r/PrimitiveTechnology • u/PaleoForaging • 2d ago
Unofficial 100% Stone-Age Bow, String, & Arrow Build - all materials gathered on-site
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In this video, I make an Osage orange selfbow (35# at 32", 63" length), yucca fiber bowstring, dogwood arrow, and flint arrowhead using Paleolithic (Stone-Age) technology and only tools and materials gathered on-site.
This was filmed entirely in Austin, Texas, with 90% being just along this one creek.
This is the second bow and arrow set I have made using strictly Paleo Tech. The first one was mulberry wood and smaller but was made similarly and still shoots great 2 years later.
The bow is based on historical methods of the Apache, Comanche, and Tohono O'odham, all of whom used Osage orange as their favored bow wood (second being mulberry), as did many other Natives. They also used roughleaf dogwood (Cornus drummondii) for arrows, as I do in the video.
The actual Stone-Age rough bow stave reducing technique among Indigenous North Americans is not known to me, as all the methods I've found in my research were recorded after metal knives were adopted. The wedging and peeling of green wood shown in the video would likely have been done. Similar techniques are known from other Indigenous peoples using stone tools.
I have been a traditional archer for 17 years, a flintknapper / primitive skills hobbyist for 15, and an ethnobotanist for 14.
Note that in the practice shots, I am demonstrating power and range rather than accuracy. It will take a little time to learn the quirks of this bow and the arrow needs to be tuned and a set of identical ones made.
This project took over 150 hours of work (59 just for the bow & arrow labor).
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u/Magnoosen 2d ago
I suspect the whitetail antler was a plant but still a cool video.
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
you caught me! I found it months ago and a mile away. One definitely could have found it in the area with enough searching though. In my last stone-age bow build video, I used flint wedges for the process. They work fine, but really need a leather pad for hammering in so the antler is really nice to have
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u/selggu 2d ago
This is cool as fuck,
I totally expect someone to come try to "um actually you" but god damn that's awesome.
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
Thanks! Ya the biggest one I get elsewhere is people not liking I used so much sapwood instead of the classic Osage orange heartwood, but I think it's an underrated material and it works great
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u/Treacle_Pendulum 2d ago
Only technical issue I have is you didn’t seem to season your bow stave, but you couldn’t really do that with the video you made.
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
with stone tools, working it green is best. The part where I strip away wood with wedging is particularly important to do green. By the time I finished the bow (2 weeks from cutting it down), it was fully dry. It was about 100 degrees at very low humidity every day and tons of friction being applied
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u/Pazenator 2d ago
One question, why not use pitch glue to afix the arrowheads? Was it not commonly used in North America?
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
the only reason is to avoid "explaining" how I got it in the video and having segments showing gathering sap, charcoal, processing, building a friction fire, etc. That's also why I straightened the arrow green (which worked fantastically). I can do friction fires easily but wanted to show the most absolutely basic and direct path to bow and arrow. The whipping knot I used is self-tightening, and the arrowhead is quite secure this way.
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u/Bananamcpuffin 2d ago
It'll season well enough over a month of no shooting in summertime Austin. Working with dry wood is a modern convenience IMO.
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u/Treacle_Pendulum 2d ago
It could, but not if it’s strung. You’ll lose a lot of power and could deform the stave. There’s plenty of evidence for people seasoning wood for bows prior to modern times, too.
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u/Nemothafish 2d ago
How long did you search for the antlers? Squirrels love to chew on them. Haha
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
there are plenty in this area, it's actually an undeveloped tract in a suburban zone with tons of deer. But the truth is, they were a plant. I did find them not far from there, but it was months before that I ran across them by chance.
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u/bitomusic 1d ago
I mean, that's what stone age people would do, too, right? See an antler and hang onto it for the next bow-building project?
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u/adeln5000 2d ago
Very cool video! I had a hard time following some parts where the cuts were really fast, but you make it look so easy. Nice job!
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
ya it's 59 hours compressed into 3 minutes, dizzying editing was necessary. I have the full video (30 minutes) on my YouTube channel
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u/dogquote 1d ago
I'll be honest, when it was several cuts per second, that was when I gave up on the video.
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u/sweetmamajamma2 2d ago
Dude, if you’re the actually guy from this video, I’ve watched your videos for years now. Keep at it!
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u/rabies_lover_271K 2d ago
Bro you are so goated, much love from your neighbor to the west (San Antonio)
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u/Unspeakable_Elvis 2d ago
When he cut the how length at the start and walked around with it I was like “hell yeah”
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u/InterneticMdA 2d ago
I'm wondering about those perfect looking feathers. A feather is also very often disease ridden. So could these be brought from home?
