Chapter 6 The fourth quarter shoots long-range weapons

The long-range weapon is a long-range weapon that shoots bullets and showers to the enemy through a device that can instantly release the accumulated mechanical energy.There are bows, crossbows, arrows and trebuchets.It was an important equipment of the ancient Chinese army, and it did not withdraw from the war arena until the guns were used in large quantities. The bow is a kind of catapult weapon in ancient China.It consists of elastic bow arms and tough strings (see Figure 8).Engels once pointed out the role of the invention of bows and arrows: the advanced stage of the age of human ignorance "begins with the invention of bows and arrows". In 1963, the archaeological department discovered a stone arrowhead made of flint flakes in the Paleolithic site of Zhiyu, Shuo County, Shanxi Province. It is 2.8 cm long, more carefully processed, and the arrowhead tip is sharper.According to radiocarbon-14 determination, it was made about 28,000 years ago, and it is one of the earliest stone arrowheads discovered in my country so far.From the sophistication of the arrowhead processing technology, we can judge that our ancestors made and used bows and arrows at least 30,000 years ago.The bows used at that time were generally bent from a single piece of bamboo and wood, that is, a single bow with "the string and wood as an arc".

With the passage of time, the single bamboo and wood bow gradually developed into a composite bow.The ashes of bows found in the tombs of the Yin Ruins, combined with the hieroglyphs about bows in oracle bone inscriptions and bronze inscriptions " "," "After investigation, it can be concluded that the bows of the Shang Dynasty were roughly combined with two layers of materials. By the Eastern Zhou Dynasty, the production level of bows had been improved, and multiple materials could be used to make composite bows. The shape and structure of the bow It has basically been finalized. The production method of the compound bow is: firstly, on the body of the bow made of bamboo and wood, the corners of the bow are tendoned, and then wrapped with silk and painted. The elasticity of this bow is much greater than that of a single bow made of a single material. Many. According to "Kao Gong Ji Bow Man", the bows of the Zhou Dynasty were made by the "Dong Guan" among the "five senses" set up by the royal family. When making bows, there are strict rules for the selection of materials, ingredients, production procedures and specifications. Strict regulations. The bows made include king bows and arc bows for chariot battles and city defense, Jia bows and Yu bows for hunting, and Tang bows and big bows for shooting.

After the Qin and Han Dynasties, although the basic structure of the bow remained unchanged, more attention was paid to the selection of materials and the decoration of the appearance.The Han Dynasty paid attention to the use of strong bows and crossbows, which had names such as tiger bows, carved bows, horned bows, road bows, and strong bows.The tension of the bows used by Han generals Gai Yan, Ji Tong and other Xiao generals has reached 300 catties.There are four kinds of bows used by the Tang army: longbow, horn bow, slightly bow and lattice bow.The longbow is made of mulberry wood, Zhe wood and other materials. It is large in shape and is mostly used by infantry; the horn bow is small in shape and strong in strength and is suitable for cavalry; bow.The cavalry in the Song Dynasty mostly used strong bows, and used the rapid-fire method of "full bow, tight arrow" to shoot at the enemy.Although the bows of the Qing Dynasty had many names, they were no longer the main long-range weapons.With the development of guns, the bow's long-range effect was dwarfed by comparison, and it was eventually eliminated.

The crossbow evolved from the bow and is a bow with a string device.String tensioning device is made up of crossbow arm and the crossbow mechanism that is positioned on it (seeing figure 9).The crossbow is more convenient to shoot than the bow. The archer can first stretch the string to set the arrow, and then shoot the string.The archer has to aim while pulling the string forcefully, so the crossbow has high accuracy.According to the archaeological excavations, our ancestors started to use wooden crossbows probably in the late primitive society or at least not later than the Shang and Zhou dynasties.In the Eastern Zhou Dynasty, with the improvement of bronze smelting and casting technology, bronze crossbow machines appeared, which improved the lethality of crossbows.The earliest bronze crossbow machine was unearthed in the ruins of the ancient city of Lu State in Qufu, Shandong.Bronze crossbows have also been found in tombs in the middle and late Warring States period in Hunan, Jiangsu, Henan, Hebei and other places.It can be seen that crossbows equipped with bronze crossbow machines have been widely equipped with troops for combat at this time.At this time, the crossbow is still a crossbow with a human arm stretching the string, so it is called an arm (爆〔bobo〕) stretching crossbow.

