A Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368) Bow from Xining, Qinghai, China

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 1:36 pm

This time in Xining I was able to take some photos of a bow that is on display in the Provincial Museum at Xining, Qinghai, China. The bow is labelled as 'Yuan', and in my view it is just that. As such, it would reflect the design used by the Mongols after their defeat of the Xixia, as Xining would have formed part of the old Xixia Kingdom.

As usual, the museum staff had not idea how to attach the fake string they had made for the bow, and the arrows and arrowheads are also modern confections.

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 1:39 pm

This is the whole display. The bow is a standard. horn/wood/sinew composite with a birch bark overing on the back of the bow. It is not possible to tell what wood was used or what glue was used.

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 1:45 pm

Here is the belly of the 'lower' limb (relative to the display) from above to show the bredth of the limb. The grip is uppermost and the siyah at the bottom.

Fox · Post by **Fox** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 1:48 pm

Is this bow similiar to the one using by the girl April in your newsletter?

Fox

http://www.atarn.org/letters/ltr_oct04.htm

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 1:50 pm

This is a detail of the 'upper' siyah and string nock.

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 1:54 pm

Detail of the grip.

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Fri Jun 17, 2005 2:08 pm

Is this bow similiar to the one using by the girl April in your newsletter?

This bow is quite a lot bigger, and the ends of the siyah were shaped differently from April's bow (which was made by Lucas Novotny).

jiao · Post by **jiao** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 7:24 am

http://www.archeryhistory.com/recurves/pics/bowpic.jpg

stephen,it is a mongolia hornbow structure picture,after the yuan dynasty end and split two country,i has a questions,after the mongolia inbreak Europe and close to all Asia ,they are glean(or captive) craft man such as bowyer make the hornbow,

also might contain Turkish, Persia,chinese hornbowyer ,it is a story real or not, but we and find at that times,the hornbow trun more transformation, the genghis khan's and hubilie khan's hornbow has showed at atarn, perhaps,some technology in common(the structure,the material the method)

at yuan dynasty, it is a gold times of the hornbow makeing?if they are not too barbarity and enjoy the money/wine/woman so much , all the world will be unite one country

Bede · Post by **Bede** » Sun Jun 19, 2005 12:55 am

Stephen,
A very special bow. What interests me is the cross sections of the siyah, near the nock, at its middle and near the working part of the limb.

The design seems appropriate for the time and still seems somewhat transitional between the Song and the later bows.

Great pictures.

Andrew Hall · Post by **Andrew Hall** » Sun Jun 19, 2005 9:31 am

Stephen, an interesting bow.

E.G. Heath's "The Grey Goose Wing" has a photograph of a Yuan dynasty Mongolian warrior with his bow, quiver and 11 arrows found in the Tsaidam Basin, Chinghai (I assume this is the old spelling of Qinghai). This bow is also damaged at one end of the grip, but does not appear to have as much reflex.

Do you have an estimate for the length of the bow?

Andrew

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Mon Jun 20, 2005 1:40 am

Do you have an estimate for the length of the bow?

I wasn't able to measure accurately; but 145-150 cm measured along the full length of the bow should be about right. Ignore the arrows completely: they are bogus.

What interests me is the cross sections of the siyah, near the nock, at its middle and near the working part of the limb.

If you took a cross-section at the middle of the working part of the limb, it would be 5.5cm wide and 1.5cm thick, flattened ovoid. That is noticeably wider in the limb than the modern 'Mongolian' hornbows that people are making; but consistent with what I have seen as a development from the Khotan bow (broadest limbs) to the Ming bows (getting close to the modern Korean form.)

The base of the siyah was about 2.7cm and almost circular in cross-section. The siyah flattens towards the tip from the point along the length where you start to see a sort of 'neck' from the side, so that the tip of the siyah is about 3cm in depth and about 5-6mm wide.

I'll try to sketch it.[/quote]

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Mon Jun 20, 2005 12:28 pm

Some cross-sections (from memory)

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Mon Jun 20, 2005 12:38 pm

Another view - blurry, but informative.

jack farrell · Post by **jack farrell** » Mon Jun 27, 2005 12:34 pm

Stephen; A wonderful bow. Looks like someone also tried to shoot it backwards. Is that the horn sticking out? Can you tell if there were bone stiffiners in the siyahs? Are the limbs flat, lenticular, or other? Thanks for your detective work. -j-

Stephen Selby · Post by **Stephen Selby** » Tue Jun 28, 2005 1:39 am

I examined the bow carefully and I do not think there was any bone reinforcement either at the siyahs or on the grip.

I would put the limb cross-section as 'flat'. That is to say that although basically lenticular, at the middle of the working section of the limb, the back and belly surfaces (in cross-section) would be parallel. There was very limited rounding of the horn belly.

A Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368) Bow from Xining, Qinghai, China

A Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368) Bow from Xining, Qinghai, China

Is this Saluki bow similiar to this ?