Thearos wrote on Sep 19
th, 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.