What do we make of the range of Byzantine and Turkic bows during the Crusades considering Anna Comnena's statement?
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This cross-bow is a bow of the barbarians quite unknown to the Greeks; and it is not stretched by the right hand pulling the string whilst the left pulls the bow in a contrary direction, but he who stretches this warlike and very far-shooting weapon must lie, one might say, almost on his back and apply both feet strongly against the semi-circle of the bow and with his two hands pull the string with all his might in the contrary direction. In the middle of the string is a socket, a cylindrical kind of cup fitted to the string itself, and about as long as an arrow of considerable size which reaches from the string to the very middle of the bow; and through this arrows of many sorts are shot out. [256] The arrows used with this bow are very short in length, but very thick, fitted in front with a very heavy iron tip. And in discharging them the string shoots them out with enormous violence and force, and whatever these darts chance to hit, they do not fall back, but they pierce through a shield, then cut through a heavy iron corselet and wing their way through and out at the other side. So violent and ineluctable is the discharge of arrows of this kind. Such an arrow has been known to pierce a bronze statue, and if it hits the wall of a very large town, the point of the arrow either protrudes on the inner side or it buries itself in the middle of the wall and is lost. Such then is this monster of a crossbow, and verily a devilish invention. And the wretched man who is struck by it, dies without feeling anything, not even feeling the blow, however strong it be. |
Her other comments aside I am mostly struck by her calling it a very far shooting weapon. They were wooden crossbows and spanned by hand. I believe Tod reckoned a trained person could draw up to 300 lbs that way which others have reckoned is about as high as you can go with a reasonably sized wooden prod.
In a recent book Mike Loades mentions a test he conducted with a 300 lbs steel prod crossbow
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We wanted to compare the deceleration of a longbow arrow from a 150lb bow with that of a bolt from a steel-lathed 300lb crossbow, measured with Doppler radar (see Loades 2013: 66). The radar malfunctioned on the day and the results were not conclusive, but the following was observable. The longbow arrow, a heavy livery arrow, began to decelerate early in its flight but continued to fly for around 200 yards. By comparison the crossbow bolt lost very little initial velocity, having a higher-energy launch, but once it started to decelerate, after approximately 60 yards, it did so rapidly, losing any military effectiveness despite continuing to travel another 30 yards or so. |
If this roughly 300 lbs wooden prod crossbow Anna saw had a military effective range of around 50 to 60 yards the bows the Byzantines and their enemies the Turks used must not have been able to effectively shoot much further and possible even less. Perhaps a bow shooting at a long range on a parabolic trajectory was not counted as effective shooting and only close range horizontal/point blank shooting was considered here, in which case the statement about the crossbows long point blank range might be true.
The 200 yards livery arrow shot is also worth remarking on. Christine de Pizan mentions English archers being able to hit a barge at 600 feet (which if they were akin to the later Royal Pied would be close to 212 yards) while a 16th century Englishman also mentions a livery bow and arrow managing 200 yards.
Dominic Mancini wrote in 1485 that the bows used by the English had a range of no less than our [Italian] arbelests, but this also makes me scratch my head. Were these crossbows he mentioned the belt and claw or belt and pulley spanned crossbows which show up in Italian art or much heavier cranequin or windlass crossbows? Besides would these be effective at 200 yards or was Mancini referring to close range point blank shooting?
The various accounts on the battle of Crecy in 1346 are also somewhat confused. Now I don't know if the crossbowmen present there had windlass crossbows or belt and pulley spanned ones but the latter seems likely to me. Froissart and another chronicle have the crossbowmen fire of the first shot/volley at the archers opposite them before the archers advanced a pace and shot back. Now Geoffroy le Baker mentions the quarrels of the Genoese falling short in this battle but at the battle of Poitiers he also has the crossbowmen firing the first volley. If these were belt and pulley spanned composite crossbows did they shoot at the English at around 200 yards or did they engage them at 50-80 yards?
The only somewhat contemporary account I know which is absolutely clear on this is that of Pero Nino who drew a very strong ballestas a cinto and also brought along many other strong crossbowmen who bend strong bows from the belt.
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Clearly the archers who attacked the men equipped with belt spanned crossbows did so at a range where the crossbowmen could hit them, effectively enough for them to bring improvised shields, let down quite the arrow storm upon them but still waited for these crossbowmen to empty their quiver.
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Trying to make sense of all this I can only really come up with three explanations
1: Mike Loades completely messed up his test, crossbows could be fired on a parabolic trajectory just as effective and just as far as arrows shot from bows
2: The Belt spanned crossbows used by Pero Nino and whatever bows used by the crossbowmen at Crecy and Poitiers were much more powerful than the bows used during the early part of the Crusades and had a much longer effective distance.
3: English archers could lob arrows up to 200 yards but chose to engage crossbow men at 50-70 yards distance anyways because that was were they were most effective.
The latter makes the most sense to me. Close to zero elevation, horizontal, point blank range shooting was the measure of effective range and crossbows, as attested or implied by Anna and Dominic nearly four centuries apart were better at that than most bows. Heavy warbows shooting clothyard shafts being a special case in that their heavy arrows could match crossbows when it came to point blank shooting.
I hope someone else will be able to give accounts that back up or discredit this suggestion.