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How did the ancient sling ? (Read 32146 times)
Bill Skinner
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #90 - Sep 14th, 2014 at 2:15pm
 
The upside down "T" is the wooden stump that he used as an anvil to hammer the helmet out on.

And even iron tools would cut a lot easier if you heated the metal up first.  Copper and bronze are very malleable, the helmet would have caved in if you just tried to hammer a tool through it.  And if you left it very work hardened, it would have cracked when you punched a hole in it.
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #91 - Sep 14th, 2014 at 2:45pm
 
Useful to know, thanks.
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #92 - Sep 14th, 2014 at 5:31pm
 
Rereading Jag's post, there may be a misunderstanding. The point is not to find out "What were these Greek vase paintings for ?"-- That's a question of cultural history, and a lot of thought has gone into the answer. They were used for consumption of alcohol in the symposion, the men's banquet. The art is meaningful for the consumers: it shows heroic or positive images (often fighting), gods, youths, but also images of "others"-- satyrs or Maenads, or Persians, or, indeed, "other warriors" like slingers or archers; or images of disorder and loss of control. All these themes are related to the action of drinking in a group. These images are often balanced, for instance on both sides of the vase or the cup. THis is the "Paris school" type of interpretations of Greek vase painting (F. Lissarrague is a leading figure of this school).

The Makron cup shows cavorting youths (like the people drinking ?)-- but starting to lose control; the central image shows a slinger in the battle, an older man, a man belonging to the despised category of the light infantry-- but showing control and calm. The combination of the two images produces the artistic and meditative effect of the whole cup.

So I've never said that the art was produced "to show how to sling".

However, for the purpose of finding out about slinging, because the basic mode of RF vases is naturalistic, and because RF vase painters paint for an audience which really knows about warfare, stuff gets shown realistically-- for instance if we (as modern interested people) want to know how to carry a Greek shield, we can look at a Greek vase (which showed shields to an audience which knew about shields and, presumably, liked to see hoplites bearing well represented shields). It matches well with the archaeology.

http://www.livius.org/a/1/greece/hoplite_kmkg.JPG

If we want to know how Greek archers shot, look at a Greek vase. Same for e.g. olive picking, metal working, piling grain in a mortar, drinking games-- and slinging.

It's a documentary reading, not centred on intent or reception; it enabled by the skill and realism of RF vase painting; it's a simple, antiquarian, positivist reading-- with precautions. Likewise, if you want to find out about what Roman legionaries wore, you look at their tombstones or at official art, as well as archaeology-- they often agree, they sometimes don't; you discuss the difference.

Why not use these visual sources, since they're there ? Students of Medieval military arts use such sources all the time; in the case of slinging, it would be madness not to study the two dozen or so visual sources from the Greek sources, and indeed the half dozen or so literary sources from Greek and Roman literature.

Which are all in this thread. I highly recommend looking at sme of the pictures I gathered on page 4 of this thread (I can tell they have not been seen)-- quite interesting, starting with the amphora in the BM. A lot of the evidence is directly useful if you're historically interested; some is less so; some is actually quite interesting for modern recreational slingers (the "Makron style")
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #93 - Sep 15th, 2014 at 5:31pm
 
Another reference, Silius Italicus 1.314ff

hic crebram fundit Baliari uerbere glandem
terque leui ducta circum caput altus habena            315
permissum uentis a<b>scondit in aera telum,

One hurled volleys of bullets with Balearic sling: standing erect, he brandished the light thong thrice round his head, and launched his missile in the air, for the winds to carry

It's a poet, writing about Hannibal in the first century CE. Like Virgil, he believes that three rotations around the head is the way to go.
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jlasud
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #94 - Sep 15th, 2014 at 5:48pm
 
Balearic people still teach the youth to rotate thrice.
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #95 - Sep 16th, 2014 at 6:15am
 
In boxing, we call this "telegraphing" your punch…

Its a very old concept that describes revealing your intentions to your opponent.

Not a good combat tactic though…as anyone with a lick of common sense will surely admit.

I'm sure the average, workaday citizen of the ancient world had about as much knowledge of the sling as people today. Hand anyone a sling and they will twirl it around….seems intuitive…only there is a lot more to it, as we all know so well.

Who was it that said a skilled slinger needs only one rotation?

I'm not convinced that contemporary "Balearic style" is the same as the warrior Balearic style of yore.

Poems and art do not a slinger make...
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #96 - Sep 16th, 2014 at 9:13am
 
Vegetius recommends one spin.
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #97 - Sep 16th, 2014 at 1:23pm
 
3 spins for beginners, one for skilled slingers I believe…

He probably understood telegraphing….
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #98 - Sep 19th, 2014 at 3:50pm
 
I Quote:
t's a poet, writing about Hannibal in the first century CE. Like Virgil, he believes that three rotations around the head is the way to go.


Doesn't mean he's right.

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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #99 - Sep 19th, 2014 at 6:44pm
 
No, it's just another source that assumes that rotation(s) "around the head" is the normal way to sling. I have listed six such sources, which is pretty good going as far as the ancient world is concerned. At the very least, on a sub-forum about ths history of slinging, it is of interest to collect such sources.

