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Carpathian Mountains

The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians are a range of mountains forming an arc across Central Europe and Southeast Europe. Roughly 1500 km long, it is the third-longest European mountain range after the Urals at 2500 km and the Scandinavian Mountains at 1700 km. The range stretches from the far eastern Czech Republic (3%) and Austria (1%) in the northwest through Slovakia (21%), Poland (10%), Ukraine (10%), Romania (50%) to Serbia (5%) in the south. The highest range within the Carpathians is known as the Tatra Mountains in Poland and Slovakia, where the highest peaks exceed 2600 m. The second-highest range is the Southern Carpathians in Romania, where the highest peaks range between 2500 m and 2550 m.

The divisions of the Carpathians usually involve three major sections:
 * Western Carpathians: Austria, Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia
 * Eastern Carpathians: southeastern Poland, eastern Slovakia, Ukraine, and Romania
 * Southern Carpathians: Romania and eastern Serbia

The term Outer Carpathians is frequently used to describe the northern rim of the Western and Eastern Carpathians.

The Carpathians provide habitat for the largest European populations of brown bears, wolves, chamois, and lynxes, with the highest concentration in Romania,  as well as over one-third of all European plant species. The mountains and their foothills also have many thermal and mineral waters, with Romania having one-third of the European total. Romania is likewise home to the second-largest area of virgin forests in Europe after Russia, totaling 250,000 hectares (65%), most of them in the Carpathians, with the Southern Carpathians constituting Europe's largest unfragmented forest area. Deforestation rates due to illegal logging in the Carpathians are high.

Name
In modern times, the range is called Karpaty in Czech, Polish and Slovak and Карпати (Karpaty) in Ukrainian, Карпати / Karpati in Serbo-Croatian, Carpați in Romanian, Карпаты in Rusyn, Karpaten  in German and Kárpátok in Hungarian. Although the toponym was recorded by Ptolemy in the second century AD, the modern form of the name is a neologism in most languages. For instance, Havasok ("Snowy Mountains") was its medieval Hungarian name. Russian chronicles referred to it as "Hungarian Mountains". Later sources, such as Dimitrie Cantemir and the Italian chronicler Giovanandrea Gromo, referred to the range as "Transylvania's Mountains", while the 17th-century historian Constantin Cantacuzino translated the name of the mountains in an Italian-Romanian glossary to "Rumanian Mountains".

The name "Carpates" is highly associated with the old Dacian tribes called "Carpes" or "Carpi" who lived in an area to the east of the Carpathians, from the east, northeast of the Black Sea to the Transylvanian Plain in the present day Romania and Moldova. Karpates is considered a Paleo-Balkan name, with evidence provided by the Albanian kárpë / kárpa, pl. kárpa / kárpat ('rock, stiff'), and the Messapic karpa 'tuff (rock), limestone' (preserved as càrpë 'tuff' in Bitonto dialect and càrparu 'limestone' in Salentino). This connection is further supported by the fact that also the oronym Beskydy, a series of mountain ranges in the Carpathians, has a meaning in Albanian: bjeshkë / bjeshkët 'high mountains, mountain pastures' (cf. also the Albanian oronym Bjeshkët e Namuna, the Accursed Mountains / Albanian Alps).

The name Carpates may ultimately be from the Proto Indo-European root *sker-/*ker-, which meant mountain, rock, or rugged (cf. Albanian kárpë, Germanic root *skerp-, Old Norse harfr "harrow", Gothic skarpo, Middle Low German scharf "potsherd", and Modern High German Scherbe "shard", Lithuanian kar~pas "cut, hack, notch", Latvian cìrpt "to shear, clip"). The archaic Polish word karpa meant 'rugged irregularities, underwater obstacles/rocks, rugged roots, or trunks'. The more common word skarpa means a sharp cliff or other vertical terrain, cf..Old English scearp and English sharp. The name may instead come from Indo-European *kwerp 'to turn', akin to Old English hweorfan 'to turn, change' (English warp) and Greek καρπός karpós 'wrist', perhaps referring to the way the mountain range bends or veers in an L-shape.

In late Roman documents, the Eastern Carpathian Mountains were referred to as Montes Sarmatici (meaning Sarmatian Mountains). The Western Carpathians were called Carpates, a name that is first recorded in Ptolemy's Geographia (second century AD).

In the Scandinavian Hervarar saga, which relates ancient Germanic legends about battles between Goths and Huns, the name Karpates appears in the predictable Germanic form as Harvaða fjöllum (see Grimm's law).

"Inter Alpes Huniae et Oceanum est Polonia" ("Between the Hunic Alps and the ocean lies Poland") by Gervase of Tilbury, was described in his Otia Imperialia ("Recreation for an Emperor") in 1211. Thirteenth- to fifteenth-century Hungarian documents named the mountains Thorchal, Tarczal, or less frequently Montes Nivium ("Snowy Mountains").

Geography

The northwestern Carpathians begin in Slovakia and southern Poland. They surround Transcarpathia and Transylvania in a large semicircle, sweeping towards the southeast, and end on the Danube near Orșova in Romania. The total length of the Carpathians is over 1500 km. The mountain chain's width varies between 12 and 500 km. The highest altitudes of the Carpathians occur where they are widest. The system attains its greatest breadth in the Transylvanian plateau and in the southern Tatra Mountains group – the highest range, in which Gerlachovský štít in Slovakia is the highest peak, is 2655 m above sea level. The Carpathians cover an area of 190000 km2. After the Alps, they form the next-most extensive mountain system in Europe.

Although commonly referred to as a mountain chain, the Carpathians do not form an uninterrupted chain of mountains. Rather, they consist of several orographically and geologically distinctive groups, presenting as great a structural variety as the Alps. The Carpathians, which attain an altitude over 2500 m in only a few places, lack the bold peaks, extensive snowfields, large glaciers, high waterfalls, and numerous large lakes that are common in the Alps. It was believed that no area of the Carpathian range was covered in snow all year round and there were no glaciers, but recent research by Polish scientists discovered one permafrost and glacial area in the Tatra Mountains.

The Carpathians at their highest altitude are only as high as the middle region of the Alps, with which they share a common appearance, climate, and flora. The Carpathians are separated from the Alps by the Danube. The two ranges meet at only one point: the Leitha Mountains at Bratislava. The river also separates them from the Balkan Mountains at Orșova in Romania. The valley of the March and Oder separates the Carpathians from the Silesian and Moravian chains, which belong to the middle wing of the great Central Mountain System of Europe.

Unlike the other wings of the system, the Carpathians, which form the watershed between the northern seas and the Black Sea, are surrounded on all sides by plains. The Pannonian plain is to the southwest, the Lower Danubian Plain to the south, with the southern part being in Bulgaria, and the northern - in (Romania), and the Galician plain to the northeast.

Cities and towns

Important cities and towns in or near the Carpathians are, in approximate descending order of population:

 * Kraków (Poland)
 * Banská Bystrica (Slovakia)
 * Bratislava (Slovakia)
 * Cluj-Napoca (Romania)
 * Chernivtsi (Ukraine)
 * Brașov (Romania)
 * Košice (Slovakia)
 * Ivano-Frankivsk (Ukraine)
 * Oradea (Romania)
 * Bielsko-Biała (Poland)
 * Miskolc (Hungary)
 * Sibiu (Romania)
 * Târgu Mureș (Romania)
 * Baia Mare (Romania)
 * Uzhhorod (Ukraine)
 * Tarnów (Poland)
 * Râmnicu Vâlcea (Romania)
 * Prešov (Slovakia)
 * Mukachevo (Ukraine)
 * Drohobych (Ukraine)
 * Piatra Neamț (Romania)
 * Nowy Sącz (Poland)
 * Suceava (Romania)
 * Vršac (Serbia)
 * Târgu Jiu (Romania)
 * Drobeta-Turnu Severin (Romania)
 * Reșița (Romania)
 * Žilina (Slovakia)
 * Bistrița (Romania)
 * Banská Bystrica (Slovakia)
 * Zvolen (Slovakia)
 * Deva (Romania)
 * Zlín (Czech Republic)
 * Hunedoara (Romania)
 * Martin (Slovakia)
 * Zalău (Romania)
 * Przemyśl (Poland)
 * Krosno (Poland)
 * Sanok (Poland)
 * Alba Iulia (Romania)
 * Sfântu Gheorghe (Romania)
 * Turda (Romania)
 * Mediaș (Romania)
 * Poprad (Slovakia)
 * Spišská Nová Ves (Slovakia)
 * Petroșani (Romania)
 * Miercurea Ciuc (Romania)
 * Făgăraș (Romania)
 * Odorheiu Secuiesc (Romania)
 * Boryslav (Ukraine)
 * Jasło (Poland)
 * Cieszyn (Poland)
 * Nowy Targ (Poland)
 * Żywiec (Poland)
 * Zakopane (Poland)
 * Petrila (Romania)
 * Cugir (Romania)
 * Târgu Neamț (Romania)
 * Câmpulung Moldovenesc (Romania)
 * Gheorgheni (Romania)
 * Rakhiv (Ukraine)
 * Vatra Dornei (Romania)
 * Rabka-Zdrój (Poland)
 * Bor (Serbia)

Highest peaks
This is an (incomplete) list of the peaks of the Carpathians having summits over 2500 m, with their heights, geologic divisions, and locations.

Highest peaks by country
This is a list of the highest national peaks of the Carpathians, their heights, geologic divisions, and locations. Excluding mountains located in two countries (on the border).

Mountain passes
In the Romanian part of the main chain of the Carpathians, mountain passes include Prislop Pass, Tihuța Pass, Bicaz Canyon, Ghimeș Pass, Buzău Pass, Predeal Pass (crossed by the railway from Brașov to Bucharest), Turnu Roșu Pass (1,115 ft., running through the narrow gorge of the Olt River and crossed by the railway from Sibiu to Bucharest), Vulcan Pass, and the Iron Gate (both crossed by the railway from Timișoara to Craiova).

