"How far away would archers and crossbows fire?" Topic

We have current longbows at nearly half that weight capable of regularly dropping arrows at that distance. These are office workers, accountants, nurses, scientists, shop workers… People who don't do hard phyisical manual work. When you take farm labourers who shot every Sunday, I don't see why this would not have been improbable. It doesn't need to be inside a 20 x 20 box, it needs to be roughly into a box perhaps 50 deep by as wide as the opposing force, and they knew what angle achieved those results. We also know that longbows of the period could shoot 400 yards – even my modern 40# recurve can do over 220 yards.

We know that King Edward III's Archery Law of 1363 commanded the obligatory practice of archery on Sundays and holidays and "forbade, on pain of death, all sport that took up time better spent on war training especially archery practise", so they were well practised both with the bow and at the distance. Henry I later proclaimed that an archer would be absolved of murder, if he killed a man during archery practise – it was the victims fault for walking on the range!

The Assize of Arms required every man to be armed, but later laws specifically required that bows were kept and used, by law, from at least 1511: "ALL Sorts of Men under the Age of Forty Years shall have Bows and Arrows, and use Shooting"

By 1541 the law required "All Men under the Age of sixty Years "shall have Bows and Arrows for shooting. Men-Children between Seven