[Leo Todeschini]

Tom King wrote

[Sean Manning]

[Randall Moffett]

Sean,

What does Egyptian bows have to do with European medieval bows? Back to my point there is really nothing else to go on for medieval bows but the Mary Rose Bows. As well the Early Medieval ones are all in tatters so a hard bit of evidence to use. The only other medieval bows I know of in decent condition are all finds from hunting locations. We cannot use far earlier bows to use as support of medieval European, nor hunting bows for martial ones, we can compare contemporary bows as they may have had similar needs with cross-cultural interaction. To me this is really only the MR bows that fit a martial bow.

RPM

[Mikael Ranelius]

[Sean Manning]

[Randall Moffett]

Mikael,

I agree.

Sean,

Let me send an email off and see if I can find some more info.

RPM

[Brian Robson]

Not sure on how true this is, but I remember hearing something a while back that indicated that the trained longbowman was expensive. In terms of pay. Very expensive.

As mentioned, you could quickly train an unskilled person to use a crossbow. The main benefit of this may well be financial.

[Dan Howard]

In the 14th-15th centuries crossbowmen were highly paid specialists often imported from Italy. Longbowmen were locally-raised peasants.

[P. Schontzler]

[Benjamin H. Abbott]

[Jason Daub]

I have a personal anecdote to offer, using a medieval styled crossbow I do not have to practice more than an hour or two in a week to maintain a high level of proficiency with it. With a heavier bow, I use a 92# Kassai, I have to practice nearly continuously to maintain the same level of proficiency. If I am tired and have been eating poorly (something that never happens to medieval soldiers, right?) my accuracy and rate of cast quickly drops off, massively more than with the crossbow.

[Benjamin H. Abbott]

Yeah, the first complaint that Sir Roger Williams made against the bow was that only 1000 out of 5000 archers were any good, and only half of those 1000 could endure a campaign and still shoot strongly.

[Kevin Smith]

I shoot a 76" (unstrung) 100 lb at 31" ELB. I can shoot it from a kneeling position, from horseback, and have even fired it prone (by lying on my back and shooting). While this is actually lower draw then most of the Mary Rose bows I have not trained all my life to shoot a warbow. The highest draw bow found on the Mary Rose was an 84" 220 lb draw (i believe measured at 28") bow. This bow would have been as effective as a "crossbow" that draws over 1000 lb (with a rate if fire roughly 1-2 shots per minute).
I don't believe that longbows were replaced as man portable weapons due to greater effectiveness of crossbows, with the exception of those that are better classified as light artillery they were not. What caused the demise of longbows was materials. Until the advent of modern adhesives a bow like the longbows of the Mary Rose could only be made of a very limited supply of woods like yew and ash. Only a small percentage of ash is suitable for bows and yew was getting harder and harder to find. Combine limited supply with the difficulty of training the archers and economics takes over.....

[Ben Coomer]

I wonder how much simple maintenance came into play with the bows versus crossbows?

There's a lot more moving parts to a crossbow, small parts that may not be replaceable on campaign, at least not easily I'd imagine. A bow, at least a longbow, you can cover in a oiled cloth cover and be relatively safe with it.

Of course it may not be that easy. A warbow has to be carefully designed and may not be simply replaced. But, the overall logistics are much simpler. Bow breaks, get new bow.

Just a thought.

[S Ghajar]

[Randall Moffett]

S,

Let me see if I cannot find an article I just read on this but within the last 15-20 years this has been called into question. The idea that Europe was a massive forest has also been disproven.

Not saying the new resources were not important as they were but that the start location may not have been so grand as often portrayed.

RPM

[Peteris R.]

Crossbows are a very sound choice considering the realities of warfare.

In the 13th to 15th centuries, the largest part of most wars consisted of endless sieges. France, for example, was littered with hundreds, if not thousands of fortified towns, castles, forts and keeps. In a siege situation, the rate of fire doesn't matter all that much. Crossbowmen were far easier to train, and so long as one had enough crossbows, crossbowmen could always be provided in large numbers.

Most French infantry of the period was raised not through any sort of feudal arrangement, but by calling on the militia regiments maintained by all cities and towns. Merchants, builders, farmers, labourers - few had the luxury of free time to practice archery, in a region where archery tradition was not strong. Crossbows provided them with effective means of engaging most threats to their own homes, and in large numbers, supported by pavise-bearing infantry, they could also be effective in open field battles. Of course, in a direct, face-to-face engagement on an open battlefield, crossbowmen were outmatched by archers (although with effective use of pavise shields not by a long margin). But for most other tasks they were no worse.

P.S. A belt-hook loaded crossbow is not 10 or even 5 times slower than a longbow, it's only outmatched 2-3 times.

P.P.S. The widespread use of the weapon meant that some states managed to field very efficient corps of crossbowmen, like the famed Genoese. They were highly trained professionals, well equipped and acting together with integrated groups of pavisier infantry. A shame that the French didn't really know what to do with them in open battle.

P.P.P.S. Not all English archers were nearly up to the standard of the rather small veteran elite, who signed up for service for years on end.

[Benjamin H. Abbott]

[S Ghajar]

[Kevin Smith]

I think the only country that ever really counted on longbowmen was England. The only way to have effective numbers if longbowmen who could use bows of useful draw was to train them from youth. Hence the English law requiring all able bodied males train with the bow at least once weekly. A large part of other countries failure to adopt the longbow was the reticence about training the commoners in weapons capable of taking down the nobility. Even Italian nations that had the greatest native supply of high quality yew did not adopt the longbow in large numbers.

As for crossbowmen only being outmatched in rate of fire by a factor of 2-3 I have never seen a test to convince me of that. The only test I've seen of period correct designs matched a 120 pound longbow against a 150 pound crossbow. As a 150 lb crossbow is far lower draw than what would have been used in warfare that test seems questionable. In fact that draw weight is the bare minimum draw weight legal for deer hunting with a crossbow in my state.....whereas 120 pounds is nearly three times the minimum draw for a traditional bow in my state.