Info Favorites Register Log in
myArmoury.com Discussion Forums

Forum index Memberlist Usergroups Spotlight Topics Search
Forum Index > Historical Arms Talk > Arrows vs armour Reply to topic
This is a Spotlight Topic Go to page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 18, 19, 20, 21  Next 
Author Message
Jean Thibodeau




Location: Montreal,Quebec,Canada
Joined: 15 Mar 2004
Likes: 50 pages
Reading list: 1 book

Spotlight topics: 5
Posts: 8,310

PostPosted: Wed 28 Mar, 2012 11:27 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Jojo Zerach wrote:
Matt Easton wrote:
Jojo Zerach wrote:
Since the effigy is supposed to represent a person, you'd want the face visible.


Hi Jojo, I think you misunderstood me. Any nationality example will show the face, but French and German effigies and brasses, for example, often show a raised visor or the attachment points for the visor. English examples in contrast almost never do - the two examples you found, and that of the Hastings Brass, are rare exceptions.

This leaves the question as to why - my 3 possible reasons above are responses to that question. A fair number of academics have concluded that English bascinets often were not fitted with visors at all.

Regards,
Matt


It's probable that the sculptors simply didn't bother to depict the visor or it's mount. The same way they didn't show buckles, hinges and rivets. Some effigies show these elements, but a lot don't.
As you mentioned with lance rests. (I'm only aware of 1 English effigy from the 14th century showing a lance rest, but they were probably commonplace.)


Well the early Bascinets where worn under the Great Helm, and if the custom of using them under the great Helm continued longer in Britain than on the continent, it's probable that the English Bascinets would not have provisions for mounting a visor ?

You can easily give up your freedom. You have to fight hard to get it back!
View user's profile Send private message
Randall Moffett




Location: Northern Utah
Joined: 07 Jun 2006
Reading list: 5 books

Posts: 2,121

PostPosted: Wed 28 Mar, 2012 1:03 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

I sort of doubt it was used longer. By the 1320s and 1330s they are being largely replaced by bascinets. By mid century I have found only a few used in real war of scores and scores of accounts. My guess is this was more a consideration 1320s and earlier.

RPM
View user's profile Send private message
William P




Location: Sydney, Australia
Joined: 11 Jul 2010

Posts: 1,523

PostPosted: Thu 29 Mar, 2012 3:43 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

well visored bascinets design, particularly the cone snouted hundskulls,
are particularly good at saving you from arrows to the face and definately one of the better designs for this purpose

the snouted visor would increase the chances of an arrow simply glancing off, and unlike great bascinets with rounder visors, would have less impact transferred from arrows flying at you and the eye holes, are , as far as i understand slightly protruding from th surface of the helm increasing the distance a arrow has to go to hit your eye,

this is contrasted with the fact the nature of the visor maybe means that you have to expose your whole face to see a lot, which, if im not mistaken, led to a LOT of arrow related deaths which boil down to people lifting the visor to see/ breathe, and having an arrow hit them in the face while doing so.
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Timo Nieminen




Location: Brisbane, Australia
Joined: 08 May 2009
Likes: 1 page
Reading list: 1 book

Posts: 1,504

PostPosted: Thu 29 Mar, 2012 1:01 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

William P wrote:
well visored bascinets design, particularly the cone snouted hundskulls,
are particularly good at saving you from arrows to the face and definately one of the better designs for this purpose

the snouted visor would increase the chances of an arrow simply glancing off, and unlike great bascinets with rounder visors, would have less impact transferred from arrows flying at you and the eye holes, are , as far as i understand slightly protruding from th surface of the helm increasing the distance a arrow has to go to hit your eye,


The "protrusion" of the eye slots is to stop the snout from guiding things straight into your eye slot. Nice pointy snout, arrow or sword thrust or lance thrust hits, and slides, and the point goes in the eye slot. The raised lip stops this. The cheapest Indian repros don't have these lips. If one is available, try it and see.

Some have a protruding top edge, some don't. It's interesting to see that some helmets don't have this type of feature. Some of these get similar guiding-to-the-eye-slot protection just from the shape of the front surface. Others don't. Bad design?

"In addition to being efficient, all pole arms were quite nice to look at." - Cherney Berg, A hideous history of weapons, Collier 1963.
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
Benjamin H. Abbott




Location: New Mexico
Joined: 28 Feb 2004

Spotlight topics: 1
Posts: 1,248

PostPosted: Tue 03 Apr, 2012 8:30 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

I'll throw out a source that I haven't seen cited before in these debates. As part of a 1527 book of military advice, Jacopo di Porcia wrote the following: "Fotemen with bowes, whych englysh men vse: do greate seruyce in an host. For there is no breste plate, whyche is able to wythstand, and holde owte the stroke of the arrowes, suche force and vyolence is in bowes." I seriously doubt English bows could pierce decent-quality breastplates in the early sixteenth century, but I figure this text deserves a place in the mix.
View user's profile Send private message
Dan Howard




Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
Joined: 08 Dec 2004

Spotlight topics: 2
Posts: 3,636

PostPosted: Tue 03 Apr, 2012 9:02 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

May as well include Francis Bacon's claim that Turkish arrows could pierce 2 inches of brass.
View user's profile Send private message
Nat Lamb




Location: Melbourne, Australia
Joined: 15 Jan 2009
Likes: 1 page

Posts: 385

PostPosted: Tue 03 Apr, 2012 10:41 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

William P wrote:


this is contrasted with the fact the nature of the visor maybe means that you have to expose your whole face to see a lot, which, if im not mistaken, led to a LOT of arrow related deaths which boil down to people lifting the visor to see/ breathe, and having an arrow hit them in the face while doing so.


That little tidbit of information seems like a good indicator of the resailiance of plate armour to arrows. If arrows can pierce plate willy-nilly, why the disproportionate number of facial injuries?
View user's profile Send private message
William P




Location: Sydney, Australia
Joined: 11 Jul 2010

Posts: 1,523

PostPosted: Tue 03 Apr, 2012 11:29 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

also at crecy in particular, what KIND of shield was used by the men at arms and how OFTEN were they used

and what kind of shields were men at arms, particularly ones dismounted to fight on foot, use around the time of agincourt?

ive also seen this suggested to me quite often,. to do a rough test of the effect of arrows on armour, get a dummy of wax or ballistics gel, stand him up, put him in a reasonable approximation ofa harness of the period or even 2 or more dummies in a variety of armours for example, a crecy armour side by side with an agincourt armour

, and have archers plug arrows at the dummy at successively closer ranges, i.e start at 200-150m, shoot a number of arrows assess the effect, then move closer by certain intervals.


this primarily would be to test the agreed phenomenon of the fact that a large number of arrows fired at a host, increases the chance of hits sliding into armpits through vision slits etc.

one guy shooting at reletively close range at a target doesnt give much of an idea of the group mechanics of a cloud of arrows striking a target
or of arrows raining down onto a target in terms of parabolic arc fire,it would also assess the grouping of arrows at longer ranges, although that factor isnt as hard to quantify
the only issue with adummy in a harness, is that a dummy lacks certain normal movements which might suddenly expose elements like the face, the armpit, the throat etc. i.e the normal movement that rocks the arms back and forth during walking, the sudden raising of the visor.

in australia, the greco roman society the sydney ancients conducts a similar experiment during their battle of marathon reenactments every couple of years inviting people to bring along a bow and safety arrows, (though due to safety regulations, of combat archery, the bows could only have a maximum poundage of 30lb's and arrows were rubber combat archery blunts) and shoot at a column of hoplites as they advanced, to assess the frequency that arrows would hit vital areas i.e legs arms, heads etc. iin 2011's reenactment, there was about 16-20 archers and 16 hoplites
the archers made VERY few direct hits on any part of the hoplites legs were hard to hit, shots to the helmets often just glanced off, andthe rest of the body was protected by shields.
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Aleksei Sosnovski





Joined: 04 Mar 2008

Posts: 313

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 12:40 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Actually a dummy might be easier to hit in a "vital" area. People who know about weaknesses of their armor tend to protect these weaker areas. Like keeping their heads down and their hands close to their bodies, maybe even protecting their armpits with their vambraces.
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Benjamin H. Abbott




Location: New Mexico
Joined: 28 Feb 2004

Spotlight topics: 1
Posts: 1,248

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 7:54 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Dan Howard wrote:
May as well include Francis Bacon's claim that Turkish arrows could pierce 2 inches of brass.


Sounds good. Does that also come from a military manual?
View user's profile Send private message
Ben P.




Location: Mountainous Terrain
Joined: 10 Jan 2009
Reading list: 1 book

Posts: 200

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 8:09 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Aleksei Sosnovski wrote:
People who know about weaknesses of their armor tend to protect these weaker areas. Like keeping their heads down and their hands close to their bodies, maybe even protecting their armpits with their vambraces.


That's a good point and what about the wearer's goussets?
View user's profile Send private message
William P




Location: Sydney, Australia
Joined: 11 Jul 2010

Posts: 1,523

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 8:16 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Ben P. wrote:
Aleksei Sosnovski wrote:
People who know about weaknesses of their armor tend to protect these weaker areas. Like keeping their heads down and their hands close to their bodies, maybe even protecting their armpits with their vambraces.


That's a good point and what about the wearer's goussets?

the dummy would, as a matter of course, be wearing the appropriate underarmour garmets i.e aketon with maile underneath, althouhg at both crecy and agincourt, maile shirts i understand were wonr under plate
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
Dan Howard




Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
Joined: 08 Dec 2004

Spotlight topics: 2
Posts: 3,636

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 2:02 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Benjamin H. Abbott wrote:
Dan Howard wrote:
May as well include Francis Bacon's claim that Turkish arrows could pierce 2 inches of brass.


