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An Arrow that Changed History

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CraigMBeckett:
dmassphoto,


--- Quote ---Ahh, I never knew there was much of a difference in the North/South Welsh population.  I read it in a couple books a few years ago, so my memory may be hazy, but I always thought the archers at Shrewsbury were Welsh.  Either way, it would take an excellent archer to hit the Prince of England in the face as he was charging.
--- End quote ---

I am a "small"  part south Welsh and lived for a number of years in mid Glamorgan part of the area where some of the fabled Welsh archers come from, It always amused me to hear and see the disdain that the South Welsh held the North Welsh in. Even down to the name they use for them which is Gog, a contraction of gogledd, pronounced gog-lee-eth which is Welsh for North. I have no idea what the North Welsh call the South Welsh I never lived there but must admit to much prefering the South and West Welsh accent to that of the North.


--- Quote ---I always thought the archers at Shrewsbury were Welsh
--- End quote ---

I would imagine they are turning in their graves at being called Welsh.

Craig.

ChrisM:
Changing tack somewhat, Hector was special guest at our club's annual mediaeval feast two years ago and chose the wounding and subsequent extraction of the bodkin as the subject for his speech. A talented orator, he kept us all spellbound for an hour covering all aspects of the injury and treatment and building up to a clever finale, the discovery of a contemporary description of the arrow extractor upon which he based his reproduction. After the speech he passed this remarkably well made object around the hall for us to handle. Unforgettable. I now feel quite privileged to use his perfect type 10's on my Welsh Class arrows.

ChrisD:
Hmmm - Interesting hypothesis in this link, but probably nonesense. Henry became king 10 years after the battle and was known to have done much carousing in the interim. His behaviour as king is all to do with careful image management combined with both piety and a desparate need to legitimise his hold of the crown.

First, 'penetrating head trauma' doesn't necessarily, or even particularly often, mean penetrating brain injury, on account of that organ being well protected inside a box with thick bone over vulnerable parts and thinner bone where lots of other protection exists. Second, the temporal lobe, as illustrated in the link, lies in the middle cranial fossa which creates a bulge to about half way down the orbit. In order to stick an arrow in it according to the type of injury being discussed ie a frontal strike, you either need to lose your eye, or if hit in the cheek, angle it upwards by at least 30 degrees (unlikely given that the arrow came from above and Henry was fighting up a hill at the time). In any case, it isn't six inches back. Third, if there was any penetration of the middle fossa resulting in a brain injury which could lead to the sort of stuff mentioned, there would have been a CSF leak (brain fluid). There are particular features of that kind of trauma that in this context, meningitis and death would have been pretty much certain no matter what anyone did. Finally, the lack of evidence of loss of consiousness goes against any direct brain injury.

I have thought about this injury often and have heard a couple of comments relating to the arrow being embedded in the skull or even the mandible(!). My own take on the descriptions is that it entered the cheek beside the nose probably along a more or less true horizontal line (Henry would still have had to have been looking up for an arrow to come down and strike in this way), went through the maxillary sinus and across the infratemporal fossa(below the middle fossa) losing energy as it did so and got itself stuck in the undersurface of petrous temporal bone , which is a long way back and certainly could be assessed as 6 inches if the cheek was swollen as it would have been. The petrous temporal bone is, as the name suggests very hard -in fact the hardest bone in the body and winkling an arrow out of it would certainly be tricky. The internal carotid artery would have traversed very near to the path of the arrow so survival was very fortunate indeed - interestingly, had the arrow hit beside the nose and gone up into the temporal lobe, it would probably have severed the internal carotid on its way!

Hats off to Bradmore - his actions give the lie to the idea that all medics of the time were a waste of space - although it has to be said that he was known to be unconventional and was under something of a cloud at the time he was called in.

C

bow-toxo:

--- Quote from: CraigMBeckett on April 11, 2011, 10:50:32 pm ---dmassphoto,
I would imagine they are turning in their graves at being called Welsh.

Craig.

--- End quote ---

 Another point that puzles me:The Black Prince, the Prince of WALES, chose a corps of Cheshire archers , not just from Cherter, but also from the environs, and they were liveried in GREEN AND WHite, the colors of WALES. His son, Richard II also used Cheshire archers as his bodyguard, again liveried in the Welsh colors, which were again used by the Tudors, from Wales. Might this be more than accidental ?

CraigMBeckett:
bow-toxo,


--- Quote ---Another point that puzles me:The Black Prince, the Prince of WALES, chose a corps of Cheshire archers , not just from Cherter, but also from the environs, and they were liveried in GREEN AND WHite, the colors of WALES. His son, Richard II also used Cheshire archers as his bodyguard, again liveried in the Welsh colors, which were again used by the Tudors, from Wales. Might this be more than accidental ?
--- End quote ---

To my knowledge (which of course is limited) the green/white livery for all welsh archers is a myth, If anyone has information to the contrary I would appreciate it if the information and its source were posted as a response here. The use of livery was to notify the observer who was lord of the mass of people. Far from being "Welsh Colours" I suggest that as the livery was chosen and payed for by the employing Lord the colours merely indicated that they were the Prince's men? Wales was responsible for raising his own contribution to any military venture, including equipping and maintaining the men raised.

As I understand it there are only two documented issues of such livery by the Black Prince, one in 1346, another in 1359. These issues were made to Archers raised by the Prince from Cheshire and Flintshire, adjoining counties, one English the other Welsh, but the Welsh one containing areas that once were part of Cheshire, (possibly the source of the Welsh archers in an area that is renowned for its Welsh spearmen) . So I would suggest that in the context of the Black Prince his use of Green and White served to signify that they were his archers from that area of the country, not that they were specifically Welsh or Cheshire-men. I would add that I do not believe that there is any evidence of the archers from the South Welsh counties (who provided the majority of the Welsh archers to the English Forces), specifically wearing green and White.

In addition Prince of Wales is only one title usually held by the English Crown Prince, he is also usually Duke of Cornwall (the Cornish being another "Celtic" people) and Earl of Chester.  Cheshire was also for a time promoted to the rank of a Principality so the holder of the title (King Richard II) was " Prince of Chester". The only significance here is that Flintshire and Chestershire as it was or Cheshire as it is are/were both lands under the control of the Prince and adjacent to each other.

Craig.

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