When David faced Goliath he ran toward him with only a sling. He had thrown off the armor and sword offered to him by King Saul, and, after taking five smooth stones from a nearby brook, launched one of them with his slingshot that struck Goliath, the Philistine giant, in the head.
We don't know whether David's sling killed Goliath or just knocked him unconscious. But David then took Goliath's sword and cut off Goliath's head. He removed Goliath's armor and took it home with him: the head he took to King Saul when he was summoned to meet him.
A slingshot can be a powerful weapon, but a stone slingshot probably could not penetrate metallic armor. Goliath's armor, in Biblical description, was made of brass. In David's time and for many years after, armor was typically made of densely woven linen (linothorax), not metal, and leather.
David's aim was incredibly good, and from the Biblical account he was running toward Goliath when he launched the fateful stone.
David's slingshot used rounded stones, but the Greeks would introduce a new kind of shot material, made from lead.
One of these lead shots was recently found in Yavne, Israel, according to the Jerusalem Post, quoting the Israel Antiquities Authority. It probably belonged to a Greek soldier during war against the Hasmoneans during the Hellenistic Period.
The word victory on the ancient bullet excavated in YavneCredit: Dafna Gazit/ Israeli Antiquities Author
Yavne-Yam was a port area and military staging ground for Seleucid armies, and the Seleucid empire, originally founded by Seleusis Nicator, was part of the empire divided after the death of Alexander the Great. It featured heavy Hellenizing of areas it conquered, including Jerusalem. The would lead to the Maccabean revolt led by Judas Maccabee ( יהודה המכבי) who would be killed in the Battle of Elasa (160 BCE).
The Greek military of the time featured heavy armor and used slingshots mostly for skirmishes. The skirmishers were often imported fighters, initially coming from Rhodes. Using a slingshot required considerable skill and practice. The advantage of the weapon, when properly used, was its range and lethality. Compared to Persian slingers who used stone projectiles or shot, the Greek lead projectile (later adopted by the Romans) was eight times denser and could cause more damage. A top class Rhodes slinger could outperform a bow and arrow and his weapon was far cheaper.
The composite bow was first developed in and around Israel during the late Biblical period. It was made from laminates of wood cemented together with a very strong glue made from the bladders of fish. It was, as I wrote in my book Technology Security and National Power, an ancient epoxy. Such bows and their arrows required a significant industrial effort and were traded widely in ancient times. A typical bow could take a year to manufacture. Slave labor was frequently used for production (usually unfortunates captured after military raids). It also required access to materials and an international trading network.
While a composite bow was expensive and required wood, glue, gut for string, and iron for arrows, the slingshot only required a leather strap and pouch and lead. Lead melts at 327.5 degrees Celsius or 621 degrees Fahrenheit, so any forge could be used to melt lead and cast the shot. One of the reasons that the Philistines forbade Israeli settlers from having forges (1 Samuel 13:19) was to control the manufacture of weapons, especially lead shot and iron arrow and spear tips.
The lead shot found at Yavne had inscriptions on it on both sides. One side has "Victory" in Greek in well formed letters. The other side names two Greek gods, Heracles and Hauron. These Greek gods were the patron saints of Yavne.
As messages go, the ones stamped on the Yavne lead shot were pretty mild. Many had nasty messages stamped on them. One shot that was found had the message on it: Pet[e]culum Octavia[ni] which means Attack Octavian's Arsehole. Others might have their unit name or commander's name or other messages (many also nasty).
Like other slingshot projectiles, the shot found at Yavne had a biconical shape (a little like a flattened football). The Romans also used this shape and another, acorn shape shot that the Romans called glandes plumbae (lead acorns). In the case of the biconical shape, it seems to have been cast in two halves and then heated to join the two sides together.
The arms trade in ancient times was as big a business as today. It included important raw materials (including fish bladders). One ship transporting lead sank some 3,200 years ago off the coast of Canaan. It carried four lead ingots that originated in Sardinia but went onwards to Cyprus (where they were rebranded, the evidence being the Cypro-Minoan script stamped on them) and then further shipped, perhaps to Egyptian forces operating in the area. Another ship, which sank off the eastern shores of Uluburun — in present-day Turkey — carrying tons of rare metal including tin from far away Uzbekistan. Tin was needed to make bronze and it was supplied from also from Britain to Egypt and others in the Middle East.
The practice of writing messages on weapons continues even to today. A message written on a bunker busting bomb addressed to ISIS terrorists said "This is for making me miss Games of Thrones."
Not bad, but the ancient Greeks were better at it.