Bow is a weapon used with arrows for obtaining food and in battle. Nephi and his family traveled “slaying food by the way, with our bows and our arrows and our stones and our slings” (1 Nephi 16:15). When Nephi went to obtain food, he “did break my bow, which was made of fine steel,” and his brethren were angry because they obtained no food (1 Nephi 16:18).
After the other bows “having lost their springs,” Nephi made “out of wood a bow, and out of a straight stick, an arrow” (1 Nephi 16:21; 1 Nephi 16:23). Zeniff armed his people “with bows, and with arrows” before they went against the Lamanites to battle (Mosiah 9:16). Zerahemnah delivered his bow, sword, and cimeter into Moroni’s hands as weapons of war (Alma 44:8).