So I've been researching on the historical context of slings through some scholarly articles and some other various websites (scholarly descriptions on how to use them are rubbish; 3-4 swings to get to the right momentum for release? Or things like generally; spin and let go? Come on, use some common sense! ).

I have found info basically stating that slingers along with other skirmishers initiated attacks on enemy armies and then fell back to protect their fellow army. So this kind of a resemblance to the idea of a modern marine in the sense that they can initiate attacks.

Also a modern marine is considered to have an elite set of skills. Each slinger serving in ancient militaries obviously are elite at their skill as well.

A bigger resemblance to a marine though is the idea that they could be useful ranged troops on galleys.

Which makes sense since ammo is rather plentiful as it's gathered or even mass produced much quicker than arrows or javelins. You probably won't miss whatever you throw as it plunks into the sea,

unless you inscribed, "Dexai," so beautifully that it was an unmatched work of art. 

Sarosh wrote on Apr 7^th, 2018 at 5:14am:


some old english texts use the word, "hurl, hurlers, hurling.' with regards to slinging...in early to mid english, that was the more common way of referring to slings...

The same is true with accuracy. Basically, be very skeptical of any academic conclusion of slinging. I try to view them as really opinionated novices. It keeps it in perspective.

Morphy wrote on Apr 10^th, 2018 at 7:40am:


Hey! I resemble that!

Just be equally wary of priests of the order of the magic sling who believe that mystical feats of physical impossibility can be achieved if you just adjust your elbow a bit and stop helicoptering.

Theory can be useful as a sanity check in the absence of concrete evidence or to explain the “why” of a particular effect, but ancient weapon historians who replicate weapons and think they are experts should definitely be taken with a grain of salt.

LOL
I didn’t assume that you were talking about me, and I don’t really consider myself an academic anyway... just an opinionated novice 

I'm more of a moderate slinger myself, in regards to slings. Not that I have much weight in my opinions, being another novice.

I agree on some sources such as Xenophon on the ranges of slings (Which likely exceeds 400m), but I tend to disagree on the ancient sources relating to pin-point accuracy of slingers, such as was achievable by the Benjamites for example. You can certainly achieve good accuracy, but likely not further than ~20-50m.

In a battlefield context though, accuracy doesn't really matter all that much with virtually all projectile weapons except firearms, because when the engagement distance is going to be longer than 100m or 200m, you shouldn't really expect to be all that accurate or have that much of an effect militarily, excepting shots to exposed and relatively unarmoured parts. This 100m-200m range doesn't seem to change until at least the ~1850's, and by the 1900's, soldiers could expect to hit opponents 400-700 meters away.

This is why you want hundreds of archers, crossbowmen or slingers in your military forces, because ranged combat is a numbers game, and for every one-hundred or two-hundred arrows you launch, you might only get one or two enemy casualties.

I personally feel that Accuracy is more important for when the distance reaches within 50m or so, or more at the 'point-blank' spectrum, because at that distance it is more likely that you can actively aim for individual or grouped opponents and expect a hit. You can also use larger rocks in the sling!

This also counts for Archers and crossbowmen. Crecy and Agincourt were likely fought at closer ranges, for example, than is commonly thought, possibly within twenty meters. At this range and on the flanks, English longbowmen could easily hit the exposed maile-covered armpits, visor-slots/breaths or for the back portion of the legs, places where the plate's might not cover. This would not be possible from longer distances, as at a range of 100m or longer, the English arrows would likely be deflected or glance off of french armour, such as plate armour or coat-of-plates et cetera.

The benefit of the sling though, likely lies in the cheapness of the projectiles. So, in my opinion, it is possible that slingers likely had further engagement ranges than archers for a large period of time, even when it could be possible for slingers to be within the 'maximal range' of bowmen, likely because commanders didn't want their archers to waste their arrows et cetera, because that stuff costs money. Meanwhile, anyone can make clay balls and bake them, supposing they had clay. Lead is an even better, but more expensive solution as well.

^That sounds an awful lot like chess.

How about the pyschological effect of 3 thousand whip cracks going off repeatedly, followed by a rain of death from above?

With slings accuracy is closely related to eyesight.

If you can't see where the missile went, it's bloody difficult to hit anything.

We did an experiment at hodd hill. Where I backed off until i could no longer hit the target. And while I can throw with a pretty flat trajectory over 100m, at the 70 metre point I could no longer see where the missile was going and tended to overthrow the target.

We did this experiment with three types of ammo and a staff sling.
Conclusion was pretty clear.
Accurate slinging is limited to how good your eyesight is. At the time I did need new glasses. Without glasses, maybe 30metres lol

Which brings up an interesting point.
I believe many of our ancestors would have been short sighted, due to all the close up work they would do in poor light.

Which also explains why british hillforts got bigger when slings got popular. Hodd hill from edge to top is about 50 metres.
What's the betting that most experienced warriors were either shortsighted or starting to be short sighted.

As a theory it's pretty much unproveable. The odds are something as every day as eyesight deterioration is so every day and such common knowlege, that it's doubtful any historians mentioned it at all.

On the other hand it does have logic on its side and the fact that it's proveable via applied archaeology