It would also be worth putting some of the pictures I've gathered on the library of images of slingers (with references if possible)--I know of 15-16 pictures on r.f. vases, of which I've given the better ones.

Incidentally, I saw a reference to a sling with thongs represented "as if they were small chains". I assume this is a representation of a braided or plaited sling. But when I checked the reference, I could not find it in the catalogue, which means that the reference is wrong, and that I'd have to read the old catalogue cover to cover.
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #100 - Sep 19th, 2014 at 6:59pm
 
If anyone knows of descriptions of slinging in Irish epic poetry or Scandinavian sagas, it would be interesting to collect these, too.
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #101 - Sep 19th, 2014 at 7:29pm
 
Thearos wrote on Sep 19th, 2014 at 6:59pm:
If anyone knows of descriptions of slinging in Irish epic poetry or Scandinavian sagas, it would be interesting to collect these, too.


I don't want to sound dismissive but I think you may be reading to much into this.

However as I find your obsession amusing

Quote:
Búi Andríðsson never carried a weapon other than his sling, which he tied around himself. He used the sling with lethal results on many occasions.

Búi was ambushed by Helgi and Vakr and ten other men on the hill called Orrustuhóll, as described in chapter 11 of the Kjalnesinga saga. By the time Búi's supply of stones ran out, he had killed four of his ambushers.


Quote:
An exception is the throwing strings (snærisspjót) used to launch spears, described in the article on spears.

Additionally, Eiríks saga rauða (chapter 11) says that the skrælingjar, the native Americans in Vínland, used valslöngur to unleash a barrage of unspecified missiles on the Greenlanders. The word is often translated as "catapult", but more likely refers to a hand-sling, a weapon known from other sources to have been used by native Americans.


In short the Norse weren't big on slings.

Quote:
Handstone.—Among the missive weapons of the ancient Irish was the handstone, which was kept ready for use in the hollow of the shield, and flung from the hand when the occasion came for using it. Handstones were specially made, and were believed to possess some sort of malign mystical quality, which rendered them very dangerous to the enemy. The handstone was called by various names, such as cloch, lia, lec, &c.

Sling and Sling-stones.—A much more effective instrument for stone-throwing was the sling, which is constantly mentioned in the Tales of the Táin, as well as in Cormac's Glossary and other authorities, in such a way as to show that it formed an important item in the offensive arms of a warrior. The accounts, in the old writings, of the dexterity and fatal precision with which Cuculainn and other heroes flung their sling-stones, remind us of the Scriptural record of the 700 chosen warriors of Gibeah who could fight with left and right hand alike, and who flung their sling-stones with such aim that they could hit even a hair, and not miss by the stone's going on either side (Judges xx. 16).

The Irish used two kinds of sling. One, which was called by two names teilm and taball [tellim taval] consisted of two thongs attached to a piece of leather at bottom to hold the stone or other missile: a form of sling which was common all over the world, and which continues to be used by boys to this day. The other was called crann-tabaill, i.e. 'wood-sling' or 'staff-sling,' from crann, 'a tree, a staff, a piece of wood of any kind'; which indicates that the sling so designated was formed of a long staff of wood with one or two thongs—like the slings we read of as used by many other ancient nations. David killed Goliath with a staff-sling. Those who carried a sling kept a supply of round stones, sometimes artificially formed. Numerous sling-stones have been found from time to time—many perfectly round—in raths and crannoges, some the size of a small plum, some as large as an orange, of which many specimens are preserved in museums.


The Irish more so. What must be remembered when reading these translations of texts, often written down by Christians, is that they are viewed from the perspective of the outsider observing an alien culture. As such they apply their interpretation to what they see. An authorized and accepted version of the original spoken tales. After all, pre-christian Europe was full of cavemen. A violent, uneducated, patriarchal society don't you know. ...
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #102 - Sep 19th, 2014 at 8:20pm
 
But could you quote actual Icelandic sagas or Irish epic ? I.e. primary sources. What you're mentioning is people describing or paraphrasing them, found by a quick Google (one, I see, from a book of 1906), i.e. secondary sources. I would like to read actual ancient sources instead (comparable to the actual Greek and Roman sources I have quoted, with references). After that, we can worry about the details of transmission and recording.

So-- if any one knows of direct quotations from Irish or Scandinavian sources (for instance), or indeed any other textual sources. that describe the gestures involved in slinging, please post. 
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #103 - Sep 19th, 2014 at 8:22pm
 
For instance, a quick check seems to show that the Tain Bo Cuailnge mentions slings often (Cu Cuchulainn's slinging exploits or threats or boasts), but never describes *how* you sling (unlike the few mentions in Latin epic, or indeed in texts).
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Thearos
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Re: How did the ancient sling ?
Reply #104 - Sep 19th, 2014 at 8:27pm
 
The Skraeling sling is discussed, with references, here

http://slinging.org/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1407394566

You can find the text here
http://sagadb.org/eiriks_saga_rauda.en
(chapter 12)


The search function in the Icelandic saga database reveals no other mention (let alone description) of slinging.
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