Ace vid as always Matt. Two quick points - firstly, peacock fletchings are actually rather dull to look at - they're just the light brown primary wings. They do make superb fletchings for war arrows however! Secondly, there have been no verified examples of linen thread whipping yet - only silk. The Mary Rose arrows were silk, as was the Westminster Abbey arrow. There is one arrow currently awaiting some form of dating which appears to have been bound with linen, but it is the only example ever found so far, and there's still zero proof that it's medieval, as compared to a modern replica.
scholagladiatoria Yes only silk thread which is also mentioned in period commissions etc. The "other" arrows that Will mentions, as siad has not had a scientific dating done on it , but from examination across an number of features is not a period arrow
It's strong and thin, so it will fit through the wb of the feather without deforming it, linen is thicker and deforms the arrow, as you can see in MAtts example, this increases the drag of the arrow and makes the feather less effective.
Matt, I did try bow hunting in the past, I don't think you were born yet. It was a great way for me to lose arrows. I did use aluminum shafts on my hunting arrows. I remember finding one that had hit a tree, it had sunk into the tree about 6 inches, still a lost arrow. There was no way to dig that out! Great information on this video, thank-you. Dante.
Nice video For those interested: Modern top end target arrow are usually tapered or barreled but for different reasons. They are tapered at the front for aerodynamic purposes and at the back for less sensitivity on release. Of course target archery today are not concerned with maximum distance or penetration, it's accuracy all the way.
Matt, to add to your point about fletchings then the wobbling effect in air also makes the arrow lose energy, so if it stabilizes sooner then less energy is lost before it hits its mark.
I like to use the word "swim". If you see high speed footage of arrows, particularly dense wooden arrows, they appear very much like a fish swimming through the water when you release them. And this is one of the reasons they penetrate so well even at relatively low velocity, almost magically. When they impact they flex like a spring, swim past and glance off things (like bones) that would stop something that was 100% rigid.
+scholagladiatoria HUZZA!!!! someone finally did NOT mix up energy and momentum!!!! THANK YOU MATT!!!!!!!! i see you are trying to get into the physics of everything. so far you did very well indeed! take it from a student of physics. if you want maximum force you want maximum momentum, that needs energy, but that is all energy does, energy is not important in itself.
I believe your right about why the fletching was so long in those days. As you said its for stabilizing the arrow soon after being shot. I base this explanation on the way manchu arrows were constructed. The manchu tactics called for very heavy arrows shot at a relatively short distance. The shorter the distance became, the bigger the fletching became. Their fletching was twice longer of the arrow your showing, or even more.
There are quite crooked blades on that wall sir. You could be a teacher by the way , you have a gift to easily give your knowledge to others which makes a big difference between good and not so good teacher.
The three primary feathers on the wings are the ones generally used for fletching,with the only the feathers from the left or right wings being used together....
you're more than welcome to come down to Georgia and hunt on our plantation this fall. Bow season starts soon, but I suggest doing in the midseason... because its still so damn hot.
Maybe I misunderstood. If it's just the animals that naturally inhabit your plantation, then I have no problem with it. However, if you are introducing and/or breeding animals for hunting, I don't neccesarily agree with that practice.
+desepticon4 Around the US rural MANY land owners will allow screened & sometimes paying hunter to use their land. Mainly for wild population control in the region and wild life harming their farm crops or property. Small side income as big city folks or bigtime hunters from scarce wildlife states will PAY good.
Good video. Thanks. A few points: -I've used peacock feathers for fletching. They are very thin and light (though kind of fragile) relative to turkey feathers, so I can see them being useful for flight archery. Goose feathers are somewhat similar in terms of weight. Both are fairly smooth. The rough texture ( and hence lots of friction for flight correction) of turkey feathers is probably part of why they are so popular. -The tapering and barreling of arrow shafts was also related to the strength and shooting style of the archer. As per Ascham in Toxophilus: "For those that be little-breasted and big toward the head, called, by their likeness, taper fashion, resh grown, and of some merry fellows bobtails, be fit for them which shoot under-hand, because they shoot with a soft loose, and stresses not a shaft much in the breast, where the weight of the bow lieth, as you may perceive by the wearing of every shaft. Again, the big-breasted shaft is fit for him which shooteth right afore him, or else the breast being weak, should never withstand that strong pithy kind of shooting: thus, the under-hand must have a small breast to go clean away out of the bow, the fore hand must have a big breast to bear the great might of the bow." If you can read through the antiquated language, it's evident that Ascham was basically talking about a rudimentary understanding of arrow spine.
Archery! Yes. I grew up with a bow. From the age of 10 to the age of about 20 I used my 40lb recurve bow at least a few hours per week. I miss it. I need to get another bow. I even made several arrows and forged steel heads just to see if I could. Worked pretty damn well too. I put one through a wooden fence. Destroyed the arrow but I got about 12 inches of penetration through some fairly new and solid wood about 3/4 of an inch thick.
Length of fletchings depends of three things: 1. structure of the feather (stiff or soft); 2. height of the feather (are they narrow to the shaft or being like fluflu?); 3. are you using 2 or 3 feathers. I am personally shooting with bamboo shafts and use only two higher standing feathers (turkey and goose). I have to say, there are some benefits of that: first: the arrow is going smooth around the bow, second: longer feathers slide smoother above your hand/knuckles, third: the arrow istn´t slower because of longer feather-standings, it´s equal to using three short ones. and even if i´m using bamboo-shafts (as they are knotted and "imbalanced"), the results in precision are remarkably good.
Longer fletchings definitely stabilise an arrow faster. Look at Manchu arrows which were optimised for shooting large game at close range, they have huge fletchings typically a quarter the length of the shaft, sometimes up to half the length of the shaft. I see a big difference in arrow stability between my bows shooting 3" and 5" fletched arrows. 5" fletchings will make an arrow straighten out much faster, an arrow with 3" fletchings wobbles much longer. Longer fletchings increase drag though. Which is why Turkish and Korean bows optimised for long range typically shoot arrows with very small fletchings.
FuckYouYouFuck It's the surface area of the fletchings that does it, and a lower profile is A. less interference B. faster arrow. And finally, the further back the fletching the more stable, however that stability has downsides.
+FuckYouYouFuck Agreed. My own experience in making arrows backs this up. Light arrows + small fletchings = velocity. But heavier arrows require corresponding longer fletching to stabilise.
Great video Matt! Wet fletching= slow arrows. Goose feathers have the advantage of natural water resistance, hence their value on an arrow for a war bow.
when you have a thicker shaft on the pointy end it also more air dynamic in the flight. by making it thicker you, more weight is placed in the forward portion of the arrow. make it less likely to yaw. similar like a modern day rifled slug or barrier penetration hourglass steel slug.
I've noticed birch is particularly tough as an arrow-wood, but unfortunately it tends to be very bendy, so you have to fire-straighten the shafts when you first get them. However with a 35-ish pound draw self bow, hitting a tree at nearly point blank, a 3/8ths inch birch arrow that I made for practice actually took about 6 impacts, and hasn't broken to this day.
I think that 90° knock thingy is called a "spline". At least that is what is called nowdays in woodworking. Inserting a spline is a typical techinque to reinforce end-grain in order to prevent it from splitting.