Geology
The area now occupied by the Carpathians was once occupied by smaller ocean basins. The Carpathian mountains were formed during the Alpine orogeny in the Mesozoic and Cenozoic by moving the ALCAPA (Alpine-Carpathian-Pannonian), Tisza and Dacia plates over subducting oceanic crust. The mountains take the form of a fold and thrust belt with generally north vergence in the western segment, northeast to east vergence in the eastern portion and southeast vergence in the southern portion. Currently, the area is the most seismically active in Central Europe.

The external, generally northern, portion of the orogenic belt is a Tertiary accretionary wedge of a so-called Flysch belt (the Carpathian Flysch Belt) created by rocks scraped off the sea bottom and thrust over the North-European plate. The Carpathian accretionary wedge is made of several thin skinned nappes composed of Cretaceous to Paleogene turbidites. Thrusting of the Flysch nappes over the Carpathian foreland caused the formation of the Carpathian foreland basin. The boundary between the Flysch belt and internal zones of the orogenic belt in the western segment of the mountain range is marked by the Pieniny Klippen Belt, a narrow complicated zone of polyphase compressional deformation, later involved in a supposed strike-slip zone.

Internal zones in western and eastern segments contain older Variscan igneous massifs reworked in Mesozoic thick and thin-skinned nappes. During the Middle Miocene this zone was affected by intensive calc-alkaline arc volcanism that developed over the subduction zone of the flysch basins. At the same time, the internal zones of the orogenic belt were affected by large extensional structure of the back-arc Pannonian Basin. The last volcanic activity occurred at Ciomadul about 30,000 years ago.

The mountains started to gain their current shape from the latest Miocene onward. The slopes of the Carphartian contain at some locations solifluction deposits.

Iron, gold and silver were found in great quantities in the Western Carpathians. After the Roman emperor Trajan's conquest of Dacia, he brought back to Rome over 165 tons of gold and 330 tons of silver.

Ecology
The ecology of the Carpathians varies with altitude, ranging from lowland forests to alpine meadows. Foothill forests are primarily of broadleaf deciduous trees, including oak, hornbeam, and linden. European beech is characteristic of the montane forest zone. Higher-elevation subalpine forests are characterized by Norway spruce (Picea abies). Krummholz and alpine meadows occur above the treeline.

Wildlife in the Carpathians includes brown bear (Ursus arctos), wolf (Canis lupus), Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx), European wildcat (Felis silvestris), Tatra chamois (Rupicapra rupicapra tatrica), European bison (Bison bonasus), and golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos).

Divisions of the Carpathians

The range with the highest peaks is the Tatras in Slovakia and Poland. A major part of the western and northeastern Outer Eastern Carpathians in Poland, Ukraine, and Slovakia is traditionally called the Eastern Beskids. Romania comprises roughly 50% of the Carpathian chain where the rest of the highest peaks, above 2500m (in the Southern Carpathians) are found.

The geological border between the Western and Eastern Carpathians runs approximately along the line (south to north) between the towns of Michalovce, Bardejov, Nowy Sącz and Tarnów. In older systems the border runs more in the east, along the line (north to south) along the rivers San and Osława (Poland), the town of Snina (Slovakia) and river Tur'ia (Ukraine). Biologists shift the border even further to the east.

The border between the eastern and southern Carpathians is formed by the Predeal Pass, south of Brașov and the Prahova Valley.

In geopolitical terms, Carpathian Mountains are often grouped and labeled according to national or regional borders, but such division has turned out to be relative, since it was, and still is dependent on frequent historical, political and administrative changes of national or regional borders. According to modern geopolitical division, Carpathians can be grouped as: Serbian, Romanian, Ukrainian, Polish, Slovakian, Czech and Austrian. Within each nation, specific classifications of the Carpathians have been developing, often reflecting local traditions, and thus creating terminological diversity, that produces various challenges in the fields of comparative classification and international systematization.

The section of the Carpathians within the borders of Romania is commonly known as the Romanian Carpathians. In local use, Romanians sometimes denote as "Eastern Carpathians" only the Romanian part of the Eastern Carpathians, which lies on their territory (i.e., from the Ukrainian border or from the Prislop Pass to the south), which they subdivide into three simplified geographical groups (northern, central, southern), instead of Outer and Inner Eastern Carpathians. These groups are:
 * Maramureș-Bukovinian Carpathians (Romanian: Carpații Maramureșului și ai Bucovinei)
 * Moldavian-Transylvanian Carpathians (Romanian: Carpații Moldo-Transilvani)
 * Curvature Carpathians (Romanian: Carpații Curburii, Carpații de Curbură)

The section of the Carpathians within the borders of Ukraine is commonly known as the Ukrainian Carpathians. Classification of eastern sections of the Carpathians is particularly complex, since it was influenced by several overlapping traditions. Terms like Wooded Carpathians, Poloniny Mountains or Eastern Beskids are often used in varying scopes by authors belonging to different traditions.

title: Carpathian Mountains


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Weapons in Star Trek

The Star Trek fictional universe contains a variety of weapons, ranging from missiles (the classic photon torpedo) to melee (primarily used by the Klingons, a race of aliens in the Star Trek universe). The Star Trek franchise consists mainly of several multi-season television shows and a dozen movies, as well as various video games and inspired merchandise. Many aspects of the Star Trek universe impact modern popular culture, especially its fictitious terminology and the concept of weaponry on spacecraft. The franchise has had a widespread influence on its audiences from the late 20th to early 21st century. Notably, Star Trek 's science fiction concepts have been studied by real scientists; NASA described it in relation to the real world as "entertaining combination of real science, imaginary science gathered from lots of earlier stories, and stuff the writers make up week-by-week to give each new episode novelty." For example, NASA noted that the Star Trek "phasers" were a fictional extrapolation of real-life lasers, and compared them to real-life microwave based weapons that have a stunning effect.

Energy weapons
The franchise depicts various weapons which fit the motif of the raygun, the most prominent of these being the "phaser". These directed-energy weapons emit energy rather than a projectile. A hand phaser can be set to "stun" or "kill".

Phaser
Phasers are common and versatile phased array pulsed energy projectile weapons, first seen in the original Star Trek series and later in almost all subsequent films and television spin-offs. Phasers range in size from small arms to starship-mounted weaponry.

Though they seem to discharge in a continuous "beam", close observation reveals that phasers actually discharge a stream of pulsed energy projectiles into the target. Phaser output can be adjusted in both area of effect and output: a typical hand phaser can be adjusted so that it will merely shock or stun a living organism, while the effects of higher settings range from burning, disintegration, or to true vaporization. This versatility means they can also be used as welding torches or cutting tools, and can create heat sources by firing at a large, solid object (like a rock). The stream can be adjusted to strike multiple targets at once, strike a single target with precision, or even destroy large amounts of material. Phasers can be set to overload, whereby they build up a force-chamber explosion by continuously generating energy without releasing it; the resulting blast can destroy most natural objects within a 50 meter radius. The overload process is marked by a distinctive sound that increases in volume and frequency until it is deactivated or it detonates. Personal phasers can be made small enough to fit in the user's palm and still be lethal. Larger and more powerful phaser rifles are commonly issued to security personnel.

Ship-mounted phasers have a similar range of functions on a larger scale: The phasers on the USS Enterprise could be used as an "anti-missile" defense to destroy incoming projectiles, stun entire city blocks full of people, destroy cities, and even destroy entire asteroids up to a given size. The ship's phaser system was also said to be capable of destroying continents.

Although starships are frequently shown firing their phasers while at Warp speeds across the various Star Trek series, this was generally avoided during The Next Generation, and the Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual stated that it was impossible. The Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual, on the other hand, describes an "ACB-jacketed beam device" as the mechanism which allows phasers to function at Warp speeds.

According to later series, phasers release a beam of fictional subatomic particles called "rapid nadion", which are then refracted ("rectified") through superconducting crystals. The Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual indicates that the superconducting crystals used in phasers are called fushigi no umi, which is Japanese for "sea of mystery", and the phrase is written ふしぎの海 in the original glyphs. This was a homage to the 1990 anime series Fushigi no Umi no Nadia, known in North America as Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water.

The phasers that appeared in the 2009 reboot Star Trek appear similar in shape to the classic phasers, but fire singular energy pulses instead of a sustained stream of them, in a fashion similar to semi-automatic weapons. This version of the phaser seems to only have two settings, stun and kill, which fire blue and red colored pulses respectively. The barrel of the weapon is two-sided, one being colored red and the other blue to indicate the current setting; the user must manually rotate to the other output to use the other setting. A similar change was seen in the starship-mounted phaser banks, which also fire single energy pulse instead of continuous streams. In Star Trek Beyond, the barrel sides of the sidearm phasers are flat and both barrels shoot blue bolts that deal no physical damage, while the barrel tips are still colored blue and red.

The original phaser rifle prop from "Where No Man Has Gone Before" sold at auction in 2013 for $231,000.

Laser
Lasers are a sidearm in the original Star Trek pilot "The Cage", and laser pistols appear in several Star Trek: The Original Series (TOS) episodes, although later episodes in Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG) seemed to indicate that the laser's use as a weapon was outdated. In one instance, the ship-mounted lasers of two spacecraft were incapable of overcoming even the navigational shields of the USS Enterprise-D, though on at least two other occasions it was threatened with destruction by a laser-armed spacecraft. The Borg cutter weapon is a laser, as mentioned in the TNG episode "Q Who" and is capable of quickly disintegrating the hull of a Federation starship, as seen in the pilot episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, "Emissary". At lower power levels, it is capable of making "surgical" incisions into a ship's hull.

According to The Making of Star Trek, Gene Roddenberry claimed that production staff realized using laser technology would cause problems in the future, as people came to understand what lasers could and could not do. This resulted in the move to phasers on-screen, while letting lasers be known as a more primitive weapon style.

