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Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields
In the Eurasian Iron Age arrow points comprise a prominent class of artifact. Projectile experiments are useful for studying the ballistic performance of ancient arrow points and implications of arrow point innovations in warfare and shifting socio politics in Eurasia. However, when projectile exper...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2023
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10370700/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37494324 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288483 |
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author | Pettigrew, Devin B. Taylor, William |
author_facet | Pettigrew, Devin B. Taylor, William |
author_sort | Pettigrew, Devin B. |
collection | PubMed |
description | In the Eurasian Iron Age arrow points comprise a prominent class of artifact. Projectile experiments are useful for studying the ballistic performance of ancient arrow points and implications of arrow point innovations in warfare and shifting socio politics in Eurasia. However, when projectile experiments are not representative of past weapon use, they can lead to misinterpretations of the archaeological record. Notable problems arise when homogeneous target simulants used in controlled experiments are not representative of the targets past weapons were designed to encounter. This article explores the relationship between arrow point morphology and design choices in the Iron Age using different target media. Shooting arrow points into pottery clay leads to the conclusion that more blades reduced penetrating performance on ancient battlefields, but a very different result obtains by shooting the same points into thick tooling leather as a simulant for leather body armor. The results help explain patterns observed in the Eurasian archaeological record, where trilobate arrow points–initially developed by lightly armored horse archers on the Eurasian steppe–were increasingly adopted by a wide range of societies across Eurasia throughout the Iron Age. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-10370700 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2023 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-103707002023-07-27 Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields Pettigrew, Devin B. Taylor, William PLoS One Research Article In the Eurasian Iron Age arrow points comprise a prominent class of artifact. Projectile experiments are useful for studying the ballistic performance of ancient arrow points and implications of arrow point innovations in warfare and shifting socio politics in Eurasia. However, when projectile experiments are not representative of past weapon use, they can lead to misinterpretations of the archaeological record. Notable problems arise when homogeneous target simulants used in controlled experiments are not representative of the targets past weapons were designed to encounter. This article explores the relationship between arrow point morphology and design choices in the Iron Age using different target media. Shooting arrow points into pottery clay leads to the conclusion that more blades reduced penetrating performance on ancient battlefields, but a very different result obtains by shooting the same points into thick tooling leather as a simulant for leather body armor. The results help explain patterns observed in the Eurasian archaeological record, where trilobate arrow points–initially developed by lightly armored horse archers on the Eurasian steppe–were increasingly adopted by a wide range of societies across Eurasia throughout the Iron Age. Public Library of Science 2023-07-26 /pmc/articles/PMC10370700/ /pubmed/37494324 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288483 Text en © 2023 Devin B. Pettigrew https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Pettigrew, Devin B. Taylor, William Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields |
title | Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields |
title_full | Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields |
title_fullStr | Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields |
title_full_unstemmed | Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields |
title_short | Reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on Iron Age battlefields |
title_sort | reassessing the terminal ballistic performance of trilobate and quadrilobate arrow points on iron age battlefields |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10370700/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37494324 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0288483 |
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