Some time ago, I promised you a picture series on the subject "slinging with a shield". This is it.

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http://www.zeno.org/Meyers-1905/I/170863a

On Trajan's Column in Rome there is a depiction of a slinger with a shield. We wanted to try how it works.
The column shows a slinger who carries his ammunition in a vault of his cloak.
Here comes Slinger Jaegoor with cloak and shield.

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The cloak is a Norman square cloak.
Very soon a problem turns up.
The cloak and the stones together were so heavy that I could lift up the shield as a protection only for a very short amount of time. Moreover the cloak was extremely cumbersome while shooting and moving, and it had to be held with the shield hand. Our conclusion: Cloaks may look good on a picture or column, in a real combat situation, however, they are completely out of place.

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So: put away the cloak and get a good shoulder bag for the stones.

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and Action

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:)

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;)

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:D

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After the first shot, the next problem becomes obvious.

How do you reload your sling without lowering the shield and losing its protection?

We discovered two possible solutions.

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First: The slinger does not carry the ammunition, but another person, a carrier, hands it to him. This possibility only makes sense in a closed formation, in the protection of a shield wall for example.


The second possibility: The slinger carries the ammunition in a bag. If he wears the bag  on the side of his shooting hand, the reloading process turns out to be rather easy. After a short time of practising, it was no problem for us to do so.

After the shot, the sling is pulled back over the upper edge of the shield, just until you can fix the pouch with your thumb. The image shows you how to.

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The shield always remains in front of your body as your protection.

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While you are fixing the pouch with your thumb behind the shield (front), your shooting hand takes out another stone/projectile out of your ammunition bag (backwards).

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You put this stone into the pouch and secure it.

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Now you just pull back your release cord, and your sling is ready to shoot again.

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...take this, you evil scoundrel! >:( ;) :D

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...one more...

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This sight can be scary. I have seen adversaries back off on reenactment battlefields. In connection with a good crossbow/bowman this is a really dangerous attacking formation.


Finally two historical pictures as an evidence for the use of just this kind of formation.

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:P :D ;D

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sehr schön jaegoor! ;D

Danke Hubert.

Ich hoffe doch nicht nur schön sondern auch schön gefährlich. ;D ;D ;D

I think the reason those guy have shields is is so they can defend themselvs from attacks from above so mabey the combo  was used more for siege than open battle? I am not an expert nor an artist that just looks ike what the pictures potray.  :-/

Thank you, excellant pictures and explanations on what actually worked and why.  Could the slinger have carried any more weapons or would they have been in the way?  Could he have worn any armor, such as a leather breast and back?  I realize that slingers were used as support, screening and scouting and would have been expected, in most cases, to run around all over the battlefield.  Bill

Nice pictures. The loading precedure seems to be the logical one :)
timann

Yes, great pictures again, and your technique seems very reasonable to me. Loading without putting the shield aside or down.  

And I would also retreat if I had that sight of an angry slinger with a shield before me  :o  ;)

As always, great stuff, Jaegoor.  Thanks.  I've never tried to sling with a shield yet I'm sure that I could in that I can sling while both holding an umbrella and controlling two rambunctious Huskies at the same time.  It's nothing that I set out to learn to do.. necessity is the mother of all inventions.  That would probably make an interesting video.
 Again, thanks for another excellent post.

More weapons are only hardly possible. Nevertheless, they hinder very much the movement.
In armament chain shirt or ringlet tank is possible.
Good effekt. By the Schield one clearly improves the aim exactness.
One does not cover any more so often to the left.

OH! Would that I had stones around here like those shown in your pictures!  Glorious, smooth round stones!  Florida really doesn't have them.  :-[

What happens to the left, shield-holding, hand, when you sling and release ? For full power, I suppose it moves out of the way while the body rotates (the Jaegoor "aim with right hip" technique)-- and hence the slinger, at the moment of release, is unshielded.

No, the Shild always remains before the body.

He serves as a help with aim.

[quote author=peacefuljeffrey link=1282647004/15#27 date=1282709337]OH! Would that I had stones around here like those shown in your pictures!  Glorious, smooth round stones!  Florida really doesn't have them.  :-[/quote]


;D ;D

I know that feeling...it never ceases to amaze me how valuable something like a stone can be when you see it from the right point of view!

I found in ostsee really good steine.

They are also called "wall stones".

These are flintstones

http://de.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Datei:Wallsteine_2009_09_03.jpg&filetimestamp=20090903173845

People who live near the Baltic Sea (Ostsee) are lucky. In my home region, there is almost no flint. All harvested away in the Neolithic. You have to drive to Belgium or France to find decent stones.

Morphy wrote on Aug 25^th, 2010 at 4:56pm:

[quote author=peacefuljeffrey link=1282647004/15#27 date=1282709337]OH! Would that I had stones around here like those shown in your pictures!  Glorious, smooth round stones!  Florida really doesn't have them.  :-[/quote] ;D ;D I know that feeling...it never ceases to amaze me how valuable something like a stone can be when you see it from the right point of view!

... Or simply from the wrong location.  :-[

That is exactly the technique I used here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJpLjc8S6c4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bapNApChPp8

You can see my first few throws with the shield are quite weedy but I picked up the power towards the end.

The shield seems to move out of the way upon release

Hi David,


I have seen your video.

However, thus one can only shoot if one stands behind own line.

In the battle must stand shield always in front.
I have to go constantly ready his of the Sling to the sword to be able to change.

I have already fought in some battles in this manner and even have survived.

The tactics behaviour of a Slingers in the fight is extremely complicated.