Plasma cannon
Plasma cannons are a form of directed energy weaponry used by both Earth Starfleet and the early Romulan Star Empire. On Starfleet vessels, they were the precursors to phase cannons. Plasma cannons fired a plasma discharge in the form of a beam or a burst, similar to the plasma bullets fired by hand-held plasma weapons, but much bigger in size. The NX-class was initially armed with plasma cannons.

Phase cannon
Phase cannons are 22nd century weapons, several of which first appear mounted to the Enterprise in the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "Silent Enemy". Phase cannons have a variable yield, with the cannons on the Enterprise being rated for a maximum output of 500 gigajoules, equivalent to about 120 tons TNT. Phase cannons are generally more powerful than spatial torpedoes. They are the 22nd century precursor to phaser technology, in addition to phase pistols (hand-carried phase cannons). Unlike 24th century phasers, they do not have the normal variable power settings or a variable beam width—only stun and kill.

Disruptor

Disruptors are employed by several alien species in this series, including Romulans, Klingons, Breen, Cardassians, Iridians and Orions in their personal and military small arms as well as being mounted as cannon, emitters, turrets, and banks. Only the first three species are known to have type-3 disruptors, the most advanced type developed so far, by the 24th Century. Disruptors cause damage by exciting the molecular bonds of targets to such great extents that those bonds are weakened and/or broken by the energies emitted, which often manifest as an explosive force. According to Last Unicorn's Star Trek: The Next Generation Role-playing Game, disruptors are considered less "elegant" than phaser-based weapons; their effects there are described as thermal shock and blunt force, as opposed to the "rapid nadion effect". As a result, disruptors inflict more damage to matter, but less damage to shields, than phasers. Klingons call their disruptors nISwI'.

Phased polaron cannon
Phased polaron cannons are the primary armament of the Dominion, the main antagonist faction in the later seasons of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. The cannon emits a beam of polaron particles, the fictional in-universe antimatter counterpart of the muon (not to be confused with the actual polaron or the actual antimuon). When first introduced, Dominion polaron cannons easily penetrate the shielding systems of most Alpha Quadrant races. The Alpha Quadrant races eventually learn to modify their shields to resist polaron weaponry, evoking surprise from the Vorta advisor Weyoun ("Call to Arms").

Tetryon cannon
Tetryon cannons are the primary armament of the Hirogen and are similar in application to phasers and disruptors. Tetryon cannons are unique in that they are designed primarily to damage energy and force fields, such as starship shields. Tetryon cannons damage matter, but not to the same extent as phasers or disruptors. This is in line with the Hirogen philosophy of the hunt, as depicted in Star Trek: Voyager (VOY). The Hirogen ship would therefore knock out its opponent's shields and beam over hunters to engage in face-to-face ranged or melee combat. This allows the Hirogen hunters to collect items that they would consider to be hunting trophies.

Varon-T disruptor
Varon-T disruptors were featured in the Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG) episode "The Most Toys", and were mentioned to be a rare type of disruptor made illegal in the Federation because of their slow, excruciating method of killing, with the weapons tearing the body apart from the inside. Kivas Fajo, a Zibalian trader in that episode, owned four of the five Varon-T disruptors ever manufactured (he slept with one under his pillow) and even used one on his own crew before his collection of rare items was confiscated after his capture and arrest for kidnapping and theft (among other crimes). The fifth Varon-T was kept by the criminal Kelsey who was killed when her scout ship exploded.

Ferengi energy whip
The Ferengi energy whip, as seen in the TNG episode "The Last Outpost", looks and handles like a typical Earth bullwhip and discharges a powerful phaser-like energy pulse.

Spatial torpedo
Also referred to as conventional torpedoes, spatial torpedoes are 22nd century weapons used by Enterprise. Spatial torpedoes are the ship's most powerful and primary ship-to-ship weapon before the installation of phase cannons. Spatial torpedoes are themselves superseded by more powerful photonic torpedoes. Unlike photonic torpedoes or any of the warhead's successors, spatial torpedoes are launched at sub-light velocity and can be used much in the manner of a missile, having the warhead on a fly-by-wire.

Photon torpedo
Photon torpedoes are a standard ship-based weapon armed with an antimatter warhead. They are present in every version of the Star Trek series and are a standard weapon on almost every Federation ship, though in Star Trek: Enterprise (ENT), the titular ship uses less powerful spatial torpedoes (guided, rocket propelled missiles) until receiving the more powerful "photonic" (as the characters describe them) variant. This is not reconciled with established canon because the events of ENT take place prior to the "Romulan Wars" during which, to quote Spock in "Balance of Terror", "This conflict was fought by our standards today with primitive atomic weapons". Photon torpedoes first appear on a Starfleet ship in the original series' episode "Arena" as part of the USS Enterprise's armament—in the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "The Expanse", the Enterprise (NX-01) first receives photonic torpedoes. Smaller Starfleet craft such as shuttlecraft and runabouts can be armed with "micro-torpedoes", a scaled-down version of photon torpedoes designed for use on craft too small to accommodate the full-sized weapon.

When fired, photon torpedoes usually appear as a spiky orb of energy of varying colours, such as red, orange, yellow, blue, or green, or in the case of Star Trek: The Original Series (TOS), red bolts. According to the original notes to TOS and The Making of Star Trek, photon torpedoes are energy shielded to allow armor-penetration. Several episodes seem to suggest this (TNG: "Suspicions"). The energy output of a photon torpedo, according to the Star Trek Technical Manuals is a maximum theoretical yield of 25 isotons and a maximum rated yield of 18.5 isotons. According to Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual, photon torpedoes use 1.5 kg of matter and the same amount of antimatter. In the TOS episode, "Balance of Terror", photon torpedoes apparently replaced nuclear warheads as the primary wartime weapons on Federation starships. Assuming a 100% mass-to-energy conversion ratio, reacting 1.5 kg of matter with 1.5 kg of antimatter would release the equivalent of 64.442 megatons of TNT, similar in scale (albeit slightly more powerful) to the Tsar Bomba.

Torpedoes are often depicted as being easy to modify to suit specific situations. Despite the stated maximum yield, torpedoes can apparently be made far more destructive with relatively little effort. In Star Trek: Voyager, Tuvok and Kim modify a normal photon torpedo with a gravimetric charge, a piece of Borg technology, to increase its destructive yield to 54 isotons. Kim comments that 50 isotons would have been sufficient to destroy a small planet. Janeway later instructs them to increase its yield even further, to 80 isotons. It is not specified exactly how they modified the warhead, but they only required a few hours to complete the work using materials readily available on Voyager. In Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Spock and Dr. McCoy modify a photon torpedo to track the plasma emissions from a cloaked Klingon bird of prey as it attacks the Enterprise-A and the Excelsior, similar to the principal function of the heat-seeking missile.

Photon torpedo launchers aboard ships are shown to be versatile enough to fire probes, which, in-universe, are designed with this functionality in mind. In Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, a torpedo casing is used as a makeshift coffin for burial in space and as scientific probes as in the TNG episode "In Theory" and in Star Trek Generations.

Plasma torpedo
Plasma torpedoes are used by the Romulans, Cardassians, and (according to Star Fleet Battles, Klingon Academy and Starfleet Command) the Gorn. The damage of a plasma torpedo spreads out over several ship systems at once, but the torpedo loses its effectiveness after only a few minutes of travel. Romulan plasma torpedoes use trilithium isotopes in their warheads.

Gravimetric torpedoes
Gravimetric torpedoes are torpedoes used by the Borg. The weapon emits a complex phase variance of gravitons to create a gravimetric distortion capable of tearing starships apart.

Quantum torpedo
Quantum torpedoes first appear in the Deep Space Nine episode "Defiant" as a weapon aboard the USS Defiant. In the DS9 episode "Paradise Lost", the USS Lakota was also stated to be carrying quantum torpedoes, although they were never used. Additionally, the USS Enterprise-E is equipped with quantum torpedoes in Star Trek: First Contact and Star Trek: Nemesis. The Federation are the only known users of quantum torpedoes. The Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual states that quantum torpedoes derive their destructive power from vacuum energy. Various in-universe sources describe quantum torpedoes as roughly double the destructive power of standard photon torpedoes, putting their yield somewhere in excess of 100 megatons of TNT.

Four of the USS Enterprise-E's quantum torpedoes destroyed an unshielded Borg sphere. The launcher appears on the 1701-E in Star Trek: Insurrection but is never fired. In Star Trek: Nemesis, nine of the Enterprise-E's quantum torpedoes disabled Scimitar's cloaking function.

Quantum torpedoes are normally shown in a shade of blue. As of Nemesis the following ship classes had quantum torpedoes launcher; Defiant, Intrepid, Luna, Sovereign, Vesta, Akira and Achilles-class, and the uncrewed Cardassian spacecraft Dreadnought were the only ships known to be equipped with quantum torpedoes. Though dreadnought only had quantum torpedos due to the marquis acquiring them illicitly, along with their other military grade weapons. Belana Torres installed the quantum torpedos on dreadnought as to increase its armament from the original photon compliment.

Polaron torpedo
Polaron torpedoes, like the Dominion weapon, are capable of penetrating normal shielding with ease. They appear in various Star Trek games. In Starfleet Command III, it is one of the Klingon's three heavy weapon options, the others being the photon torpedo and the ion cannon. It also appears in Star Trek: Armada and Star Trek: Armada II, as a researchable weapon for the Klingon Empire exclusive to the Vor'cha-class cruiser which takes out one of the targeted ship's systems at random.

