50 
catalogue of offensive weapons. They are seldom discovered 
under such circumstances as will enable us to fix their period with 
decision. The earliest example in the Museum seems to be No. 
276, Case A A of Mr. E. T. Stevens’s collection; this may pos¬ 
sibly be of the thirteenth century. We rarely meet with other 
than barbed arrows in mediaeval pictures. 
81 to 101. A series of Old English arrow-heads. 
85. This is the only example where the form of the barb is bent 
inwards ; it appears to be too small for a dart cast by the 
hand, and was probably projected from a balista or large cross¬ 
bow. 
87 and 91. Other dart-heads, the barbs of which have been 
broken off. 
92. The pile of a roving or flight arrow. The date of this is later, 
probably it may be assigned to an early period in the sixteenth 
century. 
The majority of the old English arrow-piles we meet with are of 
the fashion of this specimen, which is perhaps the best adapted for 
rapid flight. It would not inflict so terrible a stab as the barbed 
blade, but would penetrate deeper into the body, and be equally 
fatal in its effects. This form has maintained its ground from the 
earliest period down to the extinction of military archery in the 
17th century, and even now, with some slight modifications, sur¬ 
vives in the piles of the butt-shafts, or practice arrows of our 
archery societies. 
98. This appears to be the head of a cross-bow bolt. 
94. Probably the head of the old cloth-yard arrow. 
95. Bifurcate iron bolt-head. 
This form does not seem to be of common occurrence. It was 
used in field sports, as is shown by a highly curious painting 
extant of a hunt, given by the Elector of Saxony in 1554 to 
Charles V. and other great personages, who appear shooting with 
the cross-bow, the bolts having heads of this peculiar form. This 
curious painting, Mr. Bernhard Smith suggests, strikingly recalls 
to mind certain expressions of Shakspeare. In “ As You Like It,” 
the Duke laments that the “ poor dappled fools” should have their 
haunches gored with “ forked heads.” So also Kent says to Lear, 
“ though the fork invade the region of my heart.” It may, how¬ 
ever, be assumed that they were not used exclusively in the chase, 
since among various warlike relics found some years since in 
Towton Field, vestiges, doubtless of the memorable conflict in 
1461, iron bolt heads, precisely similar to these, were discovered. 
96 to 99. Dart-heads, with very long barbs ; other examples have 
been found near Oxford, and one in the Thames. They 
appear to have been the heads of feathered darts cast with the 
hand ; similar specimens are known as the vire or veron , a 
