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The Longbow
The might of Yngland standyth upon Her archers
Sir John Fortesque 1478
The origins of the Longbow have been lost in the mists of time but this weapon is a very ancient one indeed. The ice mummy nick named Ortzi found in the Alps in 1991 was carrying a Yew Longbow approximately 5,000 years ago !!
Early examples
Ashcott Heath in Somerset has produced a longbow dating back to 2,665 BC. We have only one limb giving an approximate length of 63 inch and of D section.
Edington Burtle in Somerset has provided a bough bow, made from a branch, of Yew dated to 1,320 BC.
In 1932 a Longbow was recovered from an Irish crannog, Ballinderry, in a tenth century context. Dimensions: 75 inches long, 1.6 inches wide, 1 1/4 inches deep and 4 1/4 inches in girth at its geometeric center.This is a self bow of Yew with sap wood and heart wood in proportion, of plano-convex profile and self knocked. Contemporary with this bow is the martyrdom of King Edmund by the Vikings.
The Viking used the longbow in their warfare, even though they much preferred to brain people with their axes in their wars with the Anglo-Saxons who also used bows, but neither culture made much of them in their sagas: they much preferred said axes to sing about .
I will remind readers that the Vikings stayed in this country for a long time and York (Jorvik) was their capital in England; their decendents and the Anglo-Saxons are still here.
Time to leave the early bow and move on to the middle ages.
Warfare
Bogan waeron bysige (Bows were busy) from the song of the battle of Maldon 991 AD
The Anglo-Saxons and Vikings used bows in battle and for hunting. St Edmund, the patron saint of England before St George, was martyred in the ninth century, by the Vikings by tying him to a tree and shooting him to death with arrows.
As shown above this type of bow was used in the early medieval period though it does have to be said that others were used as well. King Henry III in 1252 ,the Assize of Arms of 1181 was renewed and extended. Comissioners of Array were to choose men to serve the King in his armies. Those who owned more than 40 shillings, but less than 100shillings worth of land, must have a sword, a bow and arrows, and a dagger, as must townsmen or citizens owning more than 9 and less than 40 Marks of property. Yeomen or townsmen owning less than 40 shillings of land, or 9 marks in chattels, must have a bow and arrows.
Quick note: the term Longbow / Longbowe / Long-bow does not come into common usage until the 15th century.
Edward I was the first English King to use bows en masse. He came to this tactic by having the Welsh use them to great effect against his armies, but the Welsh used them in small numbers - and from ambush, famously skewering one Knight to his saddle through one thigh then when he turned around to remove himself from the ambush his other thigh was nailed to his saddle as well !
As a little aside, the bows upto this point had been hunting bows pressed into military service; we now have the warbow coming into use as shown above.
These archers, mainly Welsh but with more Englishmen gaining skill with this weapon, went to Scotland with Edward I
in the 1290s.
From here on the archer was a mainstay of English armies both at home and abroad with an impressive list of victories under its belt.
The longbow achieved its fame and rightful place in the hearts of Englishmen during the middle ages; the big three victories over the French Crecy 1346, Poitiers 1356 and Agincourt 1415 represent the pinnacle of the mighty war bow.
The Longbow finally left military service in 1595. Under Elizabeth I's reign the improvement in fire-arms, scarcity of good bow wood and lack of training saw the exit of the bow from the statute books, although not without a fight from the old hands.
To finish with, the Longbow was not quite obsolete: during the American Civil War efforts were made to use archers on the battle field. Napoleon Bonaparte aslo tried to raise a company of archers, why? because until the end of the 19th century the Longbow was better than fire-arms for range, rate of fire, accuracy and stopping power.
Capt Jack Churchill whilst on the retreat to Dunkirk 1939 used his Longbow to kill a German soldier before the rest of his rifle section shot the rest of the enemy squad with rifle fire.
Recreational
The earliest surviving manuscript we have written on archery in English dates from 1545 by Roger Ascham, 130 years after Agincourt ! Even though Ascham exhorts his fellow men to shoot the Longbow, and the old weapon was still used in warfare, he is mainly writing about recreational shooting
Horace Ford in 1856 brought in a way of shooting now known as point of aim up to then we had drawn the arrow to the side of the face or to the ear (some of us still do). Horace popularised the facial anchor point and scores rose considerably but so distances lessened and for better or for worse the modern target shoot and style was born.
At the end of the 19th century archers tried to add sights to their bows. This continued to the next century. To prove a point, look at pictures of Capt. Jack Churchill representing Great Britian in the Olympics. Look at how he has drawn his bow - sorry, recurvers, bar your gadgets and gizmos, your techniques were developed on the old weapon.
Hunting
Although hunting with a bow is now illegal in this country (1963) in the middle ages it was a very popular and neccessary means of putting meat on the table. Hunting with a bow was so common in England that when Gaston Phoebus, a Frenchman, writes his 14th century Hunting Book that he advises his readers to ask any one in England for how to use a bow to hunt.
Target Not a favourite of mine but their a great many rounds at various distances indoors and out. Unfortunatly to compete you need to add a rubber band as a sight, all within the rules but personally I feel it is not in the spirit of the weapon.
Clout A form of archery that is growing in popularity usual shot at 9 score for Gents 7 score for Ladies and 5 score for Juniors. This represents shooting at the enemy standard bearer the closer to the flag the better. The scoring is done by the means of a rope, one end looped over the flag, which is coloured Gold 5pts, Red 4pts, Blue 3pts, Black 2pts and White 1pt with a colour sergent to each colour collecting arrows as the rope touches them. Single clout 3 dozen arrows, double clout 6 dozen arrows, shot one way or two ways.
Standard Arrow The BLBS standard arrow is a well estblished competion. The arrow itself is a minimum of 52 grams in weight, 31 1/2 inches long, a shaft diameter of 3/8 inch armed with a bodkin or type 16 head. Fletches are 6 inch in length and 3/4 inch in height cut in a triangle. This arrow is shot for distance with everyone using an arrow of the above or greater dimensions. Record distance 309 yards
Flight Arrow As youngsters we made bows from branches and garden canes, feathers and points from dart sets one of the first questions was "How far does that go?" Flight shooting is the practice of shooting an arrow as far as possible, only now a lot more complicated. Specially made bows and arrows are an advantage with the record standing at 425 yards. To achieve the greatest distance with your bow an angle of elevation of 45 degrees and as near perfect release is required, don't forget to keep pulling.
Roving an ancient form of archery practice which involves shooting at unknown distances on rough ground uphill, downhill, over trees and with dead ground between the archer and the flag, and is scored in a similar way to clout. This is a practice for war because the judgement of distances is vital, the enemy don't carry range markers !!!!
Glossary
Laminatedbow Due to a shortage of good bow wood layers of wood are glued together to form a bow using woods that our ancesters could not have dreamed of.
Marks 2/3 of a pound - 13s 4d used for trade and measuring wealth not a coin
Knock To fit the arrow to the string. The groove which houses the string on the bow limbs or in the arrow
Score As a distance a score is 20 yards or the amount of points awarded to an arrow
Self bow made from one piece of wood
Self knock To be cut into the arrow shaft or into the ends of the bow limbs
Author Henry Sherrey |
