Pre-modern Warfare:India And Elsewhere

[ramana]

<!--QuoteBegin-rhytha+Mar 31 2006, 07:20 PM-->QUOTE(rhytha @ Mar 31 2006, 07:20 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->silapadikaram is not pre-islamic, it older, its dated 3rd centuray AD.

<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->rytha, Why dont you write the Tamil word for the 'automatic' bow in English and save us the agony?First the tamil word in english and then its meaning.
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valinthu thane eyyum einthra vil
{bending itself throwing machinated bow}

i have given word by word translation above.

Actually that para there has lots of machines, when i asked my guys to take a look.

Here is one another

sitraambhukal vaithu ayyum einthram

{small arrows place throw forward machine}

einthram is machine in tamil

one another

nootrou kolli
{hundered killer}

killer of hunderds
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Perfect. Nootru kolli seems to be same as shatagni. Again hundred killer.

einthram is like yantra for machine.

I guess vil is bow same as villu in Telugu.
vaithu is throw like veyatam in Telugu

To me it looks like the vil tells us its large bow type machine to shoot an arrow type projectile. There are examples of them from the Romans. Could be similar to kaantaka described by Liang. Is there any description of the vil beig used? Like lodaing the projectile and what it did? How many men it required to operate it?

Also the nootru kolli seems to be a different machine than the sitraambhukal machine.

Is there any clarification about the nootru kolli? Like how was it operated or the hero did this with it and its effects were like this? You get the picture. Was there any fire referenced in the same para?

So essentially all these are nomenclature for seige engines. Now if Silapadikaram has them in the early 3rd cent AD these must have been prevalent for some time and could have originated earlier. I say this as the poet assumes familiarty with these seige engines for the reader. So they must be sometime older.

I think the Mahabharata and the epics contain many descriptions but since they were written by literary figures it is up to us to figure out what is the message.