Have you heard of Oak tipped 'war' arrows where the last (forward) sixth of the shaft was 'footed' or 'peeced' with a heavier wood like oak and the rest of Hornbeam, Ash or Birch? Which would mean most of the arrow flexing of the 'Archers paradox' happens in the more flexible rear five sixths of the shaft whilst the stiffer and heavier tip tends to fly relatively straight. None of the researchers in TV 'documentaries' mention this mention of arrow construction, although the Worshipful Company of Fletchers have a small paragraph about it on their web site. They also omit the practice of 'waxing' (Coating with tallow or beeswax) a bodkin point as an aid to armour penetration. I think there are references to 'footing' in E.G. Heaths 'The Grey Goose Wing' and I think there was also mention in a commentary I once read on Roger Aschams 1545 treatise 'Toxphilus'.
Twining the fletchings to the shaft definitely is stronger than glue, especially in humid environments. It takes more time to twine, but then you don't have to spend time reglueing fletching at some inopportune time like just before or during a battle. With hunting arrows it doesn't make that much difference, since you can casuallycheck/repair them before the hunt, and may only use one arrow for the kill.
The middle of the peacock tail feather was used for Fletching and it was wrapped around the shaft in order to quickly straighten out the arrow before it hit the target. Your peacock feathers were extremely important for when you were competing in rapid fire against moving targets on a short-range. Such as a pheasant flush. And especially good for the Poppin J, because in each case the other thing that rapping the peacock's feathers would do is it would rapidly slow the arrow. Making a very accurate very short distance Arrow. And if you cannot choose the sticks yourself to make arrows out of the next best thing you can do is choose your flights. The peacocks feather was what we leaves taste call a corkscrew pom-poms or fraied flight. Here in America there are some ranges that are rather short and they only allow you to fire fraied flight arrows & on those ranges hunting bows are banned. Basically because my 90 lb hunting bow has no problems going through sandbags and has no problems going through hay bales. As a matter of fact I found I don't bring my hunting bow to practice on roundhay butts. The first time I've practiced on a round hay but in a farmer's field I left him five arrows no I only shot off six arrows but the first time shot was the only time I got to they were somewhere in the large round butt I just couldn't find them.because the farmer has set in the butts out for his cattle not for my shooting them. And yes I was polite enough to remove the tarp before practicing and replacing the charts before I left.
Great video, Matt. I was just teaching some coworkers to shoot today, and I will pass this along. Question: just as swords are not always used at full swing, did archers use bows at less than full draw for some sort of tactical reason (more control for plunging fire, tight urban setting, etc.)? A stout arrow half drawn in a 150 pound bow still has a lot of force.
Speaking of your history of archery, did (or do) you have any interest in any other traditional archery forms? (i.e Turkish,Mongol,Chinese,Korean,Native American and so on)
Mike dN I'm interested in all forms of archery and actually my favourite bows to shoot are short recurves - I have a Hungarian composite, but I always really wanted a super short Turkish bow. I also have a Mongol bow, but it kicks a lot and I don't like it to shoot (the fault of the bow rather than the design).
scholagladiatoria I can highly recommend the shorter Turkish recurves, finger pinch is an issue if you use a 3 finger draw though, thus the thumb draw is a more or less the norm. Anyway thanks for the great vids, would love to see more of this archery content too
Christiån Kirkenes As for Native American archery, it's a very *broad term*. Generally you'll have more luck looking up specific tribes (i.e. Cherokee, Sioux and so on) Generally the bows are flatbows (sometimes backed with sinew), with some notable exceptions like the Sioux bow which is a reflex bow (kinda) *Most* Native-American archery, although I don't care much for the term because it's a generalization of a complex and diverse spectrum, is (most of the time) pretty basic using (often short) pinch draws, Mediterranean draws and the occasional thumb draw is seen as well. If you're interested i would recommend reading up on Ishi, you can mostly likely find a good biography on him if you do a search on Amazon or something along those lines. He was an important figure in modern archery, he together with Dr.Pope, the renaissance of archery across the USA and later world. Honestly though, I'm *no scholar* I just thought that a Mongol bow looked cool and started researching from there on out. Eventually becoming somewhat knowledgeable about all forms of archery, but the Asian styles is my main focus. I can *highly* recommend the study of archery, as it will help you as an archer.
+scholagladiatoria I live in the USA state that used to host the INTERNATIONAL Horse archery competitions. Once I learned of it I wanted to go, 2yrs later it lost funding and hard for people from Asia to make it. Thus, I couldn't go Just as I finally had $$ & time. I learned archery in camp as a kid then picked up a competition bow in college then moved to compound for hunting with friends.
Cool vid! I'm just now watching your archery stuff... Hope you post more archery vids in the future, going to be getting into traditional archery in a bit :D
The broad arrow was actually used not for the fact that they were the earliest ordnance but because a smuggler used this mark to transport his goods, to counter this the government of the time adopted this mark as the official mark of the war department to thwart this and he had proven it's effectiveness
Would be good to bring on traditional users to comment on their method and usage. Then use historical finds to correlate and compare changes over time, how much remains similar to old form and how it has changed for present day use.
I think you are right with the big-feather -theory - the same is true with hunting arrowsor trick shooting arrows - you may shoot close range and you want the arrow impact straight into the prey/target. I like your videos! Shoot Straight!
I love traditional archery as well, got few mongolian bow and both wood and carbon arrows for fun. The way I draw is thumb draw via both Manchu and korean style thumb rings. Please put more videos about traditonal archery those things.
The physicist in in me has to tell you that it's either F = ma (force equals mass times acceleration) or E = 1/2 m v^2 (Energy equals a half of the mass times the velocity squared). You probably mean the second formula. I find your theory of the length of the fletching interesting. I think the primary effect would come from the area of the fletchings, a longer one might have a bigger area, while still not interfering with the bow too much. There could be other effects as well, like dampening more frequencies of vibration. It would be interesting to device some experiments.
Manchu bow were so far the most energy efficient bow. especially at draw weight higher than 80 lbs it can give much higher velocity than english longbows of same weight. but it just needs a lot of maintenance. its outstanding to use in cold and dry north. but once you go south where its warm and wet, it get out of shape fast. and its almost as big as a longbow and much heavier to carry around.
I have seen many references to the “clothyard shaft”. My understanding is that the cloth yard was a Flemish unit of measure equal to 28”. Is that why modern bows and arrows are based on a standard draw length of 28”? Great video, by the way. Greetings from the Colonies.
Uh-uh. The "clothyard" was just that, 36"(which is why that's STILL the measurement today!) The modern standard is simply because that's the length it takes the majority of people to draw an arrow to the chest(a standard anchor point for target archery)
peacock feathers i think would just be left and right wing feathers which are brown from what if seen when looking at actual feathers on the grown in a pen were my grandma kept him I have though using peacock feathers to make fletchings if I had the materials to make an arrow with and a bow to test it
it is strange to think of how many people and items one needs for a good war-Arrow. Of course a stone or bullet would be easier, but slings got out of fashion for some reason. Imagine what could have been build if all those resources weren't put in a military apparatus. Nevertheless, I like how people thought about their materials and made it so advanced. :3
+scholagladiatoria Could you talk about different types of bows? Like turkish, mongol, longbow etc and how they compare to each other in draw strength, effectiveness etc?
