Ok I am a middle level member of my local branch of the SCA. Last weekend we were holding our fun and games event. The week before one of the siege engine guys was mentioning he was going to bring his 8' trebuchet to this event and him and his crew were going to fully load the counterweight and see what kind of range they would get.
He knew I was working with the staff sling and wanted me to bring it and show them what it could do.

Well it rained extremely hard the night before and it drizzled off and on the next day so they left the trebuchet at home. I showed up the next day with my fusstibalus and handsling and a approximately 30-40 pound bag of limestone marble I use for ammunition.

We moved down to the archery range and I start setting up while he went to round up his crew. I start a test fire on the fustibalus when a very oblivious lady walks right in front of me about 8 feet away just before the sling slips off of the staff. Lets just say it hurt redirecting the sling. I exchanged some words with the lady who obviously wasn't aware she was walking into a  missle fire area.

Anyway, he showed up saying the crew wasn't intrested. I described to him the fustibalus and showed him how it worked. I loaded up a stone into the pouch and with him and me both looking at the range we determined that both the boundries were clear and away went the rock. It sailed about 50 meters with a "WHOOOSH" as i was rewinding from the toss all my buddy was saying was "WHOA"

I tossed a few more with the staff sling and turned it over to him. It took him a bit before he got (somewhat) the hang of it. He did manage to send a few rocks in the right direction. Now we were firing for distance not really accuracy.

At this time I broke out the handsling and let it fly. Now currently I use an underhand sling style with almost no windup. I basicly hold the sling fully extended in front of me. I then let the sling drop and once it goes 180 degrees behind me I bring it forward. at the same time i take a step forward and snap my wrist at moment of release.
The first thing that he asked was why i didn't use the "classic" helicopter windup and then he expressed amazement at the distance I got off the toss again about 75-100 meters with a high arc.
I showed him a few more tosses then I turned it over to him.
He wound it up like me and let fly and tossed the rock about 10 meters. then he looked at me puzzled and said where the sling go ?
Yes he had let go of the retention loop when he made the cast. Grumble

He spent about 30 minutes looking for a brown leather sling in the dark wet grass. He found it next to a pile of horse droppings.

he did a few more tosses then told me he was going to find somebody. I tossed quite few of my ammunition trying to get a little more practice in when he shows up with the unofficial branch photographer
We did a few tosses with the hand sling, one of which went almost 150 meters. My friend then decided that he wanted to have a shot taken if him using the fustibalus. Three bad shots ( 45+ degrees ) later I repossessed my fustibalus, took my last big rock and the staff sling and hurled the rock about 75-100 meters. The wet dirt flew when the rock hit.

I think I can safely say a good time was had by me, the buddy and the photographer.

Now when I get these digital photos I will post them to the group

Marc Adkins

Sounds great.
I know what he means I felt like I was right there with ya.
I finally found someone with a digital camra, and some nice web savy.
Looking forward to getting some postings online

-Unsapien

                                                                                                     
     Uh.......if the sling is brown how can you be sure?

What's a little wet horse poop.Put some in your sling and toss it at someone!

Cool Ansteroria here,
One of our grant level fighters used the sling as a combat missle weapon during a Gulf Wars. Check out the Florigium for details. or i could find the post and post it if ya want. I belive Meridies has regs for it's use on the field.. might be a place to start. also th TI had an article on the use of the sling back in the mid '90s I belive. it's what got me back into slinging after reading a hard copy of Lynn Ballard's article in the Mother Earth News. Let me know when you get the Anachronist article done. With te pictures that were taking the powers that be around here are wanting a sling/slinging artile put out for our local newsletter.
But hey that's a whole diffrent thread

Marc Adkins
Another of the few..the proud...and the twisted

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I finally recieved the pics from the photographer, I'll be sending them to chris so he can psot them to this thread.

Marc Adkins

Yep SCA, see sling badgers post for more info about this group.

Don't ask me why they left the treb at home, could have been due to the rain swelling the wood posts but then again I'm not a siege engine person... Nor am I on this particular crew so I don't really know. The closest I come is my work with the fustibulas. I was just showing it to them so they would have a more complete understanding of thier science/art.

The treb is  counterweight driven there is not any sinew in the construction of this particular engine,


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Looks like a lot of fun!  Awesome pics!

Your outfits made it all the better.  If i were living in that time I'd be carring a staff sling and a sling everywhere I go.