Sounds good. Does that also come from a military manual?

Francis Bacon never set foot on a battlefield and likely never laid eyes on a Turkish archer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Bacon

The point of including him was to show that not all sources should be treated equally. Quite clearly it is impossible for any bow to shoot through 2 inches of brass.
View user's profile Send private message
Matt Easton




Location: Surrey, UK.
Joined: 30 Jun 2004

Posts: 241

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 3:23 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

If it is in a molten state.... Razz
Schola Gladiatoria - www.swordfightinglondon.com
YouTube: www.youtube.com/user/scholagladiatoria
Antique Swords: www.antique-swords.co.uk/
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website MSN Messenger
Glen A Cleeton




Location: Nipmuc USA
Joined: 21 Aug 2003

Posts: 1,968

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 3:41 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Dan Howard wrote:
Benjamin H. Abbott wrote:
Dan Howard wrote:
May as well include Francis Bacon's claim that Turkish arrows could pierce 2 inches of brass.


Sounds good. Does that also come from a military manual?

Francis Bacon never set foot on a battlefield and likely never laid eyes on a Turkish archer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Bacon

The point of including him was to show that not all sources should be treated equally. Quite clearly it is impossible for any bow to shoot through 2 inches of brass.


Oh my, aren't we all a bit better than offering up a Wikipedia page to outline a historical figure?

Cheers

GC
View user's profile Send private message
Jojo Zerach





Joined: 26 Dec 2009

Posts: 288

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 4:49 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Glen A Cleeton wrote:
Dan Howard wrote:
Benjamin H. Abbott wrote:
Dan Howard wrote:
May as well include Francis Bacon's claim that Turkish arrows could pierce 2 inches of brass.


Sounds good. Does that also come from a military manual?

Francis Bacon never set foot on a battlefield and likely never laid eyes on a Turkish archer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Bacon

The point of including him was to show that not all sources should be treated equally. Quite clearly it is impossible for any bow to shoot through 2 inches of brass.


Oh my, aren't we all a bit better than offering up a Wikipedia page to outline a historical figure?

Cheers

GC


On some subjects, I notice most websites are simply copied from Wikipedia.
View user's profile Send private message
Benjamin H. Abbott




Location: New Mexico
Joined: 28 Feb 2004

Spotlight topics: 1
Posts: 1,248

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 8:09 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Dan Howard wrote:
The point of including him was to show that not all sources should be treated equally.


Indeed. But the quotation I posted comes from a military manual and isn't nearly as outlandish as Bacon's claim. I still think it's wrong, but I'm curious why a seemingly serious author had this impression of English bows. Jacopo di Porcia had military experience in Italy during the War of the League of Cambrai in the early sixteenth century. It's unlikely he'd seen any English archers in action in Italy during this period, so it's possible he based his opinion on literary sources or hearsay.

Quote:
Quite clearly it is impossible for any bow to shoot through 2 inches of brass.


Well, any bow drawn by hand.
View user's profile Send private message
Dan Howard




Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
Joined: 08 Dec 2004

Spotlight topics: 2
Posts: 3,636

PostPosted: Thu 05 Apr, 2012 8:17 pm    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Glen A Cleeton wrote:
Oh my, aren't we all a bit better than offering up a Wikipedia page to outline a historical figure?

It covers the essential points well enough for this thread. IIRC the Turkish arrrow passage comes from his Historia Naturalis
View user's profile Send private message
Bartek Strojek




Location: Poland
Joined: 05 Aug 2008
Likes: 23 pages

Posts: 496

PostPosted: Fri 06 Apr, 2012 2:51 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

Benjamin H. Abbott wrote:

Well, any bow drawn by hand.


I would actually guess that at least with any arrow with a lot of wooden parts, one would probably need way more solid projectile to have a chance to put it trough something as substantial as 2 inches of brass...

Even solid point would probably get stuck real quick if energy got wasted for splitting the shaft into small bits.
View user's profile Send private message
William P




Location: Sydney, Australia
Joined: 11 Jul 2010

Posts: 1,523

PostPosted: Fri 06 Apr, 2012 4:13 am    Post subject:         Reply with quote

i get the feeling a .50 calibre armour piercing sniper round would maybe even have trouble penetrating that much brass.
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail


Display posts from previous:   
Forum Index > Historical Arms Talk > Arrows vs armour
Page 19 of 21 Reply to topic
Go to page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 18, 19, 20, 21  Next All times are GMT - 8 Hours

View previous topic :: View next topic
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
You cannot attach files in this forum
You can download files in this forum






All contents © Copyright 2003-2024 myArmoury.com — All rights reserved
Discussion forums powered by phpBB © The phpBB Group
Switch to the Basic Low-bandwidth Version of the forum