Yuan Dynasty Closed Quiver

Yep... arrowhead-up, as I suspected. Took me forever to figure out how to deal with that draw...

Beautiful discovery !

Everything is in a very good state of conservation....

Yep... arrowhead-up, as I suspected. Took me forever to figure out how to deal with that draw...

Agreed that arrowheads were commonly up in close quivers; but I put them in that way for these photos. I don't actually know how they were placed at the time of excavation. I have a Six-Dynasty stone sculpture of a soldier carrying one of these quivers, where the arrowheads were clearly down.

Rather than ragarding this issue as a matter of 'rules', I would encourage you to think in terms of the arrowheads being up if it was necessary to choose a certain type of arrow when they were mixed in the quiver (as in this specimen.) If only one type of arrow was in the quiver (e.g. on the battlefield), then parhaps they could have been either way.

S.

Stephen,
I doubt if your theory is right. Most closed quivers are wider at the base to accommodate the fletching. By design, they were meant for the arrows to be put in point uppermost. However, if you came across one of these quivers and were used to open quivers, you would naturally place the arrows in point down. After a while you might notice that your fletching was getting ruffled, when removing the arrows, and reverse the process.

Closed quivers seem more popular for hunting and travel. Evidence from various surviving quiver remains suggest that arrow head variability was alway present except in Chinese crossbow quivers issued by the government. Archers love variety.

Groups of people are made up of individuals and you can only get approximations of individual behaviour by looking at random survivals of evidence from the group.

The quiver is fascinating. I always look forward to your discoveries.

Does the login on the photo site equate to the AtarnNet login?

How would one insert fletched arrows into this quiver fletch-first?

I think that the position of arrows should be connected with the way of loading?

jack farrell wrote:

How would one insert fletched arrows into this quiver fletch-first?

They may have put them in a silk bag then inserted them. I'll try putting in a fist-full of Korean arrows and let you know.

Jack,
I had that question from a young man with one Gr?zer's closed quivers. It is easy to insert the arrows nock first one at a time. Even the last arrow is no problem.

If you you want to put a bunch of arrows in together, Stephen's solution works. I have seen pictures of handkerchiefs with a long ribbon on one corner. Something like that would have worked to protect the fletching and could easily be retrieved.

Many of the early closed quivers are quite small and probably were filled one arrow at a time. When you took the arrow out, the feathers were smoothed down in the correct direction.

In would be interesting to know how military arrows were bundled for distribution. The English used 24-hole spacers, the Koreans bound the arrows together in mats with straw.

This quiver is not so different than Japanese open quivers of wood made to hold large battle arrows which were loaded point first. There seem to be about 10 of these for this quiver. To use korean flight shooting type arrows for a trial would not be so accurate. Presuming that there is evidence for fletchings, how long were they? Could the fletchings have been contained in the opening space? Is there evidence for the heigth of the fletch? It might be reasonable that flight-type arrows could be loaded nock first, but if the fletchings were large, this would be a problem.

Should we believe, given the large distribution of these quivers, that a silk scarf would have been a standard battle item necessary for restocking a quiver?

Lastly, carrying these arrows point up would create a great difference in balance of the quiver compared to point down. -j-

Jack, I can help with some questions:

Arrows were triple, helical fletched. Feather is missing but quills preserved. No sign of silk binding. Fletch length 11.5cm. Rear of fletching 1.5cm from bottom of nock. As the feathers are missing, I can't measure the height of the fletching, but modern Tibetan arrows, which I believe reflect a long tradition of Central Asian arrow making, have fletching no higher than the max. diameter of the shaft.

As to your point about the balance, these quivers were tied with two lugs close to the mouth, and would have been almost vertical.

Jack,
Japanese Ustsubo quivers have spacers at the mouth to take the points of the arrows though they do not work well for target points. The spacers are strips of leather which are designed to hold the blades of hunting arrows. Most war arrow heads fit though. I have inspected four of these Japanese quivers personally and seen numerous others in paintings and phtotgraphs. What I can't work out is how they were tied on.

The Japanese closed quiver was worn at a high angle with the mouth down and was very similar to the ebira or open quivers which also had spacers for the heads. Drawing an arrow was quite complicated.

