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+--- Thread: Persian arrow construction (/showthread.php?tid=30900)
Persian arrow construction - Dan D'Silva - 08-25-2018
Hello,
Is there any archaeological or literary evidence about what the Persians, or anyone else in the area during the Classical period, used to attach fletchings and keep the reed shafts from splitting below the arrowhead? I'd always assumed it was sinew sealed with pitch, but when I started investigating how to use pitch, it occurred to me that I'd only made these assumptions because these are what modern "primitive" archers prefer.
The sinew does work very nicely -- it's what I used on bamboo shafts in 2015, but I sealed them with epoxy, which went on thick and ugly, because I was in a hurry just before departing for Greece, and now I'm in the process of reconstructing them.
RE: Persian arrow construction - Feinman - 10-01-2018
In the Bronze Age the Egyptians solved the problem by using footed shafts wth the arrowhead fixed in the wooden foreshaft. Sinew was used sometimes too, iirc. I think they used hide glue to keep everything together
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/bronze_age_center/reconstructing-a-mycenaean-tower-shield-t584-s20.html
RE: Persian arrow construction - Dan D'Silva - 10-01-2018
Thank you. I understand the Skythians also used wooden inserts for their socketed arrowheads.