If any of you guys are interested in films concerning archery, then I highly suggest watching the Korean film - War of the Arrows/Arrow: The Ultimate Weapon. It's on Netflix I think. Though not 100% accurate when it comes to bowmanship. It is a thrilling movie that showcases both different archery techniques and arrowheads.
Actually the archery is very good. The character draws right and performs Khatra like they did. He was able to twist the string so it was a bow of maybe 45 ibs
Wait, so to discourage people from poaching, which I imagine was already illegal, they made something related, but not the same, illegal? What am I missing? Very informative, as usual, Matt.
""Criminals won't shoot people if we ban guns!-----a year down the road---> "Why is the prevalence of stabbings increasing so much?!" "" - So, you think this is a bad way of thinking? So how do you explain the fact that it is effective? In countries with lower availability of firearms there is less murders, shootouts, robberies and so on. If you compare countries such as Germany or Poland to the United States the difference is colossal.
***** Because you can only catch a poacher red handed. Someone with a bow and arrows in a royal forest is easier to find and catch, without having to wait for the moment that they 'poach'.
scholagladiatoria And the odds are that they're poor and hungry and no one important will miss them? Jeez, where did that come from? I shouldn't be this cynical before the watershed...
TomatoBreadOrgasm Poaching is the main reason silencers are NFA items in the US as well. The National Firearms Act of 1934 was passed at the height of the Great Depression (so there were a lot of people who were desperate for a meal and couldn't care less about game laws), and it was believed that silencers made it more difficult to catch poachers. So now you have to pay $200 and go through a bunch of red tape (not even counting how much the silencer itself costs) just to own a piece of safety equipment.
Regolith So that you don't blow out your ears? I'm no expert, but I've used silencers, and they don't silence, they just make the sonic boom a sonic grunt.
As an American interested in traditional archery, I hear your complaints about types of wood. I would love to get my hands on a classic style English longbow, but most of the ones I see are made from hickory, an American wood that has no business being part of an English longbow.
Fascinating, I never thought the aerodynamics might dictate different arrow designs for different purposes, but it makes perfect sense. Are there any records of archers or archer units carrying multiple types of arrows to handle a variety of contingencies? A few distance arrows for the early stages, then some with a more frontwards center of mass for when things get close?
I notice that your arrow fletchings are not visibly glued, many I have seen have a mixture of beeswax, copper verdigris and pine resin between the the fletching and over the bindings. However you did say that it was not 100% accurate. All in all , as always a jolly interesting and informative video.
I have often wondered what happened after battle did the victorious side send out serfs or orderlies to gather arrows that were still usuable and not damaged from hard impact. This would help re supply an army on campaign unless they have fletchers and forgers traveling with them.... in all the battle details of the famous battles, this is never mentioned....???
My theory regarding the size of fletching is different. First of all there were different types and sizes of fletching on English war arrows: images.yuku.com.s3.amazonaws.com/image/jpeg/13c169180d3039d715a92b26227cf6c9d4928479.jpg Yes, the large fletching quicker stabilizes the arrow, which is important for short range shooting, but at the same time it increases the drag. The other purpose of big fletching is to neutralize negative destabilizing aerodynamic effect, created by big broadhead. Broadheads were also used on English arrows. With modern bowhunting broadheads, the big fletching is also used for the same reason. I think at the first stages of the battle, when they loose volleys at maximum distance, archers could use arrows fletched with smaller, or at least lower profile flights.
Could it be that the bulkier head end of the shaft was for recovery purposes. I agree that it may have helped carry momentum into the target, but once you've hit the guy it seems he'd be at least a bit incapacitated. From an ordinance point of view though. Going around a battlefield and finding broken arrows (government ordinance) all over the field would be a wholly sufficient reason for the strengthening of that area of the arrow.
+Wreqt with a conventional long bow, one without a centre shot, you get the "paradox". So you, in fact, need the arrow to be elastic and bend in order to shoot where you aim it. The stiffness of an arrow is calibrated.
Laifs Exactly, and the thicker material used in these arrows would reduce that elasticity. I propose that the varying width of these arrows is designed to allow flex at those point to get around (he he he, pun intended) the paradox.
This may be a question that doesn't fit the video very well, but are the modern homemade bows made of PVC and fiber glass good bows? I suppose they are not at the same level as professional bows, but for someone that doesn't quite have the money to buy one made by a professional, a cheap homemade one doesn't seem so bad.
Would the type of wood and tapering of the arrows affect how the arrow would bend when it is shot out? Would there be different ways to adjust to the archer's paradox?
How do longbows compare to crossbows? Striking power? Range? Also, how accurate where medieval bows and crossbows? Would it be possible to shoot down messenger birds leaving a castle?
More than likely, "GI" arrows would be assembly-line produced, i.e. one person would make the shafts, one cut fletching, one make points. Then one person would fletch the shafts, and another would mount the points, then the finished arrow would be handed to someone else for making up arrow sheaves(usually 24 arrows), which would then be transported for storage or to the field of battle
You can actually spit them out pretty quickly. I forge my own heads and every thing and it's nothing to knock out 2 dozen in a few hours so long as you got the materials at hand. The part that takes most of your time is whipping the fletching, especially if you do it right and make them small and tight such as the arrow in the video. It's easy, just time consuming.
Was the choice of goose fletching and string done in part so that the arrows would be more likely to resist being damaged while not in use, by water exposure? How well did glues of the time resist water? Also, from friends shooting each other with modified target arrows with padded heads, we noticed that if the arrowhead is sufficiently big, it can interfere with the fletching's ability to stabilize the arrow. We needed more fletching. These padded heads were at least 2" diameter, so I'm not sure if this issue translates to an only somewhat bigger war arrowhead.
How were these arrows made? Looks like a time consuming process, especially if you'd need tens of thousands of them to equip an army. Were the shafts whittled by hand or turned on a sort of lathe?
The principal tecnique is called cleaving. Some timbers work better than others. Basically a straight grained log is cut to length, stood on end and then split by driving some sort of wedge into the end grain. Halves, Quarters, and further. An expert, using suitable timber, can produce "blanks" not much bigger than the required shaft size. They can then be finished with draw knife and plane
Hi Matt, The arrow it's the most important piece of an archer's arsenal. Do you know if there are any records of war arrows being 'spined'? It would of course be impossible to tailor arrows to each archer, but was there a general 'spining' of maybe 120-180 pounds draw weight? Much respect, Jim.
You mentioned cedar (an American wood) being used to create European style arrows. Although a-historical in this sense, this made me a little curious about Native American archery traditions. Do you (or anybody else reading this) happen to know anything about this subject?
NorwegianChris I assume you mean North American Natives as opposed to say the Aztecs (if those guys even had archers). I don't know an awful lot about them but I believe they had multiple kinds of bows, everything from sinew backed short bows to flatbows, and who knows maybe round or D-shaped self bows too.
+NorwegianChris While I am no expert, it is my understanding that most of the North American Native bows were relatively short with fairly low draw weight. They were not particularly accurate or powerful, and most were basically round cross section. Their emphasis was on using woodsmanship to get close and being able to quickly make a shot. If you are running around through the woods, a larger bow would snag on everything and be very cumbersome. They did have some very clever hunting spears though.
