Hi Everyone,
Onasander (19.3) tells us that "the sling is the most deadly weapon that is used by the light-armed troops, because the lead slug is the same colour as the air and is invisible in its course..."
Does anyone know of any other examples of unseen missiles, or unseen missiles causing panic?
Thanks!
Sling bullets are hard to see, yes, but this has to do less with their color, and more with their high speed and small size.
I imagine them rather more frightening than arrows - you can't see where to put your shield, and even if it hits armor you're getting a nasty bruise.
As can be arrows, bolts and plumbatae
Interesting, any literary evidence for this?
For what, sling projectiles being smaller than arrows?
No, sorry Peteris, for unseen missiles, or unseen missiles causing panic. I just wanted to emphasize that I was looking for literary evidence regarding my initial question.
When shooting normal bow arrows in a cloud, up into the sky, they are very hard to keep track of, even when you are the one who shot them. I think (never tried this, because of security issues) that they are very hard to see coming. When the archer has the sun in the back, the enemy will be looking into the sun, making it even harder to see them.
Quote:Interesting, any literary evidence for this?
Probably not, unfortunately there is much that is unrecorded, or lost to time. For example, wasn't the Boudica revolt lost to history until the 1800s? Yet that was one of the greatest feats of the First Century
My only support for this comes from personal experience and paintball,its like watching your own death..
On a more serious note I think the above would refer to sling ammunition, the sudden loud clanks and thumps from little specks in the sky would cause quite a commotion to spears which you can see, bearing in mind that the stones that manage to smack into eyeballs and the following crys of agony would be horrific
but then that makes me think that this experience is like any experience in war
There is the tale of the longbow being used by the English in the trenches during WW1. It apparently was a cause of panic as it was silent and deadly.
regards
Richard
From personal experience I can say that:
Arrows can be spotted in flight and deflected by your shield.
This goes both for a horizontal aimed shot or ballistic high curve shots.
But when 2 or more archers are shooting at you it becomes difficult.
Especially when 1 shoots horizontal and the other in a curve.
The lead or stone shots from a sling can be followed by the shooter.
But they are hard to see.
Never tried it on the receiving side tough.
In the chaos of battle every (distance) weapon will be hard to detect and to react on.
You only see the person(s) in your area and not the ones 10 or more meters away outside your 180 degrees field of vision.
This is when you are not wearing a helmet with a visor (facemask) because this blocks your field of vision (distance, angle) and hearing even more.
I guess taking cover behind your shield also means it's even more difficult to see more arrows coming. I think if a single arrow is being fired without warning, it's very difficult to see it before it's too late.
During some of our events we regularlu shoot at one of us.
We do this in the time period of 14th-15th Cent. so he is behind full plate and a shield.
At over 30 meters it´s easy to spot and try to deflect an arrow as it loses speed. But as said above the difficulty increases with the number of shooters.
For invisible arrows the only "trick" I know was to paint the shafts black and sooth the tip.
Does anyone know if a sling can sling stones farther than a bow can shoot arrows? My friend and I have been debating it and I think that a bow can shoot further but if anyone knows can they tell me?
Yeah, I also think that the only time that that would be possible is in the night. They did it in this historical fiction series called empire in books 1 or 2.