Putting arrows into these quivers was probably no harder for people used to it than anything else connected with a craft like archery.

If the fletches were cut as low as the diameter of the shaft, then they could have been inserted without any device. It would be good to find some supporting data such as artwork etc.

The overall length of the fletch from the top of the arrow, 13 cm, 5 1/8", may not exceed the opening size of the quiver. If both of these statements are fairly accurate, then the arrows could easily be inserted nock first or point first.

The array of arrowpoints is bewildering and would cause some minor problem in an emergency. But it would certainly be easier to select between them if the points were showing.

Presumably, given the level of preservation, a device could be inserted into the lower quiver to look for the imprint of a fletch or iron stains.

This single find is certainly interesting but it would not be valid to assume that conclusions would apply to all other such equipment.

Is there a story to accompany this item? -j-

It corresponds well with Cuman quivers, which were actually made with a "door" in the side in order to allow the arrows to be loaded in much like a slug in a pump shotgun.

Please refer back to this image:
http://198.170.108.27/photo/showimg.php ... posite.jpg

I have just had a chance to pass the bow through a security x-ray machine. Here is the x-ray image. This is the best resolution that such machines can achieve.

Stephen

Interesting. It is a pity it is not of high enough resolution to show any joints. It does appear to show that the horn is recessed into the base of the siyah.

Do you know if bone would show up differently from horn on a security X-Ray? The bow finds labelled as Mongolian in some Russian archaeological sources have a bone belly plate on the grip and forming the fades to the limbs. These only require fairly short lengths of horn for the bending limbs. The belly of the grip appears lighter in colour than the belly of the limbs, but this could just be an effect of the machine.

Regards

Andrew

To add to Andrew's comments, it appears that the belly strips overlap the ends of the grip belly lamination.

This seems to be an archaic feature similar to the earlier bows with more pronounced set-back handles. Having recently read Andrew's article in the Journal of Archer-Antiquaries, I would see this as supporting the theory of bow development he is advancing.

I know from Wenwu that bows with the horn inset into the siyah have been found in Yuan dynasty tombs.

I agree that this x-ray just proves the need for a better x-ray! I'll try and get one done. If I just do the grip and the siyah joint on one side, it should be enough.

Bede, I wonder if the line hinting at the horn overlapping the grip belly is just an image processing artefact - it is suspiciously horizontal.

Stephen, are any of the joints visible through the birch-bark covering on the belly?

Regards

Andrew

Andrew,
It could be. There is no corresponding line on the lower end of the handle area. Equally that could be caused by a slight angle of the object to the radiation source.. My experience with X-Rays has been patchy at best. Dr Grayson succeeded, but he has years of experience.

Let's not strain our eyes or imaginations on this rather poor x-ray. I'll get some better ones done when I can find a lab to do it.

This bow is in pristine condition. Almost all the birch-bark is present. I believe that the reason that there are no string nocks may be that it has never been used and the nocks were never cut.

But does any of you know whether there were styles of bows in Central/West Asia where the string was just wound onto the Siyah and not looped over nocks?

Stephen,
As you know, there are tomb figures from China with the strings just tied onto the siyahs, but whether that is accurate representation or artistic licence I do not know. I think it might be the latter.

The majority of illustrations from Central and West Asia that show bows in detail have string nocks on the back. I think this is universal with bows that have siyahs. I am also making the assumption that a single loop of string indicates there has to be a nock underneath.

Having written that, there will always be exceptions because we are discussing artists and not draftsmen.

In the cases of bone strips, I think all have nocks if the tips are intact.

Stephen

I suspect that the nock grooves are used as identifying characteristics on bone siyah plates. So in the (unlikely?) event that a bow was made without nock grooves, it's remains may well be misidentified.

Having made and strung some stone-age style flatbows without nocks, I would not like to try and hold a composite in the brace position whilst I tied the string on. It is easier with a slip-knot, but this requires a tapered tip.

Could a small bone plate with a nock groove have been glued to the back of the siyah? These plates are known from the Altai region in association with Mongolian style bone grip plates at about this period.

Regards

Andrew