你從來沒有聽說過的十種古代武器(中)

le-Bow Arcuballista

7.三弓牀弩

Invented and perfected throughout the height of the Greek and Roman empires, the ballista was basically a giant crossbow mounted on a cart.

經過希臘和羅馬帝國鼎盛時期的發明和完善，弩炮基本成形：安裝在車上的巨弩。

But the arms of the bow didn't bend like those of a normal crossbow. Instead, they were solid beams of wood mounted between twisted skeins of rope.

但弩炮的弓臂彎曲程度並不如平常的弓弩。它們只是裝配在擰緊的繩束之間的實心木樑。

When a lever was turned, the ends of the arms rotated toward the back of the ballista and twisted the ropes to create torsion.

當轉動槓桿時，弓臂兩端往弩炮後面轉從而使繩子緊擰產生扭力。

It was an immensely powerful weapon, but leave it to the Chinese to say that one bow wasn't enough. They wanted three.

這是一種無比強大的武器，但對中國人來說一隻弓還遠遠不夠。三隻更好。

The evolution of the multiple-bow arcuballista was gradual, beginning in the Tang dynasty with a crossbow that used two bows for added power.

多弓弩炮的研發始於唐代，最初研發者們採用雙弓來增加威力。

Records from the period state that this bow could fire an iron bolt up to 1,100 meters (3,500 ft), more than three times the range of other siege crossbows.

根據當時的記錄，該弓鐵箭的射程可達1100米（3500 英尺），是其它攻城弩射程的三倍以上。

At least 200 years later, the invading Mongol forces inspired another arms leap for Chinese arcuballista designers.

兩百多年後，蒙古軍隊的入侵啓發了中國弩炮設計師，實現了另一個武器飛躍。

Sometime during the early Song dynasty, they rolled out the sangong chuangzi nu—the "triple-bow little bed."

北宋前期，宋人制造出了三弓牀弩。

Details of this arcuballista are few and far between. But it's believed that the Mongolian army, stymied by these powerful defense machines, recruited Chinese engineers to build their own triple-bow behemoths. This eventually turned the tide of war in the Mongols' favor and led to the rise of the Yuan dynasty.

關於這種弩炮的細節少之又少。不過，據說蒙古軍隊曾因這些強大防禦武器屢屢受挫，從而招募中國技師打造三弓巨弩，最終得以扭轉戰局，元代隨之興起。

Shields

6.槍盾

Even in the 16th century, when the concept of firearms was still fresher than the pain of a first divorce, people figured out that adding a gun to something gave it at least twice the shooting power.

即使在16世紀，火器的概念仍然比首例離婚更新鮮。人們發現向某些東西添加一把槍能至少給它增加兩倍的射擊威力。

King Henry VIII was especially sold on the idea. In addition to a walking staff made deadly with a spiked morning star and three pistols, his royal armory included 46 gun shields like the one pictured above.

亨利八世對這個主意尤其熱衷。除了帶着尖刺晨星和三支手槍的致命手杖之外，他的皇家軍械庫還包括像以上圖示的46個槍盾。

These shields were typically wooden discs with a gun poking through the center, although each was different from the next.

一般來看，這些盾牌不過是一把槍從中心伸出的木盤。

Some had iron shielding on the front and others had metal grates above the gun for sighting, but they were all regarded as decorative curiosities more than anything of actual historical interest.

雖然每個槍盾形式各異——一些有鐵覆蓋在表面，還有一些則在槍的上方裝上金屬格柵輔助瞄準——但人們認爲它們作爲精飾古董的意義甚於實際的歷史價值。

Most of them were appropriated by scattered museums, where they gathered dust in display boxes along with other one-off oddities from the Middle Ages.

這些槍盾大都被一些小博物館據爲己有，和其它中世紀的獵奇之物一起擱置在展櫃中，徒積塵埃。

But the UK's Victoria and Albert Museum recently took a closer look at their specimen and discovered that gun shields may have been more commonplace than most historians originally believed.

但英國維多利亞和阿爾伯特博物館最近仔細察看他們收藏的標本，發現槍盾可能比大多數歷史學家最初所認爲的更加常用。

So they rounded up as many as they could find and got to studying.

因此他們開始盡其所能收集更多槍盾以便研究。

What they found was that several of the gun shields had powder burns from where they'd been used.

他們發現有些槍盾的槍口有着火藥燃燒的痕跡。

Some of them also appear to have been designed to lock onto a ship's gunwales, where they were probably used as an extra layer of shielding as well as a line of antipersonnel fire.

其中一些還像曾被固定在船舷上，用作額外的防禦層或進攻火力線。

In the end, though, it probably made more sense to keep the shields and the guns separate, so the bizarre gun shield fell into obscurity.

