Is this a Korean crossbow?

Jason Jelinek · Post by **Jason Jelinek** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 9:24 pm

A friend of mine said he got this in Korea, is this just a toy or tourist junk or is this a real crossbow. It doesn't look like functioning crossbow.

Jason

Jason Jelinek · Post by **Jason Jelinek** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 9:25 pm

the last picture

Bede · Post by **Bede** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 10:26 pm

The "T" shaped catch for the string is common in South East Asia. The stock is modeled on a modern rifle stock. My guess is that is a modern crossbow made by someone from South East Asia and possibly brought back as a souvenir.

Thomas Duvernay · Post by **Thomas Duvernay** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 11:20 pm

I agree with Bede. Korean crossbows (at least trad ones) look quite a bit different.

Here are examples of Korean crossbows (images property of the Korean Army Museum; used with permission):

jack farrell · Post by **jack farrell** » Sun Apr 01, 2007 11:22 pm

Agreed. Looks like Hmong from Laos, modern and formidable, not a toy. Good find. -j-

Jason Jelinek · Post by **Jason Jelinek** » Mon Apr 02, 2007 2:26 am

Thanks, I knew it wasn't Korean, I didn't realize that it could be a functioning crossbow. The bow is 2 & 1/4" wide and almost 7/8" thick and tapers in width to 1" wide and stays about 7/8" to 3/4" thick most of the way. The tips have pin nocks and don't look that bad. The bow can slide out of the stock (but fits decently in it). I would think this bow would be over 100#. The bow is over 36" long.

Any idea what it's worth?

Jason

Jason Jelinek · Post by **Jason Jelinek** » Mon Apr 02, 2007 2:29 am

By the way there is no sinew on this bow. It doesn't look like there are any marks indicating that it was strung (no marks in the string grooves).

Thanks for the quick replies.

Jason

Sime · Post by **Sime** » Sat Apr 07, 2007 9:46 am

Bede wrote:The "T" shaped catch for the string is common in South East Asia.

I saw that kind of mechanism before in some pictures on the net, but always wondered how it works. So, well, how does it work?

jack farrell · Post by **jack farrell** » Sat Apr 07, 2007 1:16 pm

The groove in the stock holds the string. But the groove is faced forward slightly so the string wants to escape. The t-bar prevents the escape of the string until triggered. This mechanism is also common to continental target crossbows circa 16th century on.

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 4:17 am

Have a look at:

http://www.atarn.org/chinese/yn_xbow/yn_xbow.htm