I replicate Native American bows (and hunt with them). I've got some knowledge on short sinew backed paddle bows made from Juniper and Cedar. I've built a few. Cedar has a relatively low SG (Specific Gravity/Density) so it's not the best wood for a bow. Yurok tribes and such used mostly Juniper along the West Coast and backed their bows with elk and deer sinew, mostly with a reflexed and recurve design. Try looking it up on California Sinew Backed Bow on TH-cam.
The arrow wobble described around 7:19 is called the archer's paradox, and Smarter Every Day had a great episode rather recently about the topic th-cam.com/video/O7zewtuUM_0/w-d-xo.html.
I have a question that you may know the answer to, would arrows of been made of various different spines? as an archer spine is incredibly important to get good arrow flight, I shoot a longbow and a too stiff spine will actually make a decent clack against the side of the bow and fly incredibly badly with a lot of power lost, to weak a spine and a similar thing will happen.With the large diversity in longbow power ranging from 100lb right up to potentially up to and even slightly over 200lb the arrows would need to be hugely different in spine for each of these bows to get decent flight.This, to me, poses a bit of a logistical nightmare, they were I believe transported in barrels by the English, would they have had different barrels with different spines? Or was this something they didn't really concern themselves with? which I find hard to believe but is possible.Any thoughts on this would be very appreciated.
+Matthew O'Connell Actually it seems that with heavy warbows and arrows spine isn't really important - the reason being that above about 120lbs draw weight English longbows were used with 1/2 inch arrows that were so stiff it didn't really matter which bow shot them (arrows were mass produced munitions, supplied by the crown. So accuracy would be reduced, but heavy volume shooting, heavy hitting and better supply chains would result.
Thanks a lot for the reply, I guess accuracy was a fairly low priority as you would be shooting into ranks of men, as long as it went somewhere roughly into the group its all good.
I think it's all too easy to lose track of the implications of the fact that when the bow was a valued weapon of war the ammunition was, as Mathew points out below, Government Issue. Sourced from all over the country, manufactured to a pattern, stored in the Tower until needed, shipped out with the troops by the cartload and issued by the sheaf. These shafts then had to perform well with a range of draw weights, draw lengths and arrow heads. My personal opinion is that this is why the fletchings were so big - in order to stabilise quickly under all circumstances. No doubt, in periods of peace, retained archers would sift through locally held stocks to pick out the ones that worked best for them, possibly even trimmming fletchings if distance shooting was an objective. But in the field, all arrows had to suit every archer. As for spine, think about this. If you are holding a draw weight of 150 lbs or so, pushing into the bow with your bow arm and shoulder, as soon as you loose your bow arm is going to extend a little, pushing the bow out of the path of the arrow. I don't think "the Archers Paradox" is going to be very relevant here, the shaft doesn't need to flex to clear the bow.
Very interesting. I know archers often carried many different types of arrows, but does this mean the perception of the long bow being a great distance weapon is false? Or at least false in the military context that it was used? Really interesting stuff Matt.
Hunting with the bow was only made illegal in UK in the 50's, there was then a movement to legalise it again in the 60's, and though the committee found in favour of it's proper reintroduction, the government decided to ignore the findings and so it stayed illegal
Q1: What glue were they using for the fletchings? Q2: Any indication whether they were using the peacocks' flight feathers or their display feathers --> could the fluff/filamentious part of the display feathers act like contemporary fluffy/'flu-flu' arrow fletchings.
Arrows are very old ..... The thousands old Indian Historic Text of Ramayana & Mahabharata have them as modern as the one you sir are holding to give a demonstration
+DushinSC I don't know what about is English but I do know that different periods and different parts of the world did have differences in fetching. In the video he even talks about it a bit. Different feathers,different woods and thicknesses and different heads etc.
Anzu Wyliei Ehm, I'm not sure if I am the most qualified person to answer that question but I heard Tod made really good reproductions: www.todsstuff.co.uk/crossbows/crossbows.htm
***** True, but I wonder if an arrow produced in Normandy or Flanders would differ that much from one produced in England. I know certain swords were more common in certain regions but I can't imagine you have that much design freedom when it comes to warbow arrows.
DushinSC The thing is, only England (in Western Europe) was producing large numbers of longbowmen using super heavyweight bows and these matching fat arrows with long fletchings. Some countries emulated the system (eg. Burgundy), but it really seems to have been England/Wales that developed the specific heavy equipment.
What would be the cost of an medieval wararrow? Say, if a soldier or knight would want to buy his own arrows during for example the War of the Roses, what would he pay for them? If the cost is given in comparison to other items, that works as well.
Knights had no use for arrows. The bow was a peasant's weapon. "GI" arrows would have a price set by the Crown, which would, likely, be by the dozen, or hundred, count. Custom- made arrows, for an individual, would probably have been charged then like they are now; depending on the maker, and what the customer wanted done
+scholagladiatoria Matt what is that "metal gauntlet with blade attached"-fist.weapon on the right behind your head? Did you make a video about it? (i searched but found nothing :/ )
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This is Thrand! Thanks very much for the shout out shield brother! Love your channel and great video on historical war bow arrows and well done!
Matt "Thickening the shaft " Easton.
Ace vid as always Matt. Two quick points - firstly, peacock fletchings are actually rather dull to look at - they're just the light brown primary wings. They do make superb fletchings for war arrows however!
Secondly, there have been no verified examples of linen thread whipping yet - only silk. The Mary Rose arrows were silk, as was the Westminster Abbey arrow. There is one arrow currently awaiting some form of dating which appears to have been bound with linen, but it is the only example ever found so far, and there's still zero proof that it's medieval, as compared to a modern replica.
Will Sherman Interesting, thanks!
scholagladiatoria Yes only silk thread which is also mentioned in period commissions etc.
The "other" arrows that Will mentions, as siad has not had a scientific dating done on it , but from examination across an number of features is not a period arrow
Will Sherman Silk seems like an expensive choice. Why'd they use it?
It's strong and thin, so it will fit through the wb of the feather without deforming it, linen is thicker and deforms the arrow, as you can see in MAtts example, this increases the drag of the arrow and makes the feather less effective.
+Regolith Because of strength to weight ratio, so you can have a very thin thread that is very strong.
Matt, I did try bow hunting in the past, I don't think you were born yet. It was a great way for me to lose arrows. I did use aluminum shafts on my hunting arrows. I remember finding one that had hit a tree, it had sunk into the tree about 6 inches, still a lost arrow. There was no way to dig that out! Great information on this video, thank-you. Dante.
Nice video
For those interested: Modern top end target arrow are usually tapered or barreled but for different reasons. They are tapered at the front for aerodynamic purposes and at the back for less sensitivity on release. Of course target archery today are not concerned with maximum distance or penetration, it's accuracy all the way.
Never knew arrows were so complex and as usual thanks for including some history and your own experience.
All this physics talk is making this engineer giddy.
Matt, to add to your point about fletchings then the wobbling effect in air also makes the arrow lose energy, so if it stabilizes sooner then less energy is lost before it hits its mark.
I had no idea about the barreled/tapered shafts but it definitely makes sense!
I like to use the word "swim". If you see high speed footage of arrows, particularly dense wooden arrows, they appear very much like a fish swimming through the water when you release them. And this is one of the reasons they penetrate so well even at relatively low velocity, almost magically. When they impact they flex like a spring, swim past and glance off things (like bones) that would stop something that was 100% rigid.