Transphasic torpedo
Transphasic torpedoes appear only once, in the Voyager series finale, "Endgame". They are high-yield torpedoes that are designed specifically to fight the Borg. The future Admiral Janeway brought them back in time in a Federation shuttlecraft and had them installed onboard Voyager in 2378. They are among the most powerful weapons used in the Star Trek universe; just one is capable of obliterating an entire Borg cube, a feat normally requiring an almost impossible amount of punishment using standard Federation weapons. They work by delivering destructive subspace compression pulse explosion. Upon detonation the pulse is delivered in asymmetric superposition of multiple phase states. Since the shields can block only one subcomponent of the pulse the remaining majority is delivered to the target. On the top of it every torpedo has different transphasic configuration generated randomly by a dissonant feedback effect to prevent Borg or any other enemy to predict the configuration of the phase states. Although they did not appear in the film Nemesis, according to the non-canon Destiny book trilogy these were in fact kept by Starfleet as the weapon of last resort to be deployed to starships only when all else had failed against the Borg. They were the one and only thing Starfleet knew the Borg had not yet adapted to and for that reason wanted to keep this ace in the hole for as long as possible. Eventually, the situation became dire enough that the specifications were released to Federation and Klingon ships; the Borg eventually learned to adapt to them.

Isokinetic cannon
The Isokinetic cannon was seen in only one episode of Star Trek: Voyager, "Retrospect". In the episode, representatives of USS Voyager met with a weapons trader and designer known as Kovin. The demonstration of the weapon destroyed a target buoy composed of 10 m thick solid monotanium with a chromoelectric forcefield in one shot, coring it cleanly through. Kovin was killed before the installation of the weapon. Though the weapon was never known to have been removed from Voyager, it was never seen in use or referred to again. It is presumed that the diplomatic fallout that resulted from the circumstances surrounding Kovin's death led to the demo version being removed from Voyager and the deal to have it permanently installed being cancelled.

TR-116 projectile rifle
The TR-116 projectile rifle is a prototype weapon developed by the Federation for situations where conventional energy weapons might be rendered useless by damping fields or other countermeasures. It is essentially a conventional rifle, but with a rather futuristic visual style. It is introduced in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Field of Fire", where it is used in conjunction with a micro-transporter and a visual scanner headpiece to create an extremely potent sniper rifle. With the scanner, the shooter can precisely target people hundreds of meters away and through solid matter with no difficulty. Using the transporter attached to the barrel, the slug can then be transported during motion at full velocity, thus capable of traveling through walls and materializing within point-blank range of the target.

Phased plasma torpedo
Phased plasma torpedoes can phase out of normal space-time to bypass shields, then phase back in to detonate on a ship's hull, thus making shields worthless against them. They only appeared in the PC game Star Trek: Bridge Commander. Shortly after the recovery of the Pegasus device, the phasing properties used in the design were seen as a delivery system for torpedoes. Since Borg ships are almost impossible to destroy by Starfleet's current technology, it made sense to their engineers to design a torpedo that could phase itself and enter the body of a Borg cube, causing devastating damage. Reducing the size of the phasing coils used to accomplish an intangible state proved difficult. Further, the antimatter within the warhead had a destabilizing effect on the phasing coil. A new kind of explosive material was needed, and it was found using the principles behind the first observed Romulan plasma weapons. The installation of a high-energy plasma infuser would allow a torpedo casing to be filled with a warhead charged with high-energy plasma from the ship's warp nacelles. Warp plasma is highly unstable and can be easily detonated. Until recently, it was considered an undeliverable medium that could not be controlled. Using a nanite-controlled trigger for reactant release now allows vessels to deliver a high-energy plasma warhead payload within a Mark IV torpedo casing.

Chroniton torpedo
Chroniton torpedoes are a unique form of weapon employed by the Krenim. The weapons phase in and out of normal time, allowing them to pass through ordinary shields and directly damage a vessel's hull. Though quite dangerous, their reliability is not absolute, as Seven of Nine and Tuvok (as well as Kes in the alternate timeline presented in "Before and After") find an undetonated chroniton torpedo lodged in Voyager's hull, which in turn allowed the crew to adapt the shields to withstand further attacks.

Positron torpedo
The Kessok are a highly intelligent race that allied themselves with the Cardassians, albeit through deceit, in the video game Star Trek: Bridge Commander. They utilize positron torpedoes: powerful, slow-moving projectiles able to inflict nearly twice as much damage as quantum torpedoes.

Thalaron radiation
Thalaron radiation was first used in the feature film Star Trek: Nemesis by the villain Shinzon to assassinate the entire Romulan senate. Later in the movie, Shinzon attempts to kill the crew of the USS Enterprise-E using a ship-mounted version. Thalaron radiation, even in small amounts, petrifies living tissue almost instantly. Its properties also allow its range and area of effect to be precisely controlled, from encompassing a single room to engulfing an entire planet. Its massive destructive potential leads the Federation to consider it a biogenic weapon, and an extremely illegal one at that. It later features prominently in the plot of "Homecoming", the Star Trek: New Frontier short story in the 2008 Mirror Universe anthology Shards and Shadows, in which the rebels manage to steal a Romulan thalaron bomb intended for use by the Alliance, to strike a balance of power against them.

Metreon cascade
The metreon cascade was designed by Dr. Ma'Bor Jetrel of the Haakonian Order. Unstable metreon isotopes were used to create a devastating explosion, with radiation effects similar to those of the 20th-century atomic bomb. Those not killed or vaporized in the initial blast suffered terrible radiation poisoning and death in the aftermath. It was used only once, on the Talaxian moon Rinax in 2355.

Trilithium resin
Trilithium resin is a byproduct of a starship's warp engines that is lethal to humans, but harmless to Cardassians. A team of terrorists attempted to steal Trilithium resin from the warp core of the Enterprise-D when it was docked at Arkaria Station to receive a baryon sweep.

Captain Benjamin Sisko would later use a Trilithium resin torpedo to render a Maquis planet uninhabitable to all human life for fifty years by detonating it in the atmosphere.

Cobalt diselenide
Cobalt diselenide is a biogenic weapon that affects the nervous system. It is composed of selenium and rhodium nitrates. It is the counterpart to trilithium resin, being lethal to Cardassians but harmless to most other humanoids.

Aceton assimilators
Aceton assimilators are used to absorb energy from other sources and then redirect it back as hazardous radiation.

KaBar combat knife
The KaBar combat knife is the Federation's standard-issue combat and survival knife. It is 32.5 cm (12.8 in) and is standard equipment in survival gear and in emergency weapons caches aboard starships. Captain Kathryn Janeway uses one in the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Macrocosm".

In the real world, the KA-BAR is an official combat knife of the United States Marine Corps.

Katana
A katana is a Federation sword of Japanese origin. The only major difference compared to the old sword of today is that the Star Trek version is foldable, thus occupying a minimum space when carried and stored. In the 2009 Star Trek reboot, Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu produces a folding katana with which to cut the lines of his parachute, having stated just before this that his hand-to-hand combat expertise is in fencing.

Bayonet
The Jem'Hadar often have bayonets attached to their plasma (also known as polaron-pulse) rifles. They employ these in close combat, or to execute prisoners. Often Jem'Hadar bayonets are chemically enhanced, releasing a lethal nerve-agent on contact.

Kar'takin
These straight-bladed polearms are used by the Jem'Hadar in close combat. They were used by both Starfleet officers and Jem'Hadar in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "To the Death". The Kar'takin bear a resemblance to the Bardiche axe.

Shock Blade
In the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: The Fallen video game, this weapon delivers a taser-like jolt to whatever it strikes in combat. Holding the shock blade's trigger discharges a beam of neuro-electrical energy, with an effective range of 15 feet.

Bat'leth (AKA betleH)
The bat'leth is the Klingon double-sided scimitar/hook sword/lujiaodao hybrid-edge weapon, designed by martial arts enthusiast and Star Trek: The Next Generation effects producer Dan Curry. The bat'leth is a curved blade with spiked protrusions and handholds along the middle of the blade's back. In battle, the handholds are used to twirl and spin the blade rapidly.

Klingon oral history holds that the first bat'leth was forged around 625 A.D. by Kahless, who dropped a lock of his hair into the lava from the Kri'stak Volcano, then plunged the fiery lock into the lake of Lursor and twisted it to form a blade. After forging the weapon, he used it to defeat the tyrant Molor, and in doing so united the Klingon homeworld. This first bat'leth was known as the Sword of Kahless' and was stolen by the invading Hur'q; an episode of Deep Space Nine revolves around an effort to recover the Sword of Kahless. The name bat'leth itself is a slight corruption of batlh 'etlh, which means "Sword of Honor" in Klingon.

A "Valdris" blade was used in Colorado Springs, Colorado, in two 7-Eleven armed-robberies in 2009.

Chon'naq (AKA chonnaQ)
A smaller version of this "belly-spear" (the literal Klingon translation) is used in the children's game of qa'vak, which incorporates spinning hoops, and hones assorted skills needed for hunting. Once a male Klingon reaches the Age of Ascension, he is presented with an adult version of the chon'naq by his father - on the occasion of their first hunt together as men.

D'k tahg (AKA Daqtagh)
A d'k tahg is a Klingon dagger. The knife has three blades: a main blade with a cutout in the center, and two smaller blades on either side. In some models, these side blades are spring-loaded and can pop out into position and close up for storage. In other models, the blades are fixed. It also features a pommel studded with blunt spikes. The d'k tahg first appeared in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and appeared occasionally throughout the following films and television series. The knife was designed by Gil Hibben. Although the d'k tahg appeared in Star Trek III, it was not referred to by its name until Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Haf'leth
This polearm is similar to a halberd.

Iw'taj (AKA 'Iw taj)
Directly descended from the weapon which inspired the Klingon tIq'ghob emblem, this dagger (literal translation: 'blood-knife') is longer and heavier than the d’k tahg (which was derived from it). Unlike the d'k tahg, which was conceived as a general-purpose combat-knife intended for mass production, the iw'taj is a dedicated dueling weapon.

