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Weapons & Warfare

Ancient Egypt Edged Weapons

One distinguishes between two kinds of battle axe: the cutting and the piercing axe. Both were used by Egyptian soldiers, but under different circumstances. The cutting axe is a blade fastened to a sizable handle, the idea being to keep as far as possible from harm's way. As relatively little power was exerted the affixing of the blade to the handl...

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Weapons in Ancient Egypt

The Old Kingdom had soldiers equipped with a great variety of weapons: shields, spears, cudgels, maces, daggers, bows and arrows... Quivers and battle axes came into use before the second Intermediary Period, which was a time of revolution in the Egyptian martial arts. The earliest metal arrowheads date from the 11th dynasty (ca.2000 BCE), made of ...

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The Armory - Roman Scutum Shield

This shield is designed after the ones used by Roman foot soldiers. It is primarily intended to be used as a decorative piece and is crafted from 20 gauge steel. It is beautifully painted and features bronzed-steel embossing and a baked-enamel. The trim and fittings are crafted from solid brass and this piece comes equipped with chain hangers and b...

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Defensive Equipment of the Egyptian Army

Ultimately, and outside of military architecture such as fortresses, the ancient Egyptians used three forms of defensive military equipment, which included body armor and helmets, shields and siege shelters, though most of these items were seen fairly late in the Dynastic period (with the exception of the shield, which may be dated back as for as t...

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Ancient Catapults

By Werner Soedel and Vernard Foley Scientific American, March 1979, pp. 150 - 160 In 399 B.C. Dionysius the Elder, ruler of the Greek colony of Syracuse in Sicily, prepared his city for a long war with Carthage by undertaking search and development program. Utilizing such now familiar techniques as the assembly of large teams of specialists, the di...

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Ancient Egypt Projectiles, Javelin, Bow and arrow, slingshot

Ancient Egyptian Weapons: Projectiles, Javelin, Bow and arrow, slingshot. The Throw Stick This somewhat boomerang shaped weapon had little military value, but was, according to the tomb depictions of hunting scenes, extensively used for hunting fowl in the thickets of the Delta reed marshes. They were cheap to make (unlike the much more sophisticat...

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The Ballista

The Roman engineers wanted a bigger machine with a greater range, so in 50 b.C., they invented the ballista. The ballista was, unlike the Greek Catapulta, built almost entirely out of wood. The ballista used an older spring frame type that was more powerful as the arms could travel further, but it was also more expensive so it was used primarily fo...

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The Chariot in Egyptian Warfare

Actually, the chariot is difficult to classify as a piece of militaryequipment. It was certainly a mode of transportation, but at the same time, most analyst consider it a weapon. Clearly, in the hands of the Hittites, one of Egypt's chief opponents during the New Kingdom, their heavy machines were weapons used to crash into the troops of their ene...

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Assyrian Warfare

From about 900 B.C. Assyrian kings sent out their armies to conquer new lands. Over 300 years Mesopotamia and lands further to the east and west became part of an Assyrianempire. Conquering foreign cities brought wealth.Regions which had been conquered by the Assyrian army had to pay tribute to the king every year. If they rebelled against his rule...

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Greek Artillery

Ancient Greek Artillery Technology: From Catapults to the Architronio Canon - Bows (the first machine invented by man?) were used at least since 8000 BC according to cave paintings in 'les Dogues' (Castellón, France). Probably bows were invented much earlier (around 20000 BC). The word Catapult comes from the Greek words kata and peltes. (Kata mea...

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