+scholagladiatoria
HUZZA!!!!
someone finally did NOT mix up energy and momentum!!!!
THANK YOU MATT!!!!!!!!
i see you are trying to get into the physics of everything. so far you did very well indeed! take it from a student of physics.
if you want maximum force you want maximum momentum, that needs energy, but that is all energy does, energy is not important in itself.
I believe your right about why the fletching was so long in those days. As you said its for stabilizing the arrow soon after being shot. I base this explanation on the way manchu arrows were constructed. The manchu tactics called for very heavy arrows shot at a relatively short distance. The shorter the distance became, the bigger the fletching became. Their fletching was twice longer of the arrow your showing, or even more.
There are quite crooked blades on that wall sir. You could be a teacher by the way , you have a gift to easily give your knowledge to others which makes a big difference between good and not so good teacher.
My mom used to work in a nocking shop (...or I think that's where my dad met her)
I can't even begin to tell you how useful little things like this are when I'm writing. It makes for cool details.
+Will Abby You still write using feathers? Wow, groovy!
;D
TheFilthyCasual ... Bastard... lol
The three primary feathers on the wings are the ones generally used for fletching,with the only the feathers from the left or right wings being used together....
you're more than welcome to come down to Georgia and hunt on our plantation this fall. Bow season starts soon, but I suggest doing in the midseason... because its still so damn hot.
+Rob Payne I'm not against hunting but the concept of a canned hunt leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
+desepticon4 How is hunting on someones property a "canned" hunt?
+desepticon4 How is hunting on someones property a "canned" hunt?
Maybe I misunderstood. If it's just the animals that naturally inhabit your plantation, then I have no problem with it. However, if you are introducing and/or breeding animals for hunting, I don't neccesarily agree with that practice.
+desepticon4 Around the US rural MANY land owners will allow screened & sometimes paying hunter to use their land. Mainly for wild population control in the region and wild life harming their farm crops or property. Small side income as big city folks or bigtime hunters from scarce wildlife states will PAY good.
Good video. Thanks. A few points:
-I've used peacock feathers for fletching. They are very thin and light (though kind of fragile) relative to turkey feathers, so I can see them being useful for flight archery. Goose feathers are somewhat similar in terms of weight. Both are fairly smooth. The rough texture ( and hence lots of friction for flight correction) of turkey feathers is probably part of why they are so popular.
-The tapering and barreling of arrow shafts was also related to the strength and shooting style of the archer. As per Ascham in Toxophilus: "For those that be little-breasted and big toward the head, called, by their likeness, taper fashion, resh grown, and of some merry fellows bobtails, be fit for them which shoot under-hand, because they shoot with a soft loose, and stresses not a shaft much in the breast, where the weight of the bow lieth, as you may perceive by the wearing of every shaft. Again, the big-breasted shaft is fit for him which shooteth right afore him, or else the breast being weak, should never withstand that strong pithy kind of shooting: thus, the under-hand must have a small breast to go clean away out of the bow, the fore hand must have a big breast to bear the great might of the bow."
If you can read through the antiquated language, it's evident that Ascham was basically talking about a rudimentary understanding of arrow spine.
Archery! Yes. I grew up with a bow. From the age of 10 to the age of about 20 I used my 40lb recurve bow at least a few hours per week. I miss it. I need to get another bow. I even made several arrows and forged steel heads just to see if I could. Worked pretty damn well too. I put one through a wooden fence. Destroyed the arrow but I got about 12 inches of penetration through some fairly new and solid wood about 3/4 of an inch thick.
Length of fletchings depends of three things: 1. structure of the feather (stiff or soft); 2. height of the feather (are they narrow to the shaft or being like fluflu?); 3. are you using 2 or 3 feathers. I am personally shooting with bamboo shafts and use only two higher standing feathers (turkey and goose). I have to say, there are some benefits of that: first: the arrow is going smooth around the bow, second: longer feathers slide smoother above your hand/knuckles, third: the arrow istn´t slower because of longer feather-standings, it´s equal to using three short ones.
and even if i´m using bamboo-shafts (as they are knotted and "imbalanced"), the results in precision are remarkably good.
Longer fletchings definitely stabilise an arrow faster. Look at Manchu arrows which were optimised for shooting large game at close range, they have huge fletchings typically a quarter the length of the shaft, sometimes up to half the length of the shaft.
I see a big difference in arrow stability between my bows shooting 3" and 5" fletched arrows. 5" fletchings will make an arrow straighten out much faster, an arrow with 3" fletchings wobbles much longer.
Longer fletchings increase drag though. Which is why Turkish and Korean bows optimised for long range typically shoot arrows with very small fletchings.
FuckYouYouFuck Great info - this totally agrees with my experience and theories.
FuckYouYouFuck It's the surface area of the fletchings that does it, and a lower profile is A. less interference B. faster arrow. And finally, the further back the fletching the more stable, however that stability has downsides.
+scholagladiatoria Great username too. :V
+scholagladiatoria Have you ever done instinctive archery?
+FuckYouYouFuck Agreed. My own experience in making arrows backs this up. Light arrows + small fletchings = velocity. But heavier arrows require corresponding longer fletching to stabilise.
Great video Matt! Wet fletching= slow arrows. Goose feathers have the advantage of natural water resistance, hence their value on an arrow for a war bow.
when you have a thicker shaft on the pointy end it also more air dynamic in the flight. by making it thicker you, more weight is placed in the forward portion of the arrow. make it less likely to yaw. similar like a modern day rifled slug or barrier penetration hourglass steel slug.
I've noticed birch is particularly tough as an arrow-wood, but unfortunately it tends to be very bendy, so you have to fire-straighten the shafts when you first get them. However with a 35-ish pound draw self bow, hitting a tree at nearly point blank, a 3/8ths inch birch arrow that I made for practice actually took about 6 impacts, and hasn't broken to this day.
I think that 90° knock thingy is called a "spline". At least that is what is called nowdays in woodworking. Inserting a spline is a typical techinque to reinforce end-grain in order to prevent it from splitting.
gods...Great info Master Easton I thank You Again!
Have you heard of Oak tipped 'war' arrows where the last (forward) sixth of the shaft was 'footed' or 'peeced' with a heavier wood like oak and the rest of Hornbeam, Ash or Birch? Which would mean most of the arrow flexing of the 'Archers paradox' happens in the more flexible rear five sixths of the shaft whilst the stiffer and heavier tip tends to fly relatively straight. None of the researchers in TV 'documentaries' mention this mention of arrow construction, although the Worshipful Company of Fletchers have a small paragraph about it on their web site. They also omit the practice of 'waxing' (Coating with tallow or beeswax) a bodkin point as an aid to armour penetration.
I think there are references to 'footing' in E.G. Heaths 'The Grey Goose Wing' and I think there was also mention in a commentary I once read on Roger Aschams 1545 treatise 'Toxphilus'.
Twining the fletchings to the shaft definitely is stronger than glue, especially in humid environments. It takes more time to twine, but then you don't have to spend time reglueing fletching at some inopportune time like just before or during a battle.
With hunting arrows it doesn't make that much difference, since you can casuallycheck/repair them before the hunt, and may only use one arrow for the kill.