The two side-blades, one pointing up and one pointing down, serve particular functions. The upward-pointing blade is designed to catch an opponent's weapon and, with a twisting motion, disarm him. The downward-pointing blade is designed to inflict shallow cuts in passing, sapping the enemy's strength; said design allows the weapon to advance smoothly, without this blade getting in the way. Duelists often hook their index and middle fingers over the crossbar; doing this allows the weapon to achieve impressive agility, despite weakening the grip...although it may also be used with a reverse grip.

The iw'taj is often carried by traditionalists, and by discerning martial artists. Usually, a warrior who carries both a mek’leth and an iw'taj is from a Qvav’mar background...and/or is a personal combatant of high caliber.

Jej'taj (AKA jejtaj)
This throwing-dagger is more often used defensively, to ward off blade attacks. Typically, it is wielded as a combination knuckleduster/boomerang.

Mek'leth (AKA meqleH)
A mek'leth is the Klingon short sword that appears in several episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and in the film Star Trek: First Contact. Designed by Dan Curry, it consists of a short, thick, curved blade with a metal guard extending back parallel with the grip to protect the hand. Worf is the most commonly seen user of the mek'leth, owning one and using it several times, including in hand-to-hand combat against Borg drones in First Contact.

Oy'naq (AKA 'oy'naQ)
This "pain-stick" (the literal translation), capable of killing a 2-ton Rectyne Monopod, is used as part of the Klingon Age of Ascension ritual.

Kut'luch (AKA qutluch)
Similar to the d'k tahg, the kut'luch is "the ceremonial weapon of an assassin". A kut'luch is designed to do considerable damage to internal organs, by Klingon standards thus making it an extremely lethal weapon. The kut'luch is featured in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Sins of the Father", when Worf's brother, Kurn, is stabbed; and in the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Real Life", where the Doctor's simulated "son" prepares for the Kut'luch ceremony.

Tik'leth (AKA tIqleH)
This “longsword” (the literal translation of tIq 'etlh) is one of the more Terran-like Klingon weapons, by most standards. Like spears, tik'leths are traditional weapons of the rank-and-file...although many nobles prefer a tik'leth's offensive functionality to that of a bat'leth, while many soldiers carry mass-produced bat’leths as a status symbol.

Teral'n
A Romulan polearm, similar to a trident with retractable blades. It appears in the 2009 Star Trek reboot and is used by the renegade miner Nero. In the Countdown comic, Nero's weapon is revealed to be the "Debrune teral'n", an ancient Romulan artifact that symbolized the empire's power; it is traditionally held by the presiding Praetor.

A similar weapon, resembling an axe was also used by a member of Nero's crew. While widely considered to also be a Teral'n, the weapon has yet to be confirmed as one by an official source.

Ahn'woon
An ahn'woon is a Vulcan catch-strangle weapon, similar in principle to the Earth Roman gladiator's cast net but much more versatile. Depending on the skill of the user, it can be used several ways. It is wide enough to be a sling. In the James Blish written adaptation of the TOS script, Kirk employs it this way and hits Spock in the ribs with a stone. The multi-strapped weapon (approximately 1.1 meters long) uses weights on the ends of the straps, like bolas, to entangle, stun, or cut the target. The application of tying action and wrapping, as with a garrote, can restrict the breathing of the target, asphyxiating the victim. It is considered the oldest Vulcan weapon.

Lirpa
A lirpa is a Vulcan weapon consisting of a wooden staff a little over a meter in length, with a semicircular blade at one end and a metal bludgeon on the other. The overall length of the weapon appears to be approximately 48 inches. It is similar to the monk's spade and the pugil stick. Captain James T. Kirk and Spock used lirpas when they fought for possession of T'Pring during Spock's Pon farr ritual in "Amok Time". Soldiers sent after Jonathan Archer and T'Pol fought with lirpas because Vulcan's "Forge" region makes conventional energy weapons useless.

Glavin
In the TNG episode "Code of Honor", the Ligonians have deep traditions of fighting with a poison-tipped hand weapon called a glavin. It is a large glove with a recurved claw at the end, and covered with dozens of spines. In several episodes, Worf is seen displaying one in his quarters, most likely the same one used by Lt. Tasha Yar.

Mortaes
In the TOS episode "The Cloud Minders", mortaes and thongs are mining tools used as martial weapons by the "troglyte" (a corruption of troglodyte) miners, and apparently the ruling class is also trained with these weapons, as Plasus challenges Kirk to hand-to-hand combat, asking, "Are you as brave with a mortae as with a phaser?" Kirk responds, "Both will kill."

Ushaan-tor
In the Enterprise episode "United", Andorian commander Thy'lek Shran and the NX-01's captain Jonathan Archer, as a second for a Tellarite officer who kills Tallas, Shran's chief tactical officer and lover, engage in an Andorian "ushaan" duel. The weapon used is the ushaan-tor, an Andorian ice-mining blade. The handheld blade of the ushaan-tor is about 20 cm from end to end, and resembles an Inupiat Ulu blade from Alaska, but in a one-piece all-metal design instead of having a separate wooden handle.

Subspace weapons
Subspace weapons are a class of directed energy weapons that directly affect subspace. The weapons can produce actual tears in subspace, and are extremely unpredictable. These weapons were banned under the second Khitomer Accord. The Son'a equipped their vessels with these types of weapons.

Isolytic burst
Son'a vessels carried and used isolytic burst weapons, a type of subspace weapon. They were seen using this weapon against the Enterprise-E in Star Trek: Insurrection. The Enterprise was only able to escape the weapon's effect by ejecting its warp core and detonating it to seal a subspace rift.

Tricobalt devices
The tricobalt warhead is a subspace weapon whose high-yield detonations can tear holes in subspace. Tricobalt devices are not a standard armament of Federation vessels and yields are calculated in Tera-Cochranes, indicating that its mechanism is somewhat similar to the general reaction in a warp field.

In TOS: "A Taste of Armageddon", the Eminian Union classified the USS Enterprise as 'destroyed' when it was hit by virtual tricobalt satellites. In DS9: "Trials and Tribble-ations", Arne Darvin plants a tricobalt explosive in a dead Tribble in an attempt to kill Kirk. USS Voyager uses a pair of tricobalt devices to destroy the Caretaker array in the Star Trek: Voyager pilot episode, "Caretaker", and such a device was used against Voyager in the episode "Blink of an Eye". A tricobalt warhead was also used by the Tholians in the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "In a Mirror, Darkly". They detonated a tricobalt warhead inside the gravity well of a dead star. The explosion created an interphasic rift, which they used to lure the Federation starship USS Defiant from another universe.

The games Star Trek: Armada and Star Trek: Armada II have ships armed with Tricobalt devices for artillery support. The Federation Steamrunner-class, the Klingon Chuq'Beh-class Bird of Prey, the Romulan Raptor-class Warbird, and the Borg Harbinger are all capable of using them. The workings of the weapon is unknown but theorised is the use of Cobalt-60.

It is far more likely that tricobalt refers to the third periodical table analog for cobalt; similar to dilithium being the second periodic table equivalent of regular lithium. "trititanium" and most other in trek universe usage where a numeric prefix is appended to a regular real world periodic table element refers to additional periodic tables whose elements are composed of nucleons that are not protons or neutrons and maybe not even regular electrons yet can form atoms molecules and chemical compounds similar to normal matter.

Neutron radiation such as produced by a Cobalt 60 weapon is not very useful for destroying outposts, starships or anything else that is not a living creature.

Magnetometric guided charges
Around Stardate 43995, the Borg used this weapon to drive the USS Enterprise, NCC-1701-D, from the Paulson Nebula. This shortly leads to the abduction of Captain Jean-Luc Picard.

Multikinetic neutronic mines
During Season 4, Episode 1 of Star Trek: Voyager, Captain Janeway consults with Borg representative Seven of Nine on how to destroy Species 8472. Janeway calls Seven of Nine's "multikinetic neutronic mine" a "weapon of mass destruction," following up on a statement from Tuvok that it would affect an entire starsystem, destroying innocent worlds. The mine's five-million isoton yield can disperse Borg nanoprobes across a five-light year range.

Dreadnought
Dreadnought was a Cardassian self-guided missile, containing one thousand kilograms of matter, and another thousand of antimatter. Tuvok describes this as enough to destroy a small moon. Although described as a self-guided missile, in practice Dreadnought functions much like an autonomous starship, and it even had life support capability on board. It possesses shields, phasers, a complement of quantum torpedoes, a Thoron shock emitter, a plasma wave weapon, engines capable of reaching at least Warp 9, and a sophisticated computer AI. It appears in the Voyager episode of the same name. It had been captured by the Maquis due to a failed detonator and reprogrammed to attack its original creator. It was dragged into the Delta Quadrant in much the same manner as Voyager, and when unable to resolve the unforeseen situation it locked on to a planet that was similar to the one it was programmed to target, but which was inhabited by innocents. Dreadnought was equipped with an exceptionally sophisticated artificial intelligence, capable of "paranoia" to a certain degree, as when reprogrammer B'Elanna Torres attempted to prevent it from destroying the innocent planet, it came to the conclusion that she had been captured by her Cardassian enemies and forced to make up a story to prevent the attack; it then pretended to follow her commands and shut down, only to re-activate and continue its mission once she was no longer aboard.

Series 5 long range tactical armor unit
Similar in purpose to the Cardassian Dreadnought, the Tactical Armor Units are self-guided missiles with sophisticated artificial intelligence. They are much smaller than Dreadnought, being only a few feet in length, and while nowhere near as powerful, they are nonetheless classified as weapons of mass destruction, capable of destroying everything in a 200-kilometer radius with a highly focused antimatter explosion. Their coordination and control is done through a "Strategic Command Matrix", analogous to a nuclear control network of the type used by the United States. Each one possesses shielding, warp drive of indeterminate speed, and a sentient, genius-level artificial intelligence programmed to do whatever is necessary to reach their targets and detonate. They can detect and prevent tampering, are intelligent enough to find a way past almost any obstacle, and can win engagements even when outnumbered. They were created by a Delta Quadrant race called the Druoda, and the devices were greatly feared for their endurance and tenacity.

