Borrowing Arrows with Straw Boats

Also called: Straw Boats Borrow Arrows

A scene invented by a historical novel. It differs from the recorded history.

A scene from the Romance of the Three Kingdoms in which Zhuge Liang gathers a hundred thousand of Cao Cao’s arrows with straw-laden boats. It is not in the official history.

A scene invented by the novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms. When Zhou Yu, hoping to be rid of him, demands a hundred thousand arrows in ten days, Zhuge Liang sends twenty boats piled with straw toward Cao Cao’s fleet at dawn in the fog, with drums beating. Thinking it an attack, Cao Cao’s men loose volley after volley, and the boats return bristling with more than a hundred thousand arrows.

Nothing like this is in the Records of the Three Kingdoms. A similar story, quoted by Pei Songzhi from the Weilüe, is told of Sun Quan: in 213 at Ruxu, arrows lodged on one side of the boat from which he was spying on Cao Cao’s camp, and it began to list, so he turned it to take arrows on the other side until it was level and then withdrew.