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On Tue, 02 Aug 2005 15:41:53 -0000,
(Robert Bonomi) wrote:
In article . com,
DamnYankee wrote:
I thought the "arrows" were called "bolts" when used in a crossbow.
Plans call them "quarrels"? Never heard that term before.
When you get down to the nuts-and-bolts of it, a quarrel is a particular
kind of an arrow -- one having a squared-off head.
A bolt is also a particular kind of an arrow -- one that is characterized
by having a short and heavy shaft., as is typically used in a cross-bow.
There used to be a kind of mason's chisel called a quarrel too -
possibly for the same reason, or perhaps because of a similarity.
Lots of interesting terms come from bows and crossbows. A spanner was
a device used to cock (or span) some of them - drawing the string back
to the nut or release mechanism. Later a tool to cock early firearms.
These days a general engineering tool used to tighten nuts of a
different sort.
To have "shot your bolt" comes from crossbow use. They weren't quick
to load, like the longbows. So if your bolt was shot, and some huge
fellow with a long pointy thing was riding towards you, your day was
about to be seriously spoiled.
A "cock-up" isn't half as rude as it sounds. The "cock feather" on an
arrow or bolt needed to be away from the bow or stock - otherwise the
arrow could go anywhere. Hence eventually a mistake of any kind.
Having "two strings to your bow" is fairly obvious. Less obvious is
the old English saying "keep it under your hat". Bowmen commonly wore
headgear of some kind - often of leather - and kept their strings dry
under them.
And of course the traditional and still much-used British
"two-fingers" gesture, used by longbowmen to show the enemy that they
could still draw a bow (those two fingers often being cut off by the
enemy if they were captured). The sexual connotations weren't
unintentional.
John
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