Q firearms
Q firearms were used in the Q Civil War by the Voyager crew to compensate against the infinite power of the Q in "The Q and the Grey". They are depicted as muzzle-loading muskets, to fit with the American Civil War-theme used by the Q Continuum as a concession to the human characters' limited perceptions. Presumably, their actual form would be as incomprehensible to non-Q as the Continuum itself. The use of the weapons caused stars to go supernova as a side effect in normal reality. They are arguably the most powerful weapons ever wielded by any humanoid species, as indicated by their ability to injure the otherwise-invulnerable Q.

Red matter
In the 2009 Star Trek reboot, red matter was developed on Vulcan before 2387. When even a droplet is ignited an unstable singularity is formed; accordingly, it must be stored in a protective chamber. The red matter was originally to be used to save the Romulan homeworld from a volatile supernova, but the design was finished too late to prevent Romulus' destruction. Upon capture in the "past" (2258) by the Romulan Nero, it was used as a planet-destroying doomsday weapon in conjunction with a plasma drill which bored a hole almost to the core of a planet. A small amount of red matter was then activated at the bottom of the drilling site, creating a black hole in the heart of the planet that would tear it apart from within. Red matter was thus used to destroy an alternate Vulcan ("alternate" due to temporal disruption, from Nero's haphazard method of time travel), then ultimately destroyed Nero's ship, the Narada, along with all remaining technology from his ship, and all of the remaining red matter.

Psionic resonator
A psionic resonator was a weapon that functioned by amplifying telepathic energy and focusing it into kinetic form. In 2369 one type of Vulcan psionic resonator, known as the Stone of Gol was discovered to still exist, though in pieces, long after it was thought destroyed. The mercenary Arctus Baran was hired to locate the pieces and deliver them to the Vulcan Isolationist Movement.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Weapons in Star Trek


text:
Chariot

A chariot is a type of cart driven by a charioteer, usually using horses to provide rapid motive power. The oldest known chariots have been found in burials of the Sintashta culture in modern-day Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia, dated to c. 1950–1880 BCE and are depicted on cylinder seals from Central Anatolia in Kültepe dated to c. 1900 BCE. The critical invention that allowed the construction of light, horse-drawn chariots was the spoked wheel.

The chariot was a fast, light, open, two-wheeled conveyance drawn by two or more equids (usually horses) that were hitched side by side, and was little more than a floor with a waist-high guard at the front and sides. It was initially used for ancient warfare during the Bronze and Iron Ages, but after its military capabilities had been superseded by light and heavy cavalries, chariots continued to be used for travel and transport, in processions, for games, and in races.

Etymology
The word "chariot" comes from the Latin term carrus, a loanword from Gaulish karros.

In ancient Rome a biga described a chariot requiring two horses, a triga three, and a quadriga four.

Origins
The wheel may have been invented at several places, with early evidence found in Ukraine, Poland, Germany, and Slovenia. Evidence of wheeled vehicles appears from the mid 4th millennium BC near-simultaneously in the Northern Caucasus (Maykop culture), and in Central Europe. These earliest vehicles may have been ox carts. A necessary precursor to the invention of the chariot is the domestication of animals, and specifically domestication of horses – a major step in the development of civilization. Despite the large impact horse domestication has had in transport and communication, tracing its origins has been challenging. Evidence supports horses having been domesticated in the Eurasian Steppes, with studies suggesting the Botai culture in modern-day Kazakhstan were the first, about 3500 BCE. Others say horses were domesticated earlier than 3500 BCE in Eastern Europe (modern Ukraine and Western Kazakhstan), 6000 years ago

The spread of spoke-wheeled chariots has been closely associated with early Indo-Iranian migrations. The earliest known chariots have been found in Sintashta culture burial sites, and the culture is considered a strong candidate for the origin of the technology, which spread throughout the Old World and played an important role in ancient warfare. It is also strongly associated with the ancestors of modern domestic horses, the DOM2 population (DOM2 horses originated from the Western Eurasia steppes, especially the lower Volga-Don, but not in Anatolia, during the late fourth and early third millennia BCE. Their genes may show selection for easier domestication and stronger backs). These Aryan people migrated southward into South Asia, ushering in the Vedic period around 1750 BCE. Shortly after this, about 1700 BCE, evidence of chariots appears in Asia-Minor.

The earliest fully developed spoke-wheeled horse chariots are from the chariot burials of the Andronovo (Timber-Grave) sites of the Sintashta-Petrovka Proto-Indo-Iranian culture in modern Russia and Kazakhstan from around 2000 BCE. This culture is at least partially derived from the earlier Yamna culture. It built heavily fortified settlements, engaged in bronze metallurgy on an industrial scale, and practiced complex burial rituals reminiscent of Hindu rituals known from the Rigveda and the Avesta. Over the next few centuries, the Andronovo culture spread across the steppes from the Urals to the Tien Shan, likely corresponding to the time of early Indo-Iranian cultures.

Not everyone agrees that the Sintashta culture vehicle finds are true chariots.

In 1996 Joost Crouwel and Mary Aiken Littauer wrote"Let us consider what is actually known of the Sintashta and Krivoe Ozero vehicles. At Sintashta, there remained only the imprints of the lower parts of the wheels in their slots in the floor of the burial chamber; Krivoe Ozero also preserved imprints of parts of the axle and naves. At Sintashta, the wheel tracks and their position relative to the walls of the tomb chamber limited the dimensions of the naves, hence the stability of the vehicle. Ancient naves were symmetrical, the part outside the spokes of equal length to that inside.

The present reconstructions of the Sintashta and Krivoe Ozero vehicles above the axle level raise many doubts and questions, but one cannot argue about something for which there is no evidence. It is from the wheel track measurements and the dimensions and positions of the wheels alone that we may legitimately draw conclusions and these are alone sufficient to establish that the Sintashta-Petrovka vehicles would not be manoeuverable enough for use either in warfare or in racing." Peter Raulwing and Stefan Burmeister consider the Sintashta and Krivoe Ozero finds from the steppe to be carts rather than chariots."However, recent discoveries in the Eurasian steppe have provided fresh support to the claim that the chariot originated there, rather than in the Near East itself, and may be attributed to speakers of an Indo-Iranian (or Indo-Aryan) language. In particular, archaeological remains of horse gear and spoked wheeled vehicles have been found at the sites of Sintashta (Russia) and Krivoe Ozero (northern Kazakhstan), with calibrated radiocarbon dating to ca. 2000–1800. These finds, however, provide evidence of a two-wheeled spoked cart that does not fit the definition of the ancient Near Eastern chariot. Before these discoveries can help answer the question of where the chariot originated, thorough studies of the spoked wheeled vehicles and horse gear of the steppes, as well as of interconnections and transfer of knowledge, are necessary (cf. Epimachov and Korjakova in Fansa and Burmeister 2004)."

Spread by Indo-Europeans

Chariots figure prominently in Indo-Iranian mythology. Chariots are also an important part of both Hindu and Persian mythology, with most of the gods in their pantheon portrayed as riding them. The Sanskrit word for a chariot is rátha- (m.), which is cognate with Avestan raθa- (also m.), and in origin a substantiation of the adjective Proto-Indo-European  meaning "having wheels", with the characteristic accent shift found in Indo-Iranian substantivisations. This adjective is in turn derived from the collective noun ' "wheels", continued in Latin rota, which belongs to the noun ' for "wheel" (from  "to run") that is also found in Germanic, Celtic and Baltic (Old High German rad n., Old Irish roth m., Lithuanian rãtas m.). Nomadic tribes of the Pontic steppes, like Scythians such as Hamaxobii, would travel in wagons, carts, and chariots during their migrations.

Hittites

The oldest testimony of chariot warfare in the ancient Near East is the Old Hittite Anitta text (18th century BCE), which mentions 40 teams of horses (in the original cuneiform spelling: 40 ṢÍ-IM-TI ANŠE.KUR.RAḪI.A) at the siege of Salatiwara. Since the text mentions teams rather than chariots, the existence of chariots in the 18th century BCE is uncertain. The first certain attestation of chariots in the Hittite empire dates to the late 17th century BCE (Hattusili I). A Hittite horse-training text is attributed to Kikkuli the Mitanni (15th century BCE).

The Hittites were renowned charioteers. They developed a new chariot design that had lighter wheels, with four spokes rather than eight, and that held three rather than two warriors. It could hold three warriors because the wheel was placed in the middle of the chariot and not at the back as in Egyptian chariots. Typically one Hittite warrior steered the chariot while the second man was usually the main archer; the third warrior would either wield a spear or sword when charging at enemies or hold up a large shield to protect himself and the others from enemy arrows.

Hittite prosperity largely depended on their control of trade routes and natural resources, specifically metals. As the Hittites gained dominion over Mesopotamia, tensions flared among the neighboring Assyrians, Hurrians, and Egyptians. Under Suppiluliuma I, the Hittites conquered Kadesh and, eventually, the whole of Syria. The Battle of Kadesh in 1274 BCE is likely to have been the largest chariot battle ever fought, involving over 5,000 chariots.

Bronze Age Indian Subcontinent

Models of single axled, solid wheeled ox-drawn vehicles, have been found at several mature Indus Valley cites, such as Chanhudaro, Daimabad, Harappa, and Nausharo.