The middle of the peacock tail feather was used for Fletching and it was wrapped around the shaft in order to quickly straighten out the arrow before it hit the target. Your peacock feathers were extremely important for when you were competing in rapid fire against moving targets on a short-range. Such as a pheasant flush. And especially good for the Poppin J, because in each case the other thing that rapping the peacock's feathers would do is it would rapidly slow the arrow. Making a very accurate very short distance Arrow. And if you cannot choose the sticks yourself to make arrows out of the next best thing you can do is choose your flights. The peacocks feather was what we leaves taste call a corkscrew pom-poms or fraied flight. Here in America there are some ranges that are rather short and they only allow you to fire fraied flight arrows & on those ranges hunting bows are banned. Basically because my 90 lb hunting bow has no problems going through sandbags and has no problems going through hay bales. As a matter of fact I found I don't bring my hunting bow to practice on roundhay butts. The first time I've practiced on a round hay but in a farmer's field I left him five arrows no I only shot off six arrows but the first time shot was the only time I got to they were somewhere in the large round butt I just couldn't find them.because the farmer has set in the butts out for his cattle not for my shooting them. And yes I was polite enough to remove the tarp before practicing and replacing the charts before I left.
Great video, Matt. I was just teaching some coworkers to shoot today, and I will pass this along. Question: just as swords are not always used at full swing, did archers use bows at less than full draw for some sort of tactical reason (more control for plunging fire, tight urban setting, etc.)? A stout arrow half drawn in a 150 pound bow still has a lot of force.
Speaking of your history of archery, did (or do) you have any interest in any other traditional archery forms? (i.e Turkish,Mongol,Chinese,Korean,Native American and so on)
Mike dN I'm interested in all forms of archery and actually my favourite bows to shoot are short recurves - I have a Hungarian composite, but I always really wanted a super short Turkish bow. I also have a Mongol bow, but it kicks a lot and I don't like it to shoot (the fault of the bow rather than the design).
scholagladiatoria I can highly recommend the shorter Turkish recurves, finger pinch is an issue if you use a 3 finger draw though, thus the thumb draw is a more or less the norm.
Anyway thanks for the great vids, would love to see more of this archery content too
Christiån Kirkenes As for Native American archery, it's a very *broad term*. Generally you'll have more luck looking up specific tribes (i.e. Cherokee, Sioux and so on) Generally the bows are flatbows (sometimes backed with sinew), with some notable exceptions like the Sioux bow which is a reflex bow (kinda)
*Most* Native-American archery, although I don't care much for the term because it's a generalization of a complex and diverse spectrum, is (most of the time) pretty basic using (often short) pinch draws, Mediterranean draws and the occasional thumb draw is seen as well.
If you're interested i would recommend reading up on Ishi, you can mostly likely find a good biography on him if you do a search on Amazon or something along those lines. He was an important figure in modern archery, he together with Dr.Pope, the renaissance of archery across the USA and later world.
Honestly though, I'm *no scholar* I just thought that a Mongol bow looked cool and started researching from there on out. Eventually becoming somewhat knowledgeable about all forms of archery, but the Asian styles is my main focus. I can *highly* recommend the study of archery, as it will help you as an archer.
+scholagladiatoria I live in the USA state that used to host the INTERNATIONAL Horse archery competitions. Once I learned of it I wanted to go, 2yrs later it lost funding and hard for people from Asia to make it. Thus, I couldn't go Just as I finally had $$ & time. I learned archery in camp as a kid then picked up a competition bow in college then moved to compound for hunting with friends.
Cool vid! I'm just now watching your archery stuff... Hope you post more archery vids in the future, going to be getting into traditional archery in a bit :D
With that heavy bodkin point, larger feathers are needed to stabilize the arrow.
Tapered and barrelled arrows are still available for modern sport archery.
The broad arrow was actually used not for the fact that they were the earliest ordnance but because a smuggler used this mark to transport his goods, to counter this the government of the time adopted this mark as the official mark of the war department to thwart this and he had proven it's effectiveness
Would be good to bring on traditional users to comment on their method and usage. Then use historical finds to correlate and compare changes over time, how much remains similar to old form and how it has changed for present day use.
I think you are right with the big-feather -theory - the same is true with hunting arrowsor trick shooting arrows - you may shoot close range and you want the arrow impact straight into the prey/target. I like your videos! Shoot Straight!
It’s also quite normal that a tree is thicker at the bottom and then thinning out. Of course it’s the same with the branches. 😊
And then there's the egregious use of turkey feathers in The Adventures of Robin Hood.
themastermason1 Outrageous!
I love traditional archery as well, got few mongolian bow and both wood and carbon arrows for fun. The way I draw is thumb draw via both Manchu and korean style thumb rings. Please put more videos about traditonal archery those things.
The physicist in in me has to tell you that it's either F = ma (force equals mass times acceleration) or E = 1/2 m v^2 (Energy equals a half of the mass times the velocity squared). You probably mean the second formula.
I find your theory of the length of the fletching interesting. I think the primary effect would come from the area of the fletchings, a longer one might have a bigger area, while still not interfering with the bow too much. There could be other effects as well, like dampening more frequencies of vibration. It would be interesting to device some experiments.
+RogerWilco with v=a*t and P=m*v we get F=P/t, hence Matt is correct
Edit: he did mention momentum (P) specifically
Manchu bow were so far the most energy efficient bow. especially at draw weight higher than 80 lbs it can give much higher velocity than english longbows of same weight. but it just needs a lot of maintenance. its outstanding to use in cold and dry north. but once you go south where its warm and wet, it get out of shape fast. and its almost as big as a longbow and much heavier to carry around.
There's no way to compare them, because a bow with a draw weight of 80lbs is not an English war bow.
Very educational video. Thanks Matt.
The Cedar has grown all over Europe and the middle east for thousands of years
Well if you look at modern athletics javelins for example, you can see how they are balanced and tapered for maximum distance.
Actually, cedars live all over the place, including the Mediterranean, India, even reaching into China.
I have seen many references to the “clothyard shaft”. My understanding is that the cloth yard was a Flemish unit of measure equal to 28”. Is that why modern bows and arrows are based on a standard draw length of 28”? Great video, by the way. Greetings from the Colonies.
Uh-uh. The "clothyard" was just that, 36"(which is why that's STILL the measurement today!) The modern standard is simply because that's the length it takes the majority of people
to draw an arrow to the chest(a standard anchor point for target archery)
peacock feathers i think would just be left and right wing feathers which are brown from what if seen when looking at actual feathers on the grown in a pen were my grandma kept him
I have though using peacock feathers to make fletchings if I had the materials to make an arrow with and a bow to test it
Jewels of energy
Could you follow up this great video with the bolts of crossbows?
it is strange to think of how many people and items one needs for a good war-Arrow. Of course a stone or bullet would be easier, but slings got out of fashion for some reason. Imagine what could have been build if all those resources weren't put in a military apparatus. Nevertheless, I like how people thought about their materials and made it so advanced. :3
+scholagladiatoria
Could you talk about different types of bows? Like turkish, mongol, longbow etc and how they compare to each other in draw strength, effectiveness etc?
+Tork789 They're all equally effective - it is all about context dear sir.
Is your picture/avatar Rorschach?
