
Throwing Fire
Projectile Technology through History
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Estimated delivery time: In stock at the publisher, but not at Prospero's office. Delivery time approx. 3-5 weeks.
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Product details:
- Publisher Cambridge University Press
- Date of Publication 8 April 2002
- ISBN 9780521791588
- Binding Hardback
- No. of pages218 pages
- Size 236x161x22 mm
- Weight 454 g
- Language English 0
Categories
Short description:
This is a history of hard, accurate throwing and the manipulation of fire as unique human capabilities.
MoreLong description:
Historian Alfred W. Crosby looks at hard, accurate throwing and the manipulation of fire as unique human capabilities. Humans began throwing rocks in prehistory and then progressed to javelins, atlatls, bows and arrows. We learned to make fire by friction and used it to cook, drive game, burn out rivals, and alter landscapes. In historic times we invented catapults, trebuchets, and such flammable liquids as Greek Fire. About 1,000 years ago we invented gunpowder, which accelerated the rise of empires and the advance of European imperialism. In the 20th century, gunpowder weaponry enabled us to wage the most destructive wars of all time, peaking at the end of World War II with the V-2 and atomic bomb. Today, we have turned our projectile talents to space travel which may make it possible for our species to migrate to other bodies of our solar system and even other star systems.
'Within less than 200 pages he tells a coherent tale including both pertinent detail and amusing anecdote covering the period from Neanderthal prehumans to the present.' History Today
Table of Contents:
Part I. Who, Why, and How: 1. The Pliocene: something new is afoot; Part II. The First Acceleration, The First Projectiles: 2. The Pliocene and Pleistocene: 'you are what you throw'; 3. The Pleistocene and Holocene: 'cooking the Earth'; 4. The Upper Paleolithic: 'humanity and other disasters'; 5. From weapon craftsmanship to weapon technology; Part III. The Second Acceleration: Gunpowder: 6. The Chinese elixir; 7. Gunpowder as centripetal force; 8. Brown Bess to Big Bertha; Part IV. The Third Acceleration: Into Extraterrestrial and Subatomic Space: 9. The V-2 and the bomb; 10. The longest throws; Part V. The Fourth Acceleration.
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