Spoked-wheeled, horse-drawn chariots, often carrying an armed passenger, are depicted in second millennium BCE Chalcolithic period rock paintings, examples are known from Chibbar Nulla, Chhatur Bhoj Nath Nulla, and Kathotia. . There are some depictions of chariots among the petroglyphs in the sandstone of the Vindhya range. Two depictions of chariots are found in Morhana Pahar, Mirzapur district. One depicts a biga and the head of the driver. The second depicts a quadriga, with six-spoked wheels, and a driver standing up in a large chariot box. This chariot is being attacked. One figure, who is armed with a shield and a mace, stands in the chariot's path; another figure, who is armed with a bow and arrow, threatens the right flank. It has been suggested (speculated) that the drawings record a story, most probably dating to the early centuries BCE, from some center in the area of the Ganges–Yamuna plain into the territory of still Neolithic hunting tribes. The very realistic chariots carved into the Sanchi stupas are dated to roughly the 1st century.

Bronze Age solid-disk wheel carts were found in 2018 at Sinauli, which were interpreted by some as horse-pulled "chariots," predating the arrival of the horse-centered Indo-Aryans. They were ascribed by Sanjay Manjul, director of the excavations, to the Ochre Coloured Pottery culture (OCP)/Copper Hoard Culture, which was contemporaneous with the Late Harappan culture, and interpreted by him as horse-pulled chariots. Majul further noted that "the rituals relating to the Sanauli burials showed close affinity with Vedic rituals, and stated that "the dating of the Mahabharata is around 1750 BCE." According to Asko Parpola these finds were ox-pulled carts, indicating that these burials are related to an early Aryan migration of Proto-Indo-Iranian speaking people into the Indian subcontinent, "forming then the ruling elite of a major Late Harappan settlement."

Horse-drawn chariots, as well as their cult and associated rituals, were spread by the Indo-Iranians, and horses and horse-drawn chariots were introduced in India by the Indo-Aryans.

In religion
In Rigveda, Indra is described as strong willed, armed with a thunderbolt, riding a chariot:"May the strong Heaven make thee the Strong wax stronger: Strong, for thou art borne by thy two strong Bay Horses. So, fair of cheek, with mighty chariot, mighty, uphold us, strong-willed, thunder armed, in battle.

— RigVeda, Book 5, Hymn XXXVI: Griffith"Among Rigvedic deities, notably the Vedic Sun God Surya rides on a one spoked chariot driven by his charioteer Aruṇa. Ushas (the dawn) rides in a chariot, as well as Agni in his function as a messenger between gods and men.

The Jain Bhagavi Sutra states that Indian troops used a chariot with a club or mace attached to it during the war against the Licchavis during the reign of Ajatashatru of Magadha.

Persia

The Persians succeeded Elam in the mid 1st millennium. They may have been the first to yoke four horses to their chariots. They also used scythed chariots. Cyrus the Younger employed these chariots in large numbers at the Battle of Cunaxa.

Herodotus mentions that the Ancient Libyan and the Ancient Indian (Sattagydia, Gandhara and Hindush) satrapies supplied cavalry and chariots to Xerxes the Great's army. However, by this time, cavalry was far more effective and agile than the chariot, and the defeat of Darius III at the Battle of Gaugamela (331 BCE), where the army of Alexander simply opened their lines and let the chariots pass and attacked them from behind, marked the end of the era of chariot warfare (barring the Seleucid and Pontic powers, India, China, and the Celtic peoples).

Introduction in the Near East
Chariots were introduced in the Near East in the 17(18)th–16th centuries BCE. Some scholars argue that the horse chariot was most likely a product of the ancient Near East early in the 2nd millennium BCE. Archaeologist Joost Crouwel writes that "Chariots were not sudden inventions, but developed out of earlier vehicles that were mounted on disk or cross-bar wheels. This development can best be traced in the Near East, where spoke-wheeled and horse-drawn chariots are first attested in the earlier part of the second millennium BCE..." and were illustrated on a Syrian cylinder seal dated to either the 18th or 17th century BCE.

Early wheeled vehicles in the Near East
According to Christoph Baumer, the earliest discoveries of wheels in Mesopotamia come from the first half of the third millennium BCE – more than half a millennium later than the first finds from the Kuban region. At the same time, in Mesopotamia, some intriguing early pictograms of a sled that rests on wooden rollers or wheels have been found. They date from about the same time as the early wheel discoveries in Europe and may indicate knowledge of the wheel.

The earliest depiction of vehicles in the context of warfare is on the Standard of Ur in southern Mesopotamia, c. 2500 BCE. These are more properly called wagons which were double-axled and pulled by oxen or a hybrid of a donkey and a female onager, named Kunga in the city of Nagar which was famous for breeding them. The hybrids were used by the Eblaite, early Sumerian, Akkadian and Ur III armies. Although sometimes carrying a spearman with the charioteer (driver), such heavy wagons, borne on solid wooden wheels and covered with skins, may have been part of the baggage train (e.g., during royal funeral processions) rather than vehicles of battle in themselves.

The Sumerians had a lighter, two-wheeled type of cart, pulled by four asses, and with solid wheels. The spoked wheel did not appear in Mesopotamia until the mid second millennium BCE.

Egypt

Chariot use made its way into Egypt around 1650 BCE during the Hyksos invasion of Egypt and establishment of the Fourteenth Dynasty. In 1659 BCE the Indo-European Hittites sacked Babylon, which demonstrated the superiority of chariots in antiquity.

The chariot and horse were used extensively in Egypt by the Hyksos invaders from the 16th century BCE onwards, though discoveries announced in 2013 potentially place the earliest chariot use as early as Egypt's Old Kingdom (c. 2686–2181 BCE). In the remains of Egyptian and Assyrian art, there are numerous representations of chariots, which display rich ornamentation. The chariots of the Egyptians and Assyrians, with whom the bow was the principal arm of attack, were richly mounted with quivers full of arrows. The Egyptians invented the yoke saddle for their chariot horses in c. 1500 BCE. As a general rule, the Egyptians used chariots as mobile archery platforms; chariots always had two men, with the driver steering the chariot with his reins while the main archer aimed his bow and arrow at any targets within range. The best preserved examples of Egyptian chariots are the four specimens from the tomb of Tutankhamun. Chariots can be pulled by two or more horses.

Ancient Canaan and Israel
Chariots are frequently mentioned in the Hebrew Tanakh and the Greek Old Testament, respectively, particularly by the prophets, as instruments of war or as symbols of power or glory. First mentioned in the story of Joseph (Genesis 50:9), "Iron chariots" are mentioned also in Joshua (17:16, 18) and Judges (1:19,4:3, 13) as weapons of the Canaanites and Israelites. 1 Samuel 13:5 mentions chariots of the Philistines, who are sometimes identified with the Sea Peoples or early Greeks.

Examples from The Jewish Study Bible of the Tanakh (Jewish Bible) include:

 * Isaiah 2:7 Their land is full of silver and gold, there is no limit to their treasures; their land is full of horses, there is no limit to their chariots.
 * Jeremiah 4:13 Lo, he [I.e., the invader of v. 7.] ascends like clouds, his chariots are like a whirlwind, his horses are swifter than eagles. Woe to us, we are ruined!
 * Ezekiel 26:10 From the cloud raised by his horses dust shall cover you; from the clatter of horsemen and wheels and chariots, your walls shall shake−when he enters your gates as men enter a breached city.
 * Psalms 20:8 They [call] on chariots, they [call] on horses, but we call on the name of the L ORD our God.
 * Song of Songs 1:9 I have likened you, my darling, to a mare in Pharaoh's chariots

Examples from the King James Version of the Christian Bible include:
 * And Solomon gathered chariots and horsemen: and he had a thousand and four hundred chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen, which he placed in the chariot cities, and with the king at Jerusalem.
 * And the LORD was with Judah; and he drave out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron.
 * Acts 8:37–38 Then Philip said, "If you believe with all your heart, you may." And he answered and said, "I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God." So he commanded the chariot to stand still. And both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water, and he baptized him.

Small domestic horses may have been present in the northern Negev before 3000 BCE. Jezreel (city) has been identified as the chariot base of King Ahab. And a decorated bronze tablet thought to be the head of a lynchpin of a Canaanite chariot was found at a site that may be Sisera's fortress Harosheth Haggoyim.

Urartu
In Urartu (860–590 BCE), the chariot was used by both the nobility and the military. In Erebuni (Yerevan), King Argishti of Urartu is depicted riding on a chariot which is pulled by two horses. The chariot has two wheels and each wheel has about eight spokes. This type of chariot was used around 800 BCE.

Introduction in Bronze-Age Europe
As David W. Anthony writes in his book The Horse, the Wheel, and Language, in Eastern Europe, the earliest well-dated depiction of a wheeled vehicle (a wagon with two axles and four wheels) is on the Bronocice pot (c. 3500 BCE). It is a clay pot excavated in a Funnelbeaker settlement in Swietokrzyskie Voivodeship in Poland. The oldest securely dated real wheel-axle combination in Eastern Europe is the Ljubljana Marshes Wheel (c. 3150 BCE).

Greece

The later Greeks of the first millennium BCE had a (still not very effective) cavalry arm (indeed, it has been argued that these early horseback riding soldiers may have given rise to the development of the later, heavily armed foot-soldiers known as hoplites ), and the rocky terrain of the Greek mainland was unsuited for wheeled vehicles.The chariot was heavily used by the Mycaenean Greeks, most probably adopted from the Hittites, around 1600 BCE. Linear B tablets from Mycenaean palaces record large inventories of chariots, sometimes with specific details as to how many chariots were assembled or not (i.e. stored in modular form).On a gravestone from the royal Shaft-grave V in Mycenae dated LH II (about 1500 BCE) there is one of the earliest depiction of the chariot in Achaean art. This sculpture shows a single man driving a two-wheeled small box chariot. Later the vehicles were used in games and processions, notably for races at the Olympic and Panathenaic Games and other public festivals in ancient Greece, in hippodromes and in contests called agons. They were also used in ceremonial functions, as when a paranymph, or friend of a bridegroom, went with him in a chariot to fetch the bride home.

Herodotus (Histories, 5. 9) Reports that chariots were widely used in the Pontic–Caspian steppe by the Sigynnae.