+rhemorigher
Not everything and every time is about context. And it's a picture of the young Stalin afaik.
It would be cultural appropriation for some ;-)
If any of you guys are interested in films concerning archery, then I highly suggest watching the Korean film - War of the Arrows/Arrow: The Ultimate Weapon. It's on Netflix I think.
Though not 100% accurate when it comes to bowmanship. It is a thrilling movie that showcases both different archery techniques and arrowheads.
Actually the archery is very good. The character draws right and performs Khatra like they did. He was able to twist the string so it was a bow of maybe 45 ibs
Is this why old drawings show arrows with a bulbous point.
You should show us on this video some medieval pictures with diferent tipes of arrow body and so.........!
Matt could you do a video on medieval English arrowheads please?
Wait, so to discourage people from poaching, which I imagine was already illegal, they made something related, but not the same, illegal? What am I missing?
Very informative, as usual, Matt.
""Criminals won't shoot people if we ban guns!-----a year down the road---> "Why is the prevalence of stabbings increasing so much?!" "" - So, you think this is a bad way of thinking? So how do you explain the fact that it is effective? In countries with lower availability of firearms there is less murders, shootouts, robberies and so on. If you compare countries such as Germany or Poland to the United States the difference is colossal.
***** Because you can only catch a poacher red handed. Someone with a bow and arrows in a royal forest is easier to find and catch, without having to wait for the moment that they 'poach'.
scholagladiatoria And the odds are that they're poor and hungry and no one important will miss them?
Jeez, where did that come from? I shouldn't be this cynical before the watershed...
TomatoBreadOrgasm Poaching is the main reason silencers are NFA items in the US as well. The National Firearms Act of 1934 was passed at the height of the Great Depression (so there were a lot of people who were desperate for a meal and couldn't care less about game laws), and it was believed that silencers made it more difficult to catch poachers.
So now you have to pay $200 and go through a bunch of red tape (not even counting how much the silencer itself costs) just to own a piece of safety equipment.
Regolith So that you don't blow out your ears? I'm no expert, but I've used silencers, and they don't silence, they just make the sonic boom a sonic grunt.
As an American interested in traditional archery, I hear your complaints about types of wood. I would love to get my hands on a classic style English longbow, but most of the ones I see are made from hickory, an American wood that has no business being part of an English longbow.
Fascinating, I never thought the aerodynamics might dictate different arrow designs for different purposes, but it makes perfect sense.
Are there any records of archers or archer units carrying multiple types of arrows to handle a variety of contingencies? A few distance arrows for the early stages, then some with a more frontwards center of mass for when things get close?
I notice that your arrow fletchings are not visibly glued, many I have seen have a mixture of beeswax, copper verdigris and pine resin between the the fletching and over the bindings. However you did say that it was not 100% accurate. All in all , as always a jolly interesting and informative video.
I have often wondered what happened after battle did the victorious side send out serfs or orderlies to gather arrows that were still usuable and not damaged from hard impact. This would help re supply an army on campaign unless they have fletchers and forgers traveling with them.... in all the battle details of the famous battles, this is never mentioned....???
Wing feathers on peacocks are very similar to goose feathers.
My theory regarding the size of fletching is different. First of all there were different types and sizes of fletching on English war arrows: images.yuku.com.s3.amazonaws.com/image/jpeg/13c169180d3039d715a92b26227cf6c9d4928479.jpg
Yes, the large fletching quicker stabilizes the arrow, which is important for short range shooting, but at the same time it increases the drag. The other purpose of big fletching is to neutralize negative destabilizing aerodynamic effect, created by big broadhead. Broadheads were also used on English arrows. With modern bowhunting broadheads, the big fletching is also used for the same reason. I think at the first stages of the battle, when they loose volleys at maximum distance, archers could use arrows fletched with smaller, or at least lower profile flights.
Ash arrows are hevier, and don't break a easily as cedar. I use birch which is somewhere between the two. Yes I shoot trees all the time, no problem.
Could it be that the bulkier head end of the shaft was for recovery purposes. I agree that it may have helped carry momentum into the target, but once you've hit the guy it seems he'd be at least a bit incapacitated. From an ordinance point of view though. Going around a battlefield and finding broken arrows (government ordinance) all over the field would be a wholly sufficient reason for the strengthening of that area of the arrow.
I would have thought that the varying thickness would be to address the archer's paradox due to the stiffness of the thicker shaft.
+Wreqt with a conventional long bow, one without a centre shot, you get the "paradox". So you, in fact, need the arrow to be elastic and bend in order to shoot where you aim it. The stiffness of an arrow is calibrated.
Laifs Exactly, and the thicker material used in these arrows would reduce that elasticity. I propose that the varying width of these arrows is designed to allow flex at those point to get around (he he he, pun intended) the paradox.
hey, did you ever do a vid on the arrow heads?
It will come.
This may be a question that doesn't fit the video very well, but are the modern homemade bows made of PVC and fiber glass good bows? I suppose they are not at the same level as professional bows, but for someone that doesn't quite have the money to buy one made by a professional, a cheap homemade one doesn't seem so bad.
Would the type of wood and tapering of the arrows affect how the arrow would bend when it is shot out? Would there be different ways to adjust to the archer's paradox?
So how can I get into traditional English archery? like getting the traditional equipment and maybe training.
How do longbows compare to crossbows? Striking power? Range? Also, how accurate where medieval bows and crossbows? Would it be possible to shoot down messenger birds leaving a castle?
How long would it actually take to make an arrow like that? Like, how many arrows a day could a person reasonably produce?
More than likely, "GI" arrows would be assembly-line produced, i.e. one person would make the shafts, one cut fletching, one make points. Then one person would fletch the shafts, and another would mount the points, then the finished arrow would be handed to someone else for making up arrow sheaves(usually 24 arrows), which would then be transported
for storage or to the field of battle
You can actually spit them out pretty quickly. I forge my own heads and every thing and it's nothing to knock out 2 dozen in a few hours so long as you got the materials at hand. The part that takes most of your time is whipping the fletching, especially if you do it right and make them small and tight such as the arrow in the video. It's easy, just time consuming.
finally your long detailed video, I prefer them more :)
Was the choice of goose fletching and string done in part so that the arrows would be more likely to resist being damaged while not in use, by water exposure?
How well did glues of the time resist water?
Also, from friends shooting each other with modified target arrows with padded heads, we noticed that if the arrowhead is sufficiently big, it can interfere with the fletching's ability to stabilize the arrow. We needed more fletching. These padded heads were at least 2" diameter, so I'm not sure if this issue translates to an only somewhat bigger war arrowhead.
Hi Matt, could you talk about different types of sword pommels in the future please? Regards
The arrow looks rather short to me for an actual longbow.
How were these arrows made? Looks like a time consuming process, especially if you'd need tens of thousands of them to equip an army. Were the shafts whittled by hand or turned on a sort of lathe?
The principal tecnique is called cleaving. Some timbers work better than others. Basically a straight grained log is cut to length, stood on end and then split by driving some sort of wedge into the end grain. Halves, Quarters, and further. An expert, using suitable timber, can produce "blanks" not much bigger than the required shaft size. They can then be finished with draw knife and plane
Does the arrow snapping on the tree cause the head to always fall, or does it sometimes stick in the tree anyway? I know, pointless question.
