the farthest throwing and hardest throwing slinger I know of - he can't hit squat for accuracy :-)
And yeah somewhere I have the video and pics to prove it :-)

You are going to find it impossible to see your shot beyond about 200 yards, so how the heck can you hit anything at greater distances?

David Morningstar wrote on Dec 16^th, 2010 at 3:17pm:

You are going to find it impossible to see your shot beyond about 200 yards, so how the heck can you hit anything at greater distances?

It boils down to sheer luck. At such extreme ranges the slightest wind eddy or even air temperature variation will cause huge dispersion of one's shots. Even for a 'mere' 200 m the flight time is in excess of 6 seconds, for 450 m it's going to be up around 10 sec.

Frankly, I suspect that slinging at the enemy at such extreme ranges did more to boost morale than causing any real battlefield casualties. Also it must be a horribly inefficient use of one's strength. How many long distance, Larry Bray like shots could a slinger get off before being exhausted? And probably only 1 in a hundred is doing anything. Meantime the enemy front is advancing. Maybe it would be more effective to use the Napoleonic era tactic of waiting till the enemy was close and hitting them with the equivalent of a ball and swan shot fusilade where every projectile does some damage.

I think it would depend on how your enemy troops were lined up.  If you're facing off against a line only one or two deep then I'd agree with you, Aussie.  Thicker formations or phalanxes would present more realistic targets for long range slinging.  Your slingers would be the most effective within 50 yards or so, of course, but that would also put them in the greatest danger.  The general most able to change his battle plan on the fly the quickest would most likely be the victor if all else was equal.  
  I'd like to try slinging lead just to see what it was like, but being extremely frugal as I am I've yet to be able to bring myself to do it.

The passage of the Anabasis describes how it happens. If I remember rightly:

The Greeks are retreating. The Persians tail them with lights-- and bombard them with arrows and slingstones that outrange the Greeks' missile troops. The Greeks counter this with a lead slinging contingent, which can keep the Persian archers and slingers at bay, because they can shoot twice as far as the Persians slings, and can also outshoot (but not by much) the Persian archers.

Xenophon tells this, a real-life engagement with slingers. But at what ranges is this happening ? Earlier I listed the extreme distances. (roughly: Greek archers 150, Persian slingers 200, Persian archers 300 Greek slingers 400 ?)-- and expressed wonder at the last figure.

The question is really whether that's the distance at which the engagements are taking place. Xen. describes a series of engagement, between several hundred Persian archers+slingers, and 200 Greek slingers

-- the first Persian attack, when the Persians are keeping the Greeks under a shower of arrows and slingstones-- it starts at fairly close range (since the Persians approach as if friendly), and is kept out just outside of the Greeks' charging distance. The Greek archers are kept within the Greek infantry formation to protect them; their fire is hence ineffective; the Greek shield and javelin men can't reach the Persian archers and slingers, and the Greek heavy infantry charges are of course vain. From the picture, could we say about 100-150m ? (if the Persians were shooting at extreme range, the Greeks would not even try to rush them). So that gives us a handle on a realistic "tactical range window" of engagement.

--a second missile engagement, where the Persian lights came just a bit too close-- and the Rhodian slingers and Cretan archers inflicted losses on them. Range: same ? 100 m ?


--a series of other engagements, where the Rhodians' shooting longer than the Persian slingers and most of their archers neutralizes the Persian sniping. This is trickier to visualize. If the Rhodians are shooting at 200m, the Persians are still within range-- but their target is no longer the massed Greek infantry retreating, but a 200 strong dispersed skirmish line. The Persians have retreated out of range (after the engagement above), and they're trying to close within range; the Greeks keep them out of their effective range. The upshot is perhaps that the Rhodians have a longer "tactical window" than the stone guys (the Persian archers can still just about trade shots with the Rhodians)--Maybe the fighting's taking place at 250-300m, at the extreme limit of viable aimability; perhaps a few potshots are covering the extreme 400m long range.

--Greek archers are reusing Persian arrows-- and firing them on high trajectories, which also shows that they're not operating within their usual tactical range, but aiming for long range harrassing fire

Anyway, that's my take on the detailled account by Xenophon, who was not only an eyewitness but the commanding officer of that bit of the Greek army. Crucial for understanding this is a good understanding of the capacities of the lead bullet.

