For comparison purposes from left to right - a five foot long
atlatl dart; a six foot long atlatl dart; an atlatl; |
a javelin; a Kwan dao, a Wudang (crown height) staff; a hook
spear and an eyebrow height staff. |
|
It is unclear when or where spears and atlatls entered the human
toolkit. The earliest preserved spears |
so far are from
Schöningen in Germany and are about 400,000 years old
(above). It would not be surprising if |
spears for thrusting and for throwing
had been made and used for ten times that many years. |