Niya bowcase and quiver info?

[daryush]

The part for the bow is made of soft leather and can be seen behind the shorter arrow tube. The entire structure is IIRC made of leather, with stiffer leather for the arrow quivers and a soft leather for the bowcase. I am not sure if there is any info on whether the two quivers are attached to each other or the bowcase alone, but I imagine they would be joined together also. The bow was found strung and warped so we cannot use it to infer whether the shape of the bowcase was for a strung or unstrung bow. Dating wise, these quivers first appear in CA in the 3rd-2nd C BC OR 1st C BC depending on whose book you read, and their last occurrence is the 6th C AD, although they are very rare by that time.

Another item of similar constructuon from Xinjiang has had one of the arrow tubes decay, and we can see it attached to the bowcase and the other arrow tube in one large stitch using thick lacing rather than stitches. It appears to be a spiral running stitch that goes through all layers. On the front edge there are numerous streaming leather thongs roughly 1/3 way down the arrow tube, and a long leather strap with holes in it seems to arise from either the back edge or the inside surface. In fact if you look closely you can see it on the Niya one posted here also. These would be used for wearing it or attaching it to a saddle. A slighly different suspension system is seen on Orlat and Rag e Bibi