Could someone tell what the weight of the lead projectils in ounces?  I have a large area and if I have a few fishing weights the correct weight, I will put some flagging on some and throw them.  All I can give as far as distance is paces, I do 110 paces to 100 meters.  This is level ground, we cut everything for hay so there is no tall grass, so if I can find them, my pace count should be pretty correct.  Bill

Wow, that sounds good. Manfred Korfmann gives a rough histogram of these things in his article, but they range in weight from 25 g (light, at Olynthos, say just under an ounce, .9 ounces) to 30-50 grams (the most common, say 1.5-1.8 ounces), with a few real heavies at 100-110 gr, say just under 4 ounces.

The problem is that the ancient bullets may have degraded because of staying under ground for so long; Tracy Rihll oserves how a lot of them have various forms of metal disease. In 250 BC, a lot of these bullets might have been a mite heavier.

So if you sling with 1 ounce, 2 ounces and 4 ounces, that should be the right sort of ranges.

I hope this helps. Let us know your results !

Rockman wrote on Dec 16^th, 2010 at 12:26pm:

Is gold denser than lead? The upper class warriors in the Incan army had gold glandes.

Imagine wandering afield and finding a few football-shaped GOLD sling glandes!! ;D OMG that would be the coolest thing ever!

If I were a millionaire, I would definitely have some of these
made up.

Gold is significantly denser than lead with an SG of 19.3 compared with 11.4, so the gold glandes would perform almost as if thrown in a vacuum, especially in the thin high Andean atmosphere.

Things got really interesting in this post.For seeing glandes at long range I have a story.Once I've slung a 70g gland into a forest.I could see the gland about 60% on it's way and it was easy to know about were it would land,and it hit a tree in the first "line" in the forest,as I could hear the massive clang it produced.I couldn't tell exactly which tree I got but I knew that I hit one of two close trees.The forest started on a hill about 10m higher than the level I was shooting.I walked to were I knew the gland would land and after about a minute of examining I found the point were the gland hit.It was about 2m high on tree,it was hit on it's "side'' so the gland bounced.I looked back to the place from where I slung,looked at the hit mark and the ricochet place was quickly located,and I found the gland about 2m from the tree it hit.The same day at home I measured in google earth the distance, as I knew the exact place from where I slung and the exact point of hit and it was 192m.Of course this range is much less than the ranges we're talking about now but I know that an experienced slinger who fought in a few battles and shot maybe hundreds of glandes would know were his shots are landing.I myself after having shot dozens of glandes know were are they going,even if was shooting at 350m.If we are talking about armies of thousands of men and hundreds,or thousands of slingers it has to be night and full moon eclipse to not see if they are putting their shots among the enemy formations.I think in most of cases  at 300-400m they could even hear the rain of glandes smashing against helmets,shields.And would surely see the havoc they caused among the enemy formation.It must be devastating to the soldier in line looking at the enemy at 400m and suddenly a rain of hundreds of lead glandes are incoming among them.Striking without any warning,sometimes they didn't even know what was it.It must had been really intimidating to see your foes felling,screaming and you still have to march 200m till you can do some damage to them.

I am pretty sure slingers could have been deployed at closer ranges as they just about as light as light infantry goes so they were probably mobile when they need to be as a rock that could go 400yds would probably have a good amount of force at 80-100yds. Also it is my understanding these Generals liked to boast about their army to play a mental game against te enemy kind of like a football team going against another team with a QB who can throw a football 100yds and defensive linemen who can charge through a brick wall. So these ranges might be a little higher than  what they actually were but judging by what everone else is saying it is probably achievable.  

A while ago, a friend and I went trekking on one of the mounts surrounding town. We´re talking about 600 something meter mounts. So we had slings and a bag of ammo.

I stood on the highest point and started throwing at the lowest point. The distance of the projectiles increased dramatically when compared to slinging on flat ground. We had no way of confirming distances other than our eyes, but we estimated the high end of 200, possibly 300 meters shots easily.  A distance I can not reach normally.

If you put Larry braid or Yurek under those circumstances, they could shatter the standing record, but I suppose that would be considered cheating.  

Rockman: there's a mathematical formula for this, no ? School physics: if you double the hight from which you shoot, with the same speed, your shot will fall ??? % further

A few more random thoughts (that probably cancel each other out).

1. Is it possible to train yourself to shoot beyond visual range (i.e. the range where you easily follow your shot) ? A question of training, muscle memory and "sling feel", so that even at extreme range, you might have a good sense of where the shot is going-- and that hitting a barn at 400 m with lead is possible at least some of the time.

2. The Anabasis passage I mention below: I looked at the text again, and the Greeks are fighting against first 400, then 1000 slingers and archers ranged against them. No doubt this is the estimation of the Greeks, but if we suppose the figure's about right, it's a pretty big target, probably not ranged in a single line like a black powder battalion, but a loose shooting line and men toing and froing from the shooting line to the rear. In other words, a pretty sizeable target-- and Xenophon says that in one of the engagements, when the Greeks let rip at short-ish range because the Persians came too close, the Greek slingers and archers found it hard to miss hitting someone with each of their shots, so target rich the opposing line was.

