HISTORY
OF
SLINGSHOTS

 

In the beginning there was the sling and it was good.

Row of Pebbles.gif (8081 bytes)

    Since so many people think that a sling is a slingshot, it seems only fitting to begin the history of the slingshot with mention of the sling and a little of it's history. We all know the story of David and Goliath and realize the power of such a simple weapon.

Do you know what happened in 1063 B.C.?

That's when Goliath found out he was only a stone's throw from David's house.


A relative of Dave Mendenhall was stationed in Israel and was able to purchase the original sling that David used to kill Goliath for my collection. Of course since he used it the sling has had 100 new sets of strings and 50 new pouches.


In 1 Chronicles 12:2 …"they were armed with bows and were able to shoot arrows or to sling stones right-handed or left-handed"…

In Judges 20:16 "Among all the soldiers there were seven hundred chosen men who were left-handed, each whom could sling a stone at a hair and not miss".

There is an excellent article in the October 1973 of Scientific American written by Manfred Korfmann on the history of the sling entitled, The Sling as a Weapon.

The Winter 1978 issue of Modern Catapultry contains the article, Experiments with Slings, by Dr. M. H. Newcomer. This too is an excellent article about slings.

Several years ago I became upset when someone said that if David was so good with his sling why did he pick up five stones when he went up against Goliath? Further research into the story led me to the rumor that Goliath had four brothers. That seems to answer the question.

The Unofficial Green Arrow Compendium by Scott McCullar

The Summer Nationals Slingshot Tournament promoted both slings and David & Goliath with a special float in the Toulon Old Settler's parade.

Back to Contents