Plumbata

Plumbatae or martiobarbuli were lead-weighted darts carried by infantrymen in Antiquity and the Middle Ages.

The first examples seem to have been carried by the Ancient Greeks from about 500 B.C. onwards, but the best-known users were the late Roman and Byzantine armies. The best written source for these tactical weapons is Vegetius' De Re Militari (1.17):

A second source, also from the late 4th century, is an anonymous treatise titled De Rebus Bellicis, which briefly discusses (so far archaeologically unattested) spiked plumbatae (plumbata tribolata), but which is also the only source that shows an image of what a plumbata looked like. The image shows what looks like a short arrow with a weight attached to the shaft. Although only later copies of the original manuscript exist, this is confirmed by the remains which have so far turned up in the archaeological record.

A third source is the late 6th century Strategicon, written by the Byzantine emperor Maurice, who wrote about the martzobarboulon, a corruption of its Latin name martiobarbulum.

Plumbatae etymologically contain plumbum, or lead, and can be translated "lead-weighted [darts]". Martiobarbuli in this translation is mattiobarbuli in the Latin, which is most likely an assimilation of Martio-barbuli, "little barbs of Mars." The barb implied a barbed head, and Mars was the god of war (among other things).

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