3. It may, in any case, be a question of "tactical" vs. extreme range, i.e. the lead slingers are within their tactical when the stone slingers are at their extreme range. In practice, this would mean that at say 200 m, a stone slinger is hurling at the end of his capacities, and (because of muscle effort put in the shot ?) not controlling his aim-- therefore, his shot is inaccurate (to the extent that he will miss the barn at 200m). The stone slinger would need to close in, to e.g. 120-100 m to control his shot and achieve tactical accuracy. In contrast, at 200 m, the lead slinger is within his tactical range, i.e. at that range he can shoot hard and straight and controlled-- and therefore achieves sufficient area accuracy for his shot to be tactically effective (hitting people, getting near misses, getting hits within groups of people). Of course, this supposes that he can actually see and control aim at 200 m.

4. NB how "war slinging" is really v. different from "daily slinging"-- to scare off predators, kill bird, herd cattle, etc: the targets, needs and ranges are completely different. War slinging is a v. peculiar, aberrant (and as Paleoarts said, hsitorically minoritary) habit

1) yes of course.

2) what's the question ???

3) see answer for 2

4) nope same skills same ammo - just different targets and more disciplined style

5) with practice you could easily hit  a barn at 400 yards - with sufficient practice you can do just about anything. This is what seperates the professional from the amateur.


Bill - average weight of lead glandes was between 2-3 oz

And if you sling them well there is no chance at all you will ever find them. Lead glandes drill into the ground on impact and unless you attach a ribbon to the end (like lobohunter did some time ago) you will not find or recover a single one :-)

I've had a lead glande land about 6 feet in front of me after 250 yards flight - I saw it land, but no way could I find the spot or recover the glande.

Which is also why I know a single lead glande in flight sounds like a swarm of angry bees.

While distances of over 400 yards with lead bullets are achievable - I think it's probably more likely that the average distance range would have been nearer the 300 yard mark than the 400.
With good technique and training 300 yards with lead glnades would have been something a good slinger could have kept up for hours at a time.

I dunno, C-A: you earlier wrote that a slinger could't hit a barn at 500 m. But now you say it's easy to hit a barn at 400 m ?

There is, admittedly, 100m difference. But which one is it: is 400-500 m an unfeasibly far distance for anyone, so that wind or air temperature will deviate shot hopelessly and the slinger can't even see where his shot is landing and hence has no idea of how hard to sling, or is it perfectly reasonable to expect a trained slinger to hit a house at that distance (or, perhaps more realistically, to land a bullet among 1000 men, as in the account of Xenophon) ?

We can speculate. We can experiment. We can study our sources closely. Hence the value of hte passage of Xenophon (Anabsis 3.2-4), which I would urge everyone with an interest in slinging to read again.

I would maintain the diff. between war-slinging and short-slinging; it's a thought inspired by something Paleoarts wrote a while back. En masse slinging at long distance-- say 250-300m-- with special ammo, in groups of 500 or 1000, is diff. from the shepherd's slinging. You're right that short range accuracy (say 60 m) must give you the control and the skill to fight with a sling. But I still think it's very different contexts, and uses, of the same artifact.

Icast up some 1 ounce bank sinkers, tied a piece of flagging tape to the top and let fly.  My Rockman sling is set up to throw much larger projectiles so that didn't work too well.  Made a 3 strand PJ about 32" (85cm) and let fly.  Didn't find but one, I had to put a piece of plastic flagging about a foot long on it, (30cm) to find it.  It went no where near as far as I can throw a clay gland, I didn't even pace the distance.  It looked like about 3" (8cm) was above ground.  The ground is pretty soft right now due to rain, I am thinking about trying some yarn as it is lighter and should have less air resistance. I also plan to borrow a cheap metal detector.  Bill

That streamer's has got to take out most of the energy...

Thearos wrote on Jan 1^st, 2011 at 1:23pm:

That streamer's has got to take out most of the energy...

Exactly, all your advantage of having a lead projectile will be eaten up by the drag of the streamer. You may as well sling ordinary stones.

Thearos wrote on Dec 17^th, 2010 at 6:54pm:

Rockman: there's a mathematical formula for this, no ? School physics: if you double the hight from which you shoot, with the same speed, your shot will fall ??? % further

Unfortunately there is no simple formula that can be applied in all case; heaps of variables involved, certainly nothing as easy as double the height, double the distance. There will be gain but much much less than a straight ratio.