最後，可能因爲盾牌和槍分開使用的威力更大，所以這奇異的槍盾就湮沒無聞了。

ese Flamethrower

5.中國突火槍

As some of the earliest firearms, the Chinese proto-guns were a vast, imaginative arsenal that was unlike anything that had been created to that point.

作爲最早的一批火器，中國最初的槍體積巨大而創意十足，不同於此前創造的任何東西。

With no prior bias for how a gunpowder-driven weapon should look, Chinese inventors had a blank canvas to create some of the most bizarre guns the world has ever seen.

由於對火藥驅動武器的外形沒有任何參照，中國發明家如同白紙作畫，創造出了世界上最奇異的槍。

Fire lances, the first incarnation, emerged sometime in the 10th century. These were spears affixed to bamboo tubes that could shoot a burst of flame and shrapnel up to a few feet away.

火槍第一次出現在公元10世紀。最開始的形態還都是綁着竹筒的矛，但這個竹筒能發射出爆裂的火焰和彈片到幾英尺外。

Some shot lead pellets, others released a burst of poisonous gas, and some fired arrows.

竹筒所裝"子彈"還包括鉛彈、毒氣以及帶火的箭。

These soon gave way to pure fire tubes as armies ditched the spears in favor of cheap, disposable bamboo guns that only gave one shot but could be mass-produced and fired one after the other.

很快，這些火槍便讓位給純火筒。此時，軍隊拋棄了矛轉而使用成本低、使用方便的竹製火器。雖然竹槍只能射擊一次，但可以批量生產，還能不斷髮射。

They were often given multiple barrels, leading to nearly endless flavors of death.

它們通常有多個槍管，能夠造成大面積傷亡。

From the bowels of this creative mayhem emerged the sky-filling spurting tube. Historians usually call this weapon a flamethrower, but that description doesn't quite do it justice.

能漫天噴射的火器便又從這一充滿創造性的致命"竹槍"中誕生。歷史學家通常將其稱爲突火槍，但是這種表述也不是特別恰當。

Using a low-nitrate form of gunpowder, this weapon could produce continuous bursts of flame for up to five minutes.

由於使用了低硝酸鹽火藥，這種武器能產生長達五分鐘連續爆發的火焰。

But it was the addition of arsenious oxide to the mixture that made it so lethal. The toxic smoke induced vomiting and convulsions.

但使它如此致命的是其中的亞砷酸添加物。突火槍射出的有毒煙霧會導致嘔吐和抽搐。

To top it off, the barrel was often packed with razor-sharp porcelain shards. The result was instant laceration followed by a searing bath of poisonous flame.

最妙的是，每個槍管常常填裝了鋒利的瓷器碎片。被該武器射中的後果就是即時的割裂之痛外加有毒火焰的洗禮。

If your Chinese foe didn't kill you right away, your insides would slowly stop working from the acute arsenic exposure. Eventually, you'd fall into a coma and die.

如果你的中國敵人沒有即時殺死你，你的內臟也會由於急性砷暴露而慢慢停止運轉。最終等着你的就是昏迷然後死亡。

ussion Pistol Whip

4.衝擊式手槍鞭

On March 17, 1834, Joshua Shaw was granted a patent for the only thing that could have made Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark even better: a riding whip with a pistol hidden in the whip's handle.

1834年3月17號，約書亞·肖獲得了專利，他獲得專利的這個發明原本可以使《奪寶奇兵1》更加精彩迭出，那是一條帶手槍的馬鞭（即將手槍暗藏在馬鞭手柄內）。

What made it particularly useful—and potentially dangerous—was the way it was fired.

這條手槍鞭子功力很大或者說很危險的原因在於它的射擊方式。

Instead of using a trigger like most guns, the pistol had a button in the side of the handle that you could press with your thumb.

和傳統使用扳機的手槍不同，手槍鞭的手柄一側有個可以用拇指按到的按鈕。

That allowed a person to hold the whip like they normally would and still have access to the pistol's trigger.

這個設計可以讓人在正常拿住鞭子的同時觸動扳機。

Normally, the trigger was flush with the handle, but when it was cocked, the button would stick out for immediate firing.

正常情況下，扳機和手柄齊平，但是當手柄豎起，按鈕便會突起，隨時準備發射。

At least one of these percussion pistol whips was actually made, although there aren't any records of them being produced in any kind of numbers.

雖然無任何記錄顯示這種衝擊式手槍鞭的大量生產，但確實有人做出了至少一柄手槍鞭。

It exists now more as a curiosity than anything else. Its major drawback was that the pistol could only be fired once, but then again, sometimes one shot is all you need.

不過現在，人們更多將它視爲奇異罕見之物而非其他。這種手槍最主要的缺點就是它只能發一槍，但有時候一發子彈就足以達到目的了。