Greek chariots were made to be drawn by two horses attached to a central pole. If two additional horses were added, they were attached on each side of the main pair by a single bar or trace fastened to the front or prow of the chariot, as may be seen on two prize vases in the British Museum from the Panathenaic Games at Athens, Greece, in which the driver is seated with feet resting on a board hanging down in front close to the legs of the horses. The biga itself consists of a seat resting on the axle, with a rail at each side to protect the driver from the wheels. Greek chariots appear to have lacked any other attachment for the horses, which would have made turning difficult.

The body or basket of the chariot rested directly on the axle (called beam) connecting the two wheels. There was no suspension, making this an uncomfortable form of transport. At the front and sides of the basket was a semicircular guard about 3 ft (1 m) high, to give some protection from enemy attack. At the back the basket was open, making it easy to mount and dismount. There was no seat, and generally only enough room for the driver and one passenger.

The reins were mostly the same as those in use in the 19th century, and were made of leather and ornamented with studs of ivory or metal. The reins were passed through rings attached to the collar bands or yoke, and were long enough to be tied round the waist of the charioteer to allow for defense.

The wheels and basket of the chariot were usually of wood, strengthened in places with bronze or iron. The wheels had from four to eight spokes and tires of bronze or iron. Due to the widely spaced spokes, the rim of the chariot wheel was held in tension over comparatively large spans. Whilst this provided a small measure of shock absorption, it also necessitated the removal of the wheels when the chariot was not in use, to prevent warping from continued weight bearing. Most other nations of this time had chariots of similar design to the Greeks, the chief differences being the mountings.

According to Greek mythology, the chariot was invented by Erichthonius of Athens to conceal his feet, which were those of a dragon.

The most notable appearance of the chariot in Greek mythology occurs when Phaëton, the son of Helios, in an attempt to drive the chariot of the sun, managed to set the earth on fire. This story led to the archaic meaning of a phaeton as one who drives a chariot or coach, especially at a reckless or dangerous speed. Plato, in his Chariot Allegory, depicted a chariot drawn by two horses, one well behaved and the other troublesome, representing opposite impulses of human nature; the task of the charioteer, representing reason, was to stop the horses from going different ways and to guide them towards enlightenment.

The Greek word for chariot, ἅρμα, hárma, is also used nowadays to denote a tank, properly called άρμα μάχης, árma mákhēs, literally a "combat chariot".

Central and Northern Europe

The Trundholm sun chariot is dated to c. 1500-1300 BCE (see: Nordic Bronze Age). The horse drawing the solar disk runs on four wheels, and the Sun itself on two. All wheels have four spokes. The "chariot" comprises the solar disk, the axle, and the wheels, and it is unclear whether the sun is depicted as the chariot or as the passenger. Nevertheless, the presence of a model of a horse-drawn vehicle on two spoked wheels in Northern Europe at such an early time is astonishing.

In addition to the Trundholm chariot, there are numerous petroglyphs from the Nordic Bronze Age that depict chariots. One petroglyph, drawn on a stone slab in a double burial from c. 1000 BCE, depicts a biga with two four-spoked wheels.

The use of the composite bow in chariot warfare is not attested in northern Europe.

Western Europe
The Celts were famous for their chariots and modern English words like car, carriage and carry are ultimately derived from the native Brythonic language (Modern Welsh: Cerbyd). The word chariot itself is derived from the Norman French charriote and shares a Celtic root (Gaulish: karros). Some 20 iron-aged chariot burials have been excavated in Britain, roughly dating from between 500 BCE and 100 BCE. Virtually all of them were found in East Yorkshire – the exception was a find in 2001 in Newbridge, 10 km west of Edinburgh.

The Celtic chariot, which may have been called karbantos in Gaulish (compare Latin carpentum), was a biga that measured approximately 2 m in width and 4 m in length.

British chariots were open in front. Julius Caesar provides the only significant eyewitness report of British chariot warfare: "Their mode of fighting with their chariots is this: firstly, they drive about in all directions and throw their weapons and generally break the ranks of the enemy with the very dread of their horses and the noise of their wheels; and when they have worked themselves in between the troops of horse, leap from their chariots and engage on foot. The charioteers in the meantime withdraw some little distance from the battle, and so place themselves with the chariots that, if their masters are overpowered by the number of the enemy, they may have a ready retreat to their own troops. Thus they display in battle the speed of horse, [together with] the firmness of infantry; and by daily practice and exercise attain to such expertness that they are accustomed, even on a declining and steep place, to check their horses at full speed, and manage and turn them in an instant and run along the pole, and stand on the yoke, and thence betake themselves with the greatest celerity to their chariots again."

Chariots play an important role in Irish mythology surrounding the hero Cú Chulainn.

Chariots could also be used for ceremonial purposes. According to Tacitus (Annals 14.35), Boudica, queen of the Iceni and a number of other tribes in a formidable uprising against the occupying Roman forces, addressed her troops from a chariot in 61:

 * "Boudicca curru filias prae se vehens, ut quamque nationem accesserat, solitum quidem Britannis feminarum ductu bellare testabatur"

 * Boudicca, with her daughters before her in a chariot, went up to tribe after tribe, protesting that it was indeed usual for Britons to fight under the leadership of women.

The last mention of chariot use in battle seems to be at the Battle of Mons Graupius, somewhere in modern Scotland, in 84 CE. From Tacitus (Agricola 1.35–36) "The plain between resounded with the noise and with the rapid movements of chariots and cavalry." The chariots did not win even their initial engagement with the Roman auxiliaries: "Meantime the enemy's cavalry had fled, and the charioteers had mingled in the engagement of the infantry."

Later through the centuries, the chariot was replaced by the "war wagon". The "war wagon" was a medieval development used to attack rebel or enemy forces on battle fields. The wagon was given slits for archers to shoot enemy targets, supported by infantry using pikes and flails and later for the invention of gunfire by hand-gunners; side walls were used for protection against archers, crossbowmen, the early use of gunpowder and cannon fire.

It was especially useful during the Hussite Wars, c. 1420, by Hussite forces rebelling in Bohemia. Groups of them could form defensive works, but they also were used as hardpoints for Hussite formations or as firepower in pincer movements. This early use of gunpowder and innovative tactics helped a largely peasant infantry stave off attacks by the Holy Roman Empire's larger forces of mounted knights.

Etruria
The only intact Etruscan chariot dates to c. 530 BCE and was uncovered as part of a chariot burial at Monteleone di Spoleto. Currently in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, it is decorated with bronze plates decorated with detailed low-relief scenes, commonly interpreted as depicting episodes from the life of Achilles.

Rome

In the Roman Empire, chariots were not used for warfare, but for chariot racing, especially in circuses, or for triumphal processions, when they could be pulled by as many as ten horses or even by dogs, tigers, or ostriches. There were four divisions, or factiones, of charioteers, distinguished by the colour of their costumes: the red, blue, green and white teams. The main centre of chariot racing was the Circus Maximus, situated in the valley between the Palatine and Aventine Hills in Rome. The track could hold 12 chariots, and the two sides of the track were separated by a raised median termed the spina. Chariot races continued to enjoy great popularity in Byzantine times, in the Hippodrome of Constantinople, even after the Olympic Games had been disbanded, until their decline after the Nika riots in the 6th century. The starting gates were known as the Carceres.

An ancient Roman car or chariot pulled by four horses abreast together with the horses pulling it was called a Quadriga, from the Latin quadriugi (of a team of four). The term sometimes meant instead the four horses without the chariot or the chariot alone. A three-horse chariot, or the three-horse team pulling it, was a triga, from triugi (of a team of three). A two-horse chariot, or the two-horse team pulling it, was a biga, from biugi.

A popular legend that has been around since at least 1937 traces the origin of the 4 ft $8 1/2$ in standard railroad gauge to Roman times, suggesting that it was based on the distance between the ruts of rutted roads marked by chariot wheels dating from the Roman Empire. There is no evidence of the distance being used in the millennium and a half between the departure of the Romans from Britain and the adoption of the gauge on the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825.

Introduction in Ancient China
The earliest archaeological evidence of chariots in China, a chariot burial site discovered in 1933 at Hougang, Anyang in Henan province, dates to the rule of King Wu Ding of the Late Shang (c. 1250 BCE). Oracle bone inscriptions suggest that the western enemies of the Shang used limited numbers of chariots in battle, but the Shang themselves used them only as mobile command-vehicles and in royal hunts.

During the Shang dynasty, members of the royal family were buried with a complete household and servants, including a chariot, horses, and a charioteer. A Shang chariot was often drawn by two horses, but four-horse variants are occasionally found in burials.

Jacques Gernet claims that the Zhou dynasty, which conquered the Shang ca. 1046 BCE, made more use of the chariot than did the Shang and "invented a new kind of harness with four horses abreast". The crew consisted of an archer, a driver, and sometimes a third warrior who was armed with a spear or dagger-axe. From the 8th to 5th centuries BCE the Chinese use of chariots reached its peak. Although chariots appeared in greater numbers, infantry often defeated charioteers in battle.

Massed-chariot warfare became all but obsolete after the Warring-States period (476–221 BCE). The main reasons were increased use of the crossbow, use of long halberds up to 18 ft long and pikes up to 22 ft long, and the adoption of standard cavalry units, and the adaptation of mounted archery from nomadic cavalry, which were more effective. Chariots would continue to serve as command posts for officers during the Qin dynasty (221–206 BCE) and the Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE), while armored chariots were also used during the Han dynasty against the Xiongnu Confederation in the Han–Xiongnu War (133 BCE to 89 CE), specifically at the Battle of Mobei (119 BCE).

Before the Han dynasty, the power of Chinese states and dynasties was often measured by the number of chariots they were known to have. A country of a thousand chariots ranked as a medium country, and a country of ten thousand chariots ranked as a huge and powerful country.

title: Chariot