07-19-2009, 09:05 PM
Quote: I'm skeptical that the quality of the Parthian bows made a difference. Even if the Parthians did have new bows which were 10-20% more effective for the same draw weight, that's still just a minor advantage, and minor advantages in technology are usually less important in war than we think. I think that the unfamiliar Parthian tactics and the skill of their soldiers were more important. The Romans had fought professional horse archers before, but I think this was the first time they fought a whole army of them.
Hi Sean!
The 10-20% improvement in the bow may have been the difference between an arrow that just bounced off armor and one that defeated it. Again, the one thing both Dio and Plutarch agree on (drawing from different sources), is the unexpected power of the Parthian bow and its ability to defeat Roman armor. The minor improvement may not, in other words, have seeemed so minor to the Romans who were on the receiving end of it.
Quote:OK ... different tack on the pilum bodkin point ... was the pilum intended to pierce mail or was it designed to defeat what it would hit first ... the shield, hence the long tang to reach the bearer behind it? Weren't the first ones around before mail was widespread?
Could the bodkin arrow head have be intended to take on shields rather than mail?
I know that early examples of the pilum had flat arrow-shaped heads, but I'm not sure if that design predated or paralleled the standard bodkin-tipped iron shank pilum, and I believe that earlier design had dissapeared by the late Republic. You might be able to make an interesting case for the introduction and spread of mail armor and the evolution of the pilum head. On the other hand, I don't think the bodkin arrowhead was designed to defeat shields. Shields at the time seem to have been too well designed and robust for arrow strikes, even large numbers of them, to render them unuseable.
Still, that admitedly leaves the question of whether or not the pilum head could pierce armor. I suppose in the end we can't accept that a bodkin-head pilum (or a bodkin arrowhead or a bodkin crossbow bolt head or a bodkin ballista bolt head) could defeat, or were intended to defeat, armor until we've had tests where an ultra-authentic pilum is thrown at ultra-authentic armor. Until then we have to assume that the bodkin tip on the pilum was not designed to defeat armor, and when a pilum hit a man wearing armor it would simply bounce off. Though, personally, I tend to doubt it.
Gregg
