bolas
Sign in to saveBolas or bolases (: bola; from Spanish and Portuguese bola, "ball", also known as a boleadora or boleadeira) is a type of throwing weapon made of weights on the ends of interconnected cords, used to capture animals by entangling their legs. Bolas were most famously used by the gauchos, but have been found in excavations of Pre-Columbian settlements, especially in Patagonia, where indigenous peoples (particularly the Tehuelche) used them to catch 200-pound guanacos and rheas. The Mapuche and the Inca army used them in battle. Mapuche warriors used bolas in their confrontations with the Chilean
Key facts
- Weapon.name
- Bolas
- Weapon.image
- Bola (PSF).jpg
- Weapon.caption
- A hunter using bolas while mounted on a horse.
- Weapon.origin
- The Americas
- Weapon.type
- Throwing weapon
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Subclass of
- throwing weapon
- Country of origin
- Americas
- Image
- Bola (PSF).jpg
Show 3 more facts
- Commons category
- Bolas
- different from
- Bola
- described by source
- Encyclopædia Britannica 11th edition
Sources (3)
via Wikidata · CC0
~4 min read
Encyclopedic overview
5 sectionsContents
- Use
- Design
- See also
- References
- External links
Bolas or bolases (: bola; from Spanish and Portuguese bola, "ball", also known as a boleadora or boleadeira) is a type of throwing weapon made of weights on the ends of interconnected cords, used to capture animals by entangling their legs. Bolas were most famously used by the gauchos, but have been found in excavations of Pre-Columbian settlements, especially in Patagonia, where indigenous peoples (particularly the Tehuelche) used them to catch 200-pound guanacos and rheas. The Mapuche and the Inca army used them in battle. Mapuche warriors used bolas in their confrontations with the Chilean Army during the Occupation of Araucanía (1861–1883).
== Use == thumb|right|Río de la Plata|River Plate Indians with Bolas (Hendrick Ottsen, 1603)
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “bolas” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.