Bow and arrow

What it is

Backed bone and quartz points with adhesive residue and impact fractures consistent with arrows. The bow stores elastic energy to shoot light projectiles with precision.

Indirect evidence at Sibudu (64 ka); Fa-Hien Lena (Sri Lanka, 48 ka) and Grotte Mandrin (France, 54 ka) provide arrowheads; the oldest preserved bows come from Stellmoor (Germany, c. 9000 BCE) and Holmegaard (Denmark).

What it led to

• Individual hunting of medium-sized prey: less reliance on communal drives
• Hunting in closed forests and wooded savanna
• A weapon of interpersonal warfare: a shift in intergroup violence
• A competitive advantage for Homo sapiens over other hominins

Built on

• Hafting of stone pointsc. 500 ka
• Birch bark tar adhesivec. 200 ka
• Compound adhesive of plant gum and ochrec. 70 ka
• Microliths (backed bladelets)c. 71 ka
• Cordage (twisted fibre string)c. 50 ka
• Birch bark tar adhesive
• Cordage (twisted fibre string)

Made possible

• Arrow poisonc. 24 ka
• Slingc. 5000 BCE
• English and Welsh longbowsiglos XII-XIV (Crécy, 1346)

Links

Sources✓ verified 2026-09-23

• https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquity/article/abs/indications-of-bow-and-stonetipped-arrow-use-64-000-years-ago-in-kwazulunatal-south-africa/89AF638BE5E64CEAC63363EFDD4D5E8F
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sibudu_Cave