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The bow and arrow is a ranged weapon that consists of a flexible launcher (bow) and long-shafted projectiles (arrows).

Archery is the art, practice, and skill of shooting arrows using bows. A bowman or archer is a person who fires arrows using a bow. A bowyer is someone who creates bows, a fletcher is someone who produces arrows, and an arrowsmith is someone who crafts metal arrowheads.

Long before recorded history, humans used bows and arrows for hunting and warfare, and the technique was widespread among prehistoric tribes. They were essential weapons of combat from antiquity until the early modern period, when the advent of more powerful and precise guns rendered them more outdated, and they were finally phased out of warfare. Bows and arrows are mostly used for hunting and sports nowadays.

A bow is made up of two limbs that are connected by a semi-rigid yet elastic arc with a high-tensile bowstring. A projectile having a sharp tip and a long shaft with stabilizer fins (fletching) towards the rear and a tiny notch (nock) at the very end to contact the bowstring is known as an arrow.

The archer lays an arrow across the middle of the bowstring with the bowstring in the arrow’s nock to load an arrow for firing (nocking an arrow). To shoot, the archer pulls back (draws) the arrow and the bowstring with one hand while holding the bow at its center with the other (typically the dominant hand). This causes the bow’s two limbs to flex backwards, acting as a pair of cantilever springs to store elastic energy.

The archer usually shoots the shot instinctively or by sighting along the arrow while maintaining the draw. The archer then releases (loosens) the draw, allowing the stored energy in the limbs to be converted into kinetic energy and delivered to the arrow via the bowstring, pushing it forward at a high velocity.

A quiver is a container or pouch that holds extra arrows for speedy reloading.

Bows are usually stored unstrung while not in use, which means one or both ends of the bowstring are disconnected from the bow. This relieves any remaining stress on the bow, which can help it retain its strength and suppleness over time. Many bow designs also allow it to straighten out entirely, minimizing the amount of storage space required. Stringing the bow refers to the process of returning the bowstring to its ready-to-use position.

The earliest known evidence of arrows comes from South African locations like as Sibudu Cave, where arrowheads dating from 72,000″60,000 years ago have been discovered.

Around the Upper Paleolithic in Eurasia, the bow and arrow reemerge. Except for Australasia and most of Oceania, usage of the bow appears to have expanded to every inhabited region after the end of the last glacial era.

The earliest possible arrowheads unearthed outside of Africa were discovered at Fa Hien Cave, Sri Lanka, in 2020. It was discovered 48,000 years ago. “According to Langley, bow-and-arrow shooting at the Sri Lankan site likely targeted monkeys and smaller animals like squirrels. These creatures’ remains were discovered in the same soil as the bone points.”

Possible pieces from Mannheim-Vogelstang, dated 17,500″18,000 years ago, and Stellmoor, dated 11,000 years ago, are the oldest certain traces of bow and arrow from Europe. Azilian points discovered near the bones of a bear and a hunter at Grotte du Bichon, Switzerland, together with flint shards recovered in the bear’s third vertebra, imply the usage of arrows 13,500 years ago.

Obsidian bladelets discovered embedded in a skull and within the thoracic cavity of another cadaver at the Nataruk site in Turkana County, Kenya, indicating the usage of stone-tipped arrows as weapons around 10,000 years ago.

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