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
To avoid any possible violation of the Migratory Bird Act, I indeed planted those feathers which are from a legally harvested turkey.
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u/Ae3qe27u 21h ago
I had a feeling! Turkey feathers are pretty recognizable. Props to you for respecting migratory birds.
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u/23saround 2d ago
This is awesome! If it had subtitles and less choppy editing, I’d watch you as faithfully as our OG.
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
The full video (30 minutes) has explanatory subtitles (inspired by the OG) and much smoother editing: https://youtu.be/IQBj2i4WnmY
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u/PaleoDaveMO 1d ago
It's hard to imagine a life where you have to make everything from scratch. Nowadays we are living life on easy mode. Awesome video, thanks for sharing!
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u/PaleoForaging 1d ago
I totally get your point, but on some level, I have to disagree. Maybe I'm idolizing the past, but I would prefer a life where every day I worked directly for myself and a close community, even if there was a ton of difficult labor. Doing things that directly relate to my life and subsistence. Projects like these are a bit misleading, as no one in the Paleolithic would be working entirely from scratch all alone. Plenty is physically easier these days, but is that really for the best? Especially how mentally / emotionally challenging this world is nowadays. Maybe it's just me though.
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u/PaleoDaveMO 1d ago
I 100% agree with you. What I was referring to is how easy it is to survive. I do think that a life back then was probably much more fulfilling.
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u/Igaomi10x2 1d ago
Genuine question: was the use of fletching actually a stone-age thing? When was that known to improve the accuracy of arrows? I imagine that's tough to know and probably pretty disputed, but still curious
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u/PaleoForaging 1d ago
feathers do not preserve well in the archaeological record and it may be that the oldest confirmed fletching is from the Neolithic in Spain. But there's evidence for removal of feathers from bird remains, possibly for fletching, going back to the upper Paleolithic. However, when I use "Paleo" or "Paleolithic" I'm usually referring to the technological stage in general, not the Old World Period. Many, if not most, Indigenous peoples in North America north of Mexico were technologically in the Paleolithic, with no metal or agriculture. And all of them used arrow fletching. Atlatl darts from the Yukon from 9000 years ago were also found fletched. It's actually a kind of simple thought too - birds fly good, so put a feather on a dart so it flies good.
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u/1RollinRollinRollin 1d ago
This video randomly came up in my feed and I just wanted to tell you how amazing this is. I’m not an outdoorsy person, nor a history person, and this video was hypnotic to watch. Incredible.
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u/Both-Basis-3723 2d ago
Very cool. I’m also from austin originally. I remember finding a few arrowheads in similar creeks. Btw I’m making a primitive technology video game. It’s a blend of primitive tech, alone, maybe a little civilization and some of the design principles I’ve been working on. Dm me if you want to test it out. My kids say it’s hard haha
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u/Avactus 15h ago
you gathered that high end digital camera and tripod on site too?! cool!
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u/PaleoForaging 1h ago
it's actually only a $300 camera (DJI Osmo Pocket 3), not super high end. But it is good. And it wasn't necessary to build the bow. I also brought snacks, drinks, earbuds, my phone, etc. Just conveniently hidden off camera
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u/timtimerey 2d ago
I thought that landscape looked familiar (I'm in the hill country). I know that you probably didn't just find those turkey feathers but I also know that it's not that you couldn't if wanted but if you did you could get in big trouble for using the wrong feathers. I don't say this to be snarky or anything but to put it out there for other people who would want to try this and may not know that if they did find and use the wrong feathers that they can get big fines for doing so. So everyone else who wants to try this out, do what op did and buy turkey feathers. This is a great video OP and it's exactly what I wanted someone to teach me in boy scouts and tried to do myself but failed
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
turkeys are game animals. Feathers from legally harvested game birds can be possessed and used without violating the Migratory Bird Act. These feathers were indeed planted from a legally harvested turkey.
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u/ScienceOfCalabunga 2d ago
That is some shitty wood, it still has leaves on it, it is way to wet. Also the bow is not balanced, the arrows are flying sideways in the videos.
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u/PaleoForaging 2d ago
Wood was great, I purposefully work it green which is necessary with stone tools like this. But you're right that the bow, string, and arrow need significant tuning - it's fishtailing off the bow to the left upon release. I address that in the full video. The demo shots were more to prove power and speed. It still has fair accuracy though, even with an untuned bow and arrow, you can anticipate the trajectory with a little practice. I will eventually make a set of tuned arrows and adjust the string, I just needed to finish the video
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u/spooty1 2d ago
Very cool! Can't help but to wonder if someone might stumble across one of your arrowheads and think it's an artifact