Article on Chinese Bronze Age weapons (incl. crossbows)
Hello all,
I have discovered another article that might be useful to those of us with interests in traditional Chinese weaponry, crossbows, etc. It is called "Making Weapons for the Terracotta Army" and it features some interesting spatial and formal analyses of weapons (including crossbow triggers and arrow points) from the Qin Shihuang Mausoleum deposits. I provide the link at the bottom of this note, after the abstract, reference, etc.
All best,
Ian
Abstract:
"The Terracotta Army of the First Emperor of China is one of the most emblematic archaeological sites in the world. Many questions remain about the logistics of technology, standardisation and labour organisation behind the creation of such a colossal construction in just a few decades over 2,000 years ago. An ongoing research project co-ordinated between the UCL Institute of Archaeology and the Emperor Qin Shihang's Terracotta Army Museum is beginning to address some of these questions. This paper outlines some results of the typological, metric, microscopic, chemical and spatial analyses of the 40,000 bronze weapons recovered with the Terracotta Warriors. Thanks to a holistic approach developed specifically for this project, it is possible to reveal remarkable aspects of the organisation of the Qin workforce in production cells, of the standardisation, efficiency and quality-control procedures employed, and of the sophisticated technical knowledge of the weapon-makers."
Reference:
Martin?n-Torres, Marcos, Xiuzhen Janice Li, Andrew Bevan, Yin Xia, Zhao Kun and Thilo Rehren
2009-2011 Making Weapons for the Terracotta Army. Archaeology International 13/14:65-75.
Source:
http://www.ai-journal.com/article/view/ai.1316
I have discovered another article that might be useful to those of us with interests in traditional Chinese weaponry, crossbows, etc. It is called "Making Weapons for the Terracotta Army" and it features some interesting spatial and formal analyses of weapons (including crossbow triggers and arrow points) from the Qin Shihuang Mausoleum deposits. I provide the link at the bottom of this note, after the abstract, reference, etc.
All best,
Ian
Abstract:
"The Terracotta Army of the First Emperor of China is one of the most emblematic archaeological sites in the world. Many questions remain about the logistics of technology, standardisation and labour organisation behind the creation of such a colossal construction in just a few decades over 2,000 years ago. An ongoing research project co-ordinated between the UCL Institute of Archaeology and the Emperor Qin Shihang's Terracotta Army Museum is beginning to address some of these questions. This paper outlines some results of the typological, metric, microscopic, chemical and spatial analyses of the 40,000 bronze weapons recovered with the Terracotta Warriors. Thanks to a holistic approach developed specifically for this project, it is possible to reveal remarkable aspects of the organisation of the Qin workforce in production cells, of the standardisation, efficiency and quality-control procedures employed, and of the sophisticated technical knowledge of the weapon-makers."
Reference:
Martin?n-Torres, Marcos, Xiuzhen Janice Li, Andrew Bevan, Yin Xia, Zhao Kun and Thilo Rehren
2009-2011 Making Weapons for the Terracotta Army. Archaeology International 13/14:65-75.
Source:
http://www.ai-journal.com/article/view/ai.1316
Thanks for posting this. A great read, and a great resource website.
This is a useful piece of research and shows promise for future publications. An important part of this research will lead to an understanding of how large numbers of arrowheads could be produced with a high standard of reliability. It is important to note that the that the tangs and the arrowheads each had a different hardness adapted to their purposes. It is interesting that casting the arrowhead onto the tang in two processes predated the use of iron tangs. When soft iron became available it replaced the more expensive bronze. Since the process already included two steps, this would have been easily incorporated into normal production.
The two groups of tang lengths (8 cm and 14 cm) could reflect either arrowheads made to two different standard weights or short tangs for wooden arrows and long tangs for bamboo arrows. It could also be evidence of trimming tangs that did not full fill with metal during casting. However, since the tangs would have been cast first and probably cut up from longer lengths, this is unlikely.
The two groups of tang lengths (8 cm and 14 cm) could reflect either arrowheads made to two different standard weights or short tangs for wooden arrows and long tangs for bamboo arrows. It could also be evidence of trimming tangs that did not full fill with metal during casting. However, since the tangs would have been cast first and probably cut up from longer lengths, this is unlikely.
Thank you for sharing, this is most interesting. Markus :D
Thank you !