Museum Quality Ancient Chinese Ballista Bolt...14 7/8"

I have only seen 3-genuine Chinese Ballista Bolts in my career and this will be the last as China has begun executing smugglers of artifacts, fossils, dinosaur eggs & even antiques.

This very heavy bronze bolt was attached by a wood shaft, much like an arrow to the bronze end cap, which allowed the strong twisted cord to be attached to the hook.

The ballista machine was then wound tight so volleys of these could be fired straight at the enemy or more like into the air to rain death down on the attacking soldiers or horsemen. An especially effective method would be to fire these heavy projectiles straight at the enemy and into the air giving attacking soldiers a choice of defending against either the ones coming straight on or those dropping from the air. And with one shield per warrior it often was a life or death decision. Unlike the Romans and others these attacking hoards did not have large heavy shields that could protect against both frontal & aerial missiles.

With the invention of the European cross bow and adanced bows like the famed English long bow soldiers there often had to make the same choices as the hoards trying to breech China's Great Wall.

In a sense the Chinese ballista machines were the first "machine guns" and these were followed by semi-automatic cross bows, which were designed so that when one or two bolts were fired one or two more would drop right down from a "magazine" on top of the crossbow.

This ballista projectile exhibits the best patina possible and is about 1800 years of age.

You are bidding on the ballista bold & the matching end piece both of which are 100% guaranteed genuine and carry a lifetime guarantee. In plain English if an experienced museum curator from anywhere says this is not a genuine ancient Chinese ballista bolt just send it back along with that letter and you will get your original purchase price back less S & H.