Crossbow bolt injuries to skulls occur in the Visby mass grave but I am 
too preoccupied by medieval bridges and too tired to look it up.

paul


Carl Carlson-Drexler wrote:
> Will not contest that the initial energy carried by the projectile at the
> moment of impact is sufficient to pierce steel or bone. However, the more
> relevant question (and I genuinely don't know the answer to this), is how
> rapidly that energy is dissipated as the bolt travels through the 
> skull, and
> whether it would lose enough energy to not pierce the bone on the other
> side. A projectile fired from a firearm, on the other hand, isn't 
> dragging
> the extra weight and friction of the shaft and fletching that a crossbow
> bolt would, and would (it would seem to me) be more likely to pass 
> through
> the skull rather than lodging in it.
>
> I will end this sanguinary comment with the notation that there is a 
> wealth
> of forensic literature that illustrates that even un-jacketed, soft lead
> firearms ammunition can and routinely does make clean entry wounds in 
> human
> crania, which the limited amount of information and presented in the 
> article
> and accompanying picture could be considered consistent with. Science
> Daily's article on the find is more expansive, and indicates that the 
> defect
> show in the image is in fact the entry wound.
> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/070620081734.htm
>
> But, more to the point, our colleagues in Peru and specialists in 
> forensic
> science classed it as a gunshot wound.
>
> CGCD