Strange Ottoman arrow

Very nice work, are there any detectable nodes in bamboo? Where is it from?

Adam

I see I wrote "the main part of the shaft". This is sort of misleading, as the whole shaft is splitcane construction.

What is really impressive, is that there is not a single node that I have noticed. So the bamboo they have used must have had 23 inches between the nodes - at least. I wonder what type of bamboo it could be. My Pseudosasa Japonica has much shorter distances between the nodes - although the biggest shoots are only 11mm diameter at the moment.

Considering the shape of the nock, I believe it is Ottoman. Other than that, there is no info on it, except for a collection- or museum number. It came from the collection of Karl Zeilinger.

I have some splitcane bamboo shaft with such node, its 30" shaft with 27-28 node.. though not a multiple splitcane construction..

bamboo species is 'dendrocalamus asper'..

[external image]

[external image]

Wow! That looks like wonderful material! Do you know where this material could be bought?

Kviljo wrote:

Wow! That looks like wonderful material! Do you know where this material could be bought?

I bought those shaft from Java (Indonesia).. its commonly use for Javanese traditional archery, but the one with 27-28" node is indeed quite rare.. the common shaft is 19-24" node in 6-8mm diameter..

While the nock looks Ottoman, the lips are thicker than normal. Ivory is quite strong and might be expected to be thinned down more.

Old arrows were fletched using hide glue. Any marks from the glue could be cleaned off with water. On painted arrows the marks of previous fletching are much more obvious.

An ivory head that large would be heavy and the arrow would be likely to flirt without any fletching. However, the arrow could be assembled from parts that were intended for other uses. Ottoman whistling arrowheads look something like this head, except they have a hole.

Were splitcane arrows made in other cultures as well? I have only heard of Ottoman splitcanes?

What I have been thinking is that it might have been a really really high-end Torba arrow...? There was another arrow in the lot with horn point and nock, and pine shaft, which has a somewhat similar feel. This one is also very clean, without fletches. Some time during the fall/winter I will try to find time to take some good photos of them.

I also felt like connecting it with the whistle heads, but there is no hole in it at all, and it is only about half the length I think.

Some weeks ago I made a few bone whistle heads, like this one. The green is original.

[external image]

The Chinese in the Ming Dynasty also knew how to make split cane arrows and it is recorded in one of the late encyclopaedias.

The torba gezi are much thinner, tapered, and the points are tiny. Ivory is hard and heavy. Since some of the puta targets were hung with bells, this might be from a game we don't know about yet. The Manchus had cloth targets they shot whistling blunts at so these arrows may have had some purpose like that.

Turkish researchers may already have the information.