In the late Warring States period, there were two kinds of stretching methods: the strong crossbow was kicked up with the feet, and the shooting range was longer; the weak crossbow was pushed up with the knees, and the shooting range was short.The shooting range of the kicking crossbow is longer, generally two to three times that of the breaking crossbow. The crossbow in the Western Han Dynasty has a scaled "Wangshan", which is similar to the ruler on a modern rifle. The shooter can control the height of the arrowhead and adjust the firing angle according to the distance of the target, so as to accurately hit the target.In the Eastern Han Dynasty, the waist-opening crossbow with the largest ejection force for a single person appeared.When shooting, the crossbowman sits on the ground, pushes the bow with both feet forward, and pulls the bow with the rope of the hook tied at the waist.Because the crossbowman uses the joint force of the waist and legs to pull the bow and stretch the string, the ejection force of the bow is enhanced, and the shooting range is farther than that of the kicked crossbow.At the same time, bed crossbows that used twisted axles to draw bows and shoot arrows also appeared.The bed crossbow (also known as the bed crossbow) can be equipped with one or several bows on the crossbow bed, and the combined force of multiple bows can shoot arrows. Its range and lethality are far beyond that of a single crossbow.Zhuge Liang, Prime Minister of Shu during the Three Kingdoms period, improved the continuous crossbow used for shooting arrows in the Western Han Dynasty into the Yuan Rong crossbow for shooting ten arrows continuously.

The army of the Tang Dynasty was equipped with seven kinds of crossbows. Among them, the large wooden cart crossbow was the bed crossbow that appeared in the Eastern Han Dynasty. The bow was 12 feet long.Crossbows in the Song Dynasty have been greatly developed, and its products are divided into two categories: kicking crossbows and bed crossbows.Especially important is the development of bed crossbows. Its products include Dahe cicada crossbow, Xiaohe cicada crossbow, double-bow crossbow, sub-three bow crossbow, three-bow (dou Dou) [doujiu] sub-bow crossbow, etc.Among them, the front and back of the double crossbows are each equipped with a bow, which is stretched by seven people with a rope shaft, and the shooting range can reach 150 steps (about five feet per step).The three-bow crossbow is the first two bows and the second bow. It is shot by 70 people and has a range of 300 steps.The stepping arrows shot by the third crossbow can be firmly nailed to the rammed earth wall in rows, and the attackers can step on it, just like stepping on a ladder, to climb up the city. (Dou Dou) There is an iron bag on the string of the sub-crossbow and the three-bow crossbow, and dozens of arrows are placed inside, which can be shot at the same time, like jackdaws flying in groups, known as "jackdaw arrows", which can shoot a large number of dense Siege enemy.Due to the great power of the bed crossbow and the ability to shoot gunpowder arrows, it can be used in both offensive and defensive city battles and field battles.When Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin watched the bed crossbow test shooting in the suburbs, some crossbows could shoot 700 steps away.In the first year of Jingde (1004 A.D.), the Song army shot and killed the Khitan general Xiao Tat with a bed crossbow during the Battle of Chanyuan, which greatly demoralized the Khitan army.The bed crossbow created by Wei Pi, a general of the Southern Song Dynasty, can shoot up to a thousand steps.In the past, Engels once said that the big bows used by British soldiers in the 14th and 15th centuries could shoot arrows 200 yards away, which was a very terrible weapon.However, in the 10th and 11th centuries, Chinese soldiers were already able to shoot targets 500 meters away with divine arm bows and bed crossbows.The bed crossbow used by the Yuan army also has a range of 800 steps.After the Ming Dynasty, due to the widespread use of guns, crossbows and bows gradually took a backseat and were finally eliminated.

If bows and crossbows are launching devices, then arrows are fired long-range weapons with sharp edges, which are often called arrows in ancient books.Arrows are composed of arrowheads, arrow shafts, and arrow feathers (see Figure 10). The original arrow was made by attaching a sharpened stone arrowhead, bone arrowhead or shell arrowhead to a sharpened bamboo pole or branch, and attaching a feather to the tail.From the stone arrowheads, bone arrowheads, and horn arrowheads unearthed from various cultural sites in the late Neolithic Age, it can be seen that the first arrowheads were mostly made of bone and horn grinding.Later, due to the improvement of stone tool production technology, the number of stone arrowheads gradually increased.These arrowheads were all simple triangles at first, with a front, two wings outstretched, and no collar at the back.After that, it gradually developed into an arrowhead with a sharp point in the front and a collar in the back.Finally, from the arrowhead with no obvious distinction between the arrowhead body and the arrowhead collar, it developed into the arrowhead with a sharp front and a clear distinction between the arrowhead body and the arrowhead collar.This situation fully reflects the development process of continuous improvement in shape and structure of bone arrowheads, horn arrowheads and stone arrowheads.