Whats the weight of a military arrow with tapering?
Great video! Will you do one about arrowheads?
really informative video
Hi Matt, The arrow it's the most important piece of an archer's arsenal. Do you know if there are any records of war arrows being 'spined'? It would of course be impossible to tailor arrows to each archer, but was there a general 'spining' of maybe 120-180 pounds draw weight? Much respect, Jim.
You mentioned cedar (an American wood) being used to create European style arrows. Although a-historical in this sense, this made me a little curious about Native American archery traditions. Do you (or anybody else reading this) happen to know anything about this subject?
NorwegianChris I assume you mean North American Natives as opposed to say the Aztecs (if those guys even had archers). I don't know an awful lot about them but I believe they had multiple kinds of bows, everything from sinew backed short bows to flatbows, and who knows maybe round or D-shaped self bows too.
+NorwegianChris While I am no expert, it is my understanding that most of the North American Native bows were relatively short with fairly low draw weight. They were not particularly accurate or powerful, and most were basically round cross section. Their emphasis was on using woodsmanship to get close and being able to quickly make a shot. If you are running around through the woods, a larger bow would snag on everything and be very cumbersome. They did have some very clever hunting spears though.
I replicate Native American bows (and hunt with them). I've got some knowledge on short sinew backed paddle bows made from Juniper and Cedar. I've built a few. Cedar has a relatively low SG (Specific Gravity/Density) so it's not the best wood for a bow. Yurok tribes and such used mostly Juniper along the West Coast and backed their bows with elk and deer sinew, mostly with a reflexed and recurve design. Try looking it up on California Sinew Backed Bow on TH-cam.
The arrow wobble described around 7:19 is called the archer's paradox, and Smarter Every Day had a great episode rather recently about the topic th-cam.com/video/O7zewtuUM_0/w-d-xo.html.
I have a question that you may know the answer to, would arrows of been made of various different spines? as an archer spine is incredibly important to get good arrow flight, I shoot a longbow and a too stiff spine will actually make a decent clack against the side of the bow and fly incredibly badly with a lot of power lost, to weak a spine and a similar thing will happen.With the large diversity in longbow power ranging from 100lb right up to potentially up to and even slightly over 200lb the arrows would need to be hugely different in spine for each of these bows to get decent flight.This, to me, poses a bit of a logistical nightmare, they were I believe transported in barrels by the English, would they have had different barrels with different spines? Or was this something they didn't really concern themselves with? which I find hard to believe but is possible.Any thoughts on this would be very appreciated.
+Matthew O'Connell Actually it seems that with heavy warbows and arrows spine isn't really important - the reason being that above about 120lbs draw weight English longbows were used with 1/2 inch arrows that were so stiff it didn't really matter which bow shot them (arrows were mass produced munitions, supplied by the crown. So accuracy would be reduced, but heavy volume shooting, heavy hitting and better supply chains would result.
Thanks a lot for the reply, I guess accuracy was a fairly low priority as you would be shooting into ranks of men, as long as it went somewhere roughly into the group its all good.
I think it's all too easy to lose track of the implications of the fact that when the bow was a valued weapon of war the ammunition was, as Mathew points out below, Government Issue. Sourced from all over the country, manufactured to a pattern, stored in the Tower until needed, shipped out with the troops by the cartload and issued by the sheaf. These shafts then had to perform well with a range of draw weights, draw lengths and arrow heads. My personal opinion is that this is why the fletchings were so big - in order to stabilise quickly under all circumstances. No doubt, in periods of peace, retained archers would sift through locally held stocks to pick out the ones that worked best for them, possibly even trimmming fletchings if distance shooting was an objective. But in the field, all arrows had to suit every archer.
As for spine, think about this. If you are holding a draw weight of 150 lbs or so, pushing into the bow with your bow arm and shoulder, as soon as you loose your bow arm is going to extend a little, pushing the bow out of the path of the arrow. I don't think "the Archers Paradox" is going to be very relevant here, the shaft doesn't need to flex to clear the bow.
Greenie
Very interesting. I know archers often carried many different types of arrows, but does this mean the perception of the long bow being a great distance weapon is false? Or at least false in the military context that it was used? Really interesting stuff Matt.
What type of string was used with the arrow fletching?
Hunting with the bow was only made illegal in UK in the 50's, there was then a movement to legalise it again in the 60's, and though the committee found in favour of it's proper reintroduction, the government decided to ignore the findings and so it stayed illegal
good.
Q1: What glue were they using for the fletchings?
Q2: Any indication whether they were using the peacocks' flight feathers or their display feathers --> could the fluff/filamentious part of the display feathers act like contemporary fluffy/'flu-flu' arrow fletchings.
Did the historical Americans use cedar or did they have another favourite?
Arrows are very old ..... The thousands old Indian Historic Text of Ramayana & Mahabharata have them as modern as the one you sir are holding to give a demonstration
Where can i find the Thrand video?
What part of it is English per say? Did continental Europe have different fletching or something?
+DushinSC I don't know what about is English but I do know that different periods and different parts of the world did have differences in fetching. In the video he even talks about it a bit. Different feathers,different woods and thicknesses and different heads etc.
Anzu Wyliei Ehm, I'm not sure if I am the most qualified person to answer that question but I heard Tod made really good reproductions: www.todsstuff.co.uk/crossbows/crossbows.htm
***** True, but I wonder if an arrow produced in Normandy or Flanders would differ that much from one produced in England. I know certain swords were more common in certain regions but I can't imagine you have that much design freedom when it comes to warbow arrows.
DushinSC The thing is, only England (in Western Europe) was producing large numbers of longbowmen using super heavyweight bows and these matching fat arrows with long fletchings. Some countries emulated the system (eg. Burgundy), but it really seems to have been England/Wales that developed the specific heavy equipment.
+DushinSC English arrows spin on the left.
I watch both you and Skallagrim and have wondered who would win in a fencing match?
Meh, arrows cost money... send in the Irish.
+Androandroandrica Yes... but we'll hit theirs as well. We have reserves. Attack.
Ahhh Braveheart. ;) Historically inaccurate, but oh such an ever so good classic movie.
One of my favorite lines from the movie btw. ;P
blakdust3 funny quote but incredibly dumb - mercenaries cost 1000x more than an arrow.
@@Wunel not if they were forced to fight and not volunteers which were part of what a mercenary was. Not a forced soul
How Heavy Were War arrows? In terms of Grains? Ex. 400 grains.
How long would it normally take someone to make a traditional arrow, then?
I have heard of owl feather being used for arrows because a owls feathers make a lot less sound while flying. How common was this?
What would be the cost of an medieval wararrow?
Say, if a soldier or knight would want to buy his own arrows during for example the War of the Roses, what would he pay for them?
If the cost is given in comparison to other items, that works as well.
Knights had no use for arrows. The bow was a peasant's weapon. "GI" arrows would have a price set by the Crown, which would, likely, be by the dozen, or hundred, count. Custom-
made arrows, for an individual, would probably have been charged then like they are now; depending on the maker, and what the customer wanted done
thank you . very informative.
+scholagladiatoria Matt what is that "metal gauntlet with blade attached"-fist.weapon on the right behind your head? Did you make a video about it? (i searched but found nothing :/ )