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What is "Warbow"

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MattE:
I am no autrority on war bows but I have read many books on the subject.One thing that I find is rarely mentioned is how short the people were in the days of the long bow, around 5' 4" was considered a large man. A bow tillered for a 32" draw, which seems to be the norm, would have been impossible for the average man of the day to reach if he were to draw the bow . I am 6'-1 1/2" tall and I can barely reach 32" draw pulling to my ear. I have come to the conclusion that bows of the day were tillered to 32" for safety ,while in reality the bows were only drawn to around 26" to 28" max. If we were to make a bow to fit us and use ratio to proportion  as a pattern. The bow would have to be tillered to 38" to 40" to be correct. There are other factors that come into play as well, things like reaching the point of diminishing returns and the bows averaging 72" in length.After doing the math it appears that the bows of the day were only pulled to about 65# draw on an average if that and not 90 to 100# as we have seen in print...... This is only an opinion! 

sagitarius boemoru:

--- Quote from: MattE on May 07, 2007, 10:43:10 am ---I am no autrority on war bows but I have read many books on the subject.One thing that I find is rarely mentioned is how short the people were in the days of the long bow, around 5' 4" was considered a large man. A bow tillered for a 32" draw, which seems to be the norm, would have been impossible for the average man of the day to reach if he were to draw the bow . I am 6'-1 1/2" tall and I can barely reach 32" draw pulling to my ear. I have come to the conclusion that bows of the day were tillered to 32" for safety ,while in reality the bows were only drawn to around 26" to 28" max. If we were to make a bow to fit us and use ratio to proportion  as a pattern. The bow would have to be tillered to 38" to 40" to be correct. There are other factors that come into play as well, things like reaching the point of diminishing returns and the bows averaging 72" in length.After doing the math it appears that the bows of the day were only pulled to about 65# draw on an average if that and not 90 to 100# as we have seen in print...... This is only an opinion! 

--- End quote ---


One thing that I find is rarely mentioned is how short the people were in the days of the long bow, around 5' 4" was considered a large man.

- Not true. "People were shorter than us, back in medieval ages" its known and debunked misinformation. Average height oscilated alot over periods of good and bad nutritions e.g. even over a so short time as two or three generations. A free farmer with his heavy work, but good nutrition on both sacharide and protein was actually very well build and of todays "normal" height with off course some people being shorter and some higher. People had slightly different frame - e.g. the palms of hands were more than narrow, but generally "they were smaller than us" is hersay.

I am 6'-1 1/2" tall and I can barely reach 32" draw pulling to my ear

- I m only 5´3´´ and I can draw 31´´ unless I get too much of body compression with bow over 115# or so. You do something wrong.


I have come to the conclusion that bows of the day were tillered to 32" for safety ,while in reality the bows were only drawn to around 26" to 28" max

- Such  bows would be extremelly sluggish. While there are some shorter arrows, these still allow for at least 28´´, but fully tilered english bow works indeed best at some 32´´. It starts to shoot reasonably at 30´´.  26´´ draw is just too short to store energy for these arrows. At 28´´ these bows just dont perform any satisfactory or in unity with a common performance they were required to reach.


There are other factors that come into play as well, things like reaching the point of diminishing returns and the bows averaging 72" in length

- Point of dimnishing return is reached at some 33´´ of drawlenght with english bows from yew. Past that you wont get much increase in distance reached.
MR bows averaged on 75-77´´. There is few (les then 10) which are actually shorter , but even these were in 74´´ range. 72´´ was probably standart in pre azincourt era, though we have no means to say for sure and again even 72´´ is easy to tiler at 32´´. For very heavy bows longer is better because the elastic limits of material is reached.

After doing the math it appears that the bows of the day were only pulled to about 65# draw on an average if that and not 90 to 100# as we have seen in print

-What math? Bad one apparently.  I follow right away with side note on required performance of said bows.

J.

sagitarius boemoru:
Side note  on required performance..Read this before posting nonsense.

There is very much cited law by Henry VIII. which is by some longbowmen interpreted wrongly as one which does indeed prohibits shooting the targets closer than 240 yards or sets this distance as common practice distance.

In fact the law says something like this :
"Item that no man during a required practice shoot any flighting or prickling arrow at marks shorter than 240 yards."

(Cited from memory, original printed accurate in Hugh Soars "Of Bowmen and Battles")

As we can see the law only prohibits shooting TOO LIGHT arrows at closer targets and its intended to preserve shooting of heavy military standart arrows and bows of necessary weight and performance. It does not mean that shorter marks than 240 yrds werent shot, but an arrow between 3-4 oz was required for them, where longer could be shot with lighter 2 oz "flight" arrow.
The law is to prevent sporterisation of equipment.


Now to adress previous posts. A bow tilered for safety to 32´´/100# and then drawn at 65#/26´´ not even is sluggish and incapable of shooting 3 oz arrow at the edge of 240 yrds, but its not capable of shooting even light 2 oz arrow at that distance.
A dedicated military professional would fare even better!
The treshold is exactly where it is -

90#/32´´ with good cast will do 240+ with standart (2 oz) arrow or 200 with 3 oz
110#/32´´ with normal cast will do around the same

I would by this discard the idea of shortdrawing and what we could read in previous post as nonsense.

In post azincourt era even better performance is required as plate armour is in play, some arrowheads are quite huge and bows around 125# seem to be the standart.

80#/28´´ bow is not capable of performance required by law even amongst commonfolk, much less military men and its only a warbow to todays people who arent able to do better and want romatic.

(Side note on snipers - a accuracy specialist such as "Black Will long" leader of dean forresters would indeed shoot a bow on low edge of the weight spectrum, but even he would be smirked upon if he wasnt able to reach a commonners standart of distance and I would expect such person to baby his bow rather lot.

J.

MattE:
Jaro, you have managed to discredit every bit of what I think may be correct. I realize you and some other, as well as myself, enjoy the history of bows but we all have to step back and take a long hard look at what the romance is and what is factual.It is documented fact that people were shorter in the fourteenth century and even up to the seventeenth century, contrary to what you stated.One only has to visit any museum and look at the armor worn in those days.I have seen actual clothes of the period and if  didn't know better I would have thought it was made for a adolescent. People were mostly short.I like to keep things in context. What we would like things to be and what they actually are sometimes conflict. The heaviest bow at my draw that I could ever shoot decent was 80# and only for very few shots.I don't believe in supermen. There are none now and there wern't any during the days of the long bow. Very few men today can pull the weight bows that you would have us believe all archers shot in the days of the longbow. The romance and the facts just arn't the same. I also don't think the knights of the day faught fire breathing dragons! :)

Loki:

--- Quote ---, but an arrow is only drawn to where the shaft ends (meets the socket of arrowhead). You dont pull it over the socket because it ultimatelly damages the bow much.
--- End quote ---

I like to keep my arrows the same length so i cut the shaft accordingly to fit the head,When i'm using a type 7 needle bodkin i still draw it back to the same place as when i'm using a type 1 head.My draw is 31" and my arrows are 32",i dont wear any type of glove on my bowhand and i havent found drawing over the socket  to cause any damage to my bow,which has no arrow plate.
What type of damage does doing this with type 7's do to the Bow?

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