The cast arrowhead models of the Shang Dynasty unearthed from the Yin Ruins in Anyang show that bronze arrowheads could be cast in batches at that time.The angle between the two wings of the arrowhead gradually increases, the barbs at the end of the wings become increasingly sharp, and the edges on both sides have obvious blood grooves.After this kind of arrow is shot into the human body, the wounded area is enlarged, and it is not easy to pull out, which improves the stabbing power.In the Western Zhou Dynasty, the arrow-making organization "Si Gong Shi" was established, and the arrowheads made were improved. The sharp angles of the two wings were larger, and the barbs at the tail of the wings were sharper.After entering the Spring and Autumn Period, due to the development of chariot warfare and the strengthening of chariot protection, a three-edged arrowhead was created.This kind of arrowhead has three protruding edge blades, which have strong penetrating power and can shoot through the solid protective equipment and leather armor of the chariot.This kind of arrow was mostly used in the late Warring States period.Steel arrows have been widely used in the Qin and Han Dynasties.This kind of arrow not only has a longer head, but also often smears poison on the head.The sharp steel arrows of the Jin Dynasty could penetrate solid armor.In the Ming and Qing dynasties, although there were many names for arrows, with the development of guns, arrows, like bows and crossbows, became less and less useful in war until they were finally eliminated.

The trebuchet is an ancient long-range weapon that uses the principle of leverage to throw stone bullets and fireballs.Its long-range shooting effect is similar to that of a bow and crossbow.During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, people called this weapon [kuaikuai] and hair stone machine.It was not until the Western Jin Dynasty that the character "礮" appeared in the poem "礮石雷恩" in the poem "Xianju Fu" by the writer Pan Yue, and it was officially called "礮" in the Tang Dynasty.In the Song Dynasty, "礮" was rewritten as "pao", and sometimes "pao" and "礮" were used together.Later it was written as a cannon.The Northern Song Dynasty produced a large number of them, not only throwing stone bombs, but also throwing fireballs.Their basic structure is to place a wooden shaft horizontally on various large wooden frames, and the center of the wooden shaft passes through a thick and long log with toughness. This thick and long log is the projectile lever, that is, gun barrel.There is a leather socket for stone bullets or fireballs at the end of the gun barrel, and dozens or even hundreds of gun cables are tied at the head for the shooter to pull.When it is about to throw, one person will determine the target, and the others will each pull a cannon cord. When the commander gives an order, everyone will pull the cannon cord together, causing the cannon rod to flip rapidly, so that the cannon stone will fly out in a tangential direction until the enemy's formation hits the target. , to achieve the purpose of destroying and killing. "Wu Jing Zong Yao" records more than a dozen types of guns used in the Song Dynasty, including fixed single-shoot guns (see Figure 11), double-shoot guns, tiger squatting guns, etc. Sleeping car guns, etc.

Cannons were widely used in the Song Dynasty. Among them, Chen Gui and Wei Sheng were well-known anti-gold generals who were good at using cannons.In order to strengthen the city defense in De'an (now Anlu, Hubei), Chen Gui hired a group of skilled craftsmen to make solid stone trebuchets, trained the soldiers on the use of machinery, and successfully used the stone trebuchets. Cooperate with muskets and other weapons to win the battle of defending the city.In the anti-golden battle, Wei Sheng created dozens of artillery vehicles and hundreds of Ruyi artillery vehicles, and defeated the Jin army many times.After the imperial court learned about it, it ordered the manufacture and use of this kind of gun carriage in various places.

In the tenth year of Xianchun in the Southern Song Dynasty (1274 A.D.), when the Mongolian army attacked Xiangyang, they invited back the man-made gunsmith Shi Yisimain, and designed and manufactured a gravity-falling stone trebuchet, which had greater smashing and destructive power than that of the Song Dynasty. Army's human-pulled trebuchet.It is said that this kind of trebuchet threw a huge boulder weighing 150 kilograms when it attacked Xiangyang, "everything it hit was destroyed."Later, when attacking Changsha and Guilin, this trebuchet was used.Because it was first created in the battle to attack Xiangyang, it is called Xiangyang Cannon.And because it was designed by Hui people, it is also called Huihui Cannon.There are two reasons why the Xiangyang cannon is so powerful: one is that the stone projectiles thrown are large, weighing up to 150 kilograms; while the stone projectiles thrown by the Song Army trebuchets do not exceed 90 kilograms.The second is that the force bearing method of the tip of the gun has been improved. The force end of the stone throwing machine of the Song Army has dozens or even hundreds of drag cables, and the tip of the gun is pulled by manpower to throw the stone bullet; the force end of the tip of the Xiangyang gun Attach a boulder or heavy metal block, hook it to prevent it from falling down; when throwing, the hook is about to be released suddenly, the boulder drops rapidly, and the gun tip rotates rapidly, and the stone bullet is thrown due to the instantaneous sudden force. Out; because the Song Army's trebuchet was pulled by manpower, the force was uneven, and it was not easy to concentrate the force on one point instantaneously, so the power was relatively small.Xiangyang guns were also commonly used in combat in the Ming Dynasty.