Talk:Fire arrow

intranetusa - deleted the part about the Greek inventor because it wasn't a rocket. I looked up his article and it said he "might" have invented an early steam device, not a rocket device.

Use by Mongol forces

Can anyone explain what could possibly be meant by a Mongolian invasion of Japan? I didn't think they ever got that far -- were there perhaps some naval skirmishes? -- Visviva 08:17, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

They did. Around 3 invasions. 1st one failed before they got there because of the typhoon. In the rest of the 2 invasions, the typhoon damaged the Mongol navy badly, but they managed to get on land. Even then, they had many internal disputes and poor leadership. They lost. (Wikimachine 20:17, 21 May 2006 (UTC))

The only 3 invasions of Japan in history, all thwarted by bad weather... -- Миборовский 02:03, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

-intraetusa - yeh, the three typhoons were called "kamakazies" or divine wind because it saved Japan.

Korean variant?

Can anyone familiar with Fire Arrows take a guess as to whether this is a Fire Arrow? -- Visviva 08:17, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

That is a Dae-Singijeon. Take a look at the fully revised Singijeon article. It is really large & had to be launched individually. (Wikimachine 20:16, 21 May 2006 (UTC))

English Translation Please

Would it be possible to get an English translation of the footnotes section? joturner 20:54, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

other "fire arrows"

This weapon described in this article is a specific asian weapon and needs to be differentiated from a simple arrow with a cloth or such that is set ablaze, a weapon that has been used all over the world to set structures on fire. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.128.248.119 (talk) 14:11, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Agreed--174.71.78.253 (talk) 09:09, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Agree, agree. I also came here looking for the mechanics of the 'common' fire arrow. The subject matter isn't broached on 'Arrow' either. Since they both use the same name, they're both arrows, and the common fire arrow probably doesn't deserve a whole article, a paragraph near the beginning of the article would make sense. Any takers? Jmgariepy (talk) 07:15, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

- agree it should be called powder arrow, but there a real fire arrows which were used since 1000s of years with putting mixing cotton and oil on the arrows so they burn which were used in Europe and the middle east too. This article is very biased on asian history.--Shokioto22 (talk) 06:42, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

There is a real "flammable arrow", but they should be kept separate from this fire arrow, and this article topic, as they're quite different. The fire arrow here is specifically Chinese.

BTW - cotton wasn't much used for incendiary arrows either, as it wasn't available in Europe at the time they were most used. In some cases they were merely iron arrow points (as these were what the archers had, and were used to shooting), but they were heated to red heat in a forge before loosing them. Andy Dingley (talk) 09:03, 20 October 2012 (UTC)

The Merriam Webster Online Dictionary disagrees with you. It's definition of a 'Fire Arrow' is: "An arrow bearing a flaming substance to set its mark afire". If that's the dictionary definition, I don't see why we couldn't talk about ancient fire arrows here, then transition to rocket arrows further into the article. I don't doubt that gunpowder arrows are called 'fire arrows' as well... but trying to rename traditional 'fire arrows' to 'flammable arrows' is abusing the language, and confusing readers. That isn't their name. Jmgariepy (talk) 11:19, 26 October 2012 (UTC)

There are (as ever) two issues: what the scope is, and what the name is for that scope. It's a real mistake (and ever popular at WP) to allow the naming choice to drive the scope decision. Names are rarely ontological. This article is already about the Chinese exploding gunpowder projectile, not the Western device of burning pitch. Rename it to "Dragon's eggs fart loudly" if you must, but don't confuse two different scopes with separate development histories. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:59, 26 October 2012

I can appreciate the argument of confusing the reader. As it is, my sugestion sounded good in my head outside of context, but when I looked back at the current definition, it became clear to me that there would be a pretty big jump between both arrows. Starting off the page with "Fire arrows are arrows that use fire", then continuing to the table of contents would just look weird.

I got a solution, though. Why don't I go make an entry in Wiktionary instead, then we can put a redirect at the top of the page to that? I mean, I don't really have much to say about pitch fire arrows, and I doubt the rest of the internet community does either, or we would have had this problem years ago. This page just seems misleading to me. When I first came here, I scanned through the page and thought "Oh. Those movies where they used arrows that were on fire... that must be a myth or something." That's what I'm trying to stop... I'm not trying to slap this article around, or give it a new name or anythihng. I'm also trying to prevent reader confusion. 134.141.1.138 (talk) 11:36, 28 October 2012 (UTC) (UTC)

Indian use

The "Laws of Manu," a Hindu treatise on statecraft (c. 400 BC) forbids the use of poison and fire arrows, but advises poisoning food and water.

Kautilya's "Arthashastra," a statecraft manual of the same era, contains hundreds of recipes for creating poison weapons, toxic smokes, and other chemical weapons. Ancient Greek historians recount that Alexander the Great encountered poison arrows and fire incendiaries in India at Indus Basin in the 4th century BC.

Reference: Mayor, 2003 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.164.82.13 (talk) 22:29, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Recorded uses - Chinese fire arrows

"1221, the Thundercrash Bombs, used by the Jin invaders during the attack of Qizhou, which were exploding grenades filled with black powder rather than incendiary bombs filled with molten material, and lastly in 1232 when the Jin repelled the Mongolians in the battle of Kai-keng. They also used in this battle the Flying Firelances, which were bamboo tubes stuffed with black powder; the tube was ignited and used as a flamethrower.[8]"

I didn't want to outright delete it, but nothing in this section quoted appears to refer to the use of fire arrows. Assuming that the reference cited is an accurate translation, then nothing in that appears to mention the use of any kind of fire arrow or similar rocket weapons. This section should be deleted. 27.33.54.238 (talk) 08:27, 22 August 2016 (UTC)Oldmate

I have deleted the section for the reasons mentioned above.27.33.54.238 (talk) 10:37, 21 September 2016 (UTC)Oldmate

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a suggestion

it is better to name it rocket arrow instead of fire arrow because it describes from what it is propelled — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.72.101.175 (talk) 02:59, 7 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree that the current title is problematic because, even in the primary sources, "fire arrow" is an ambiguous term that can refer to either flaming arrows or gunpowder arrows. I would recommend moving this article to another title and disambiguating the fire arrow article.--Khanate General ☪ talk ^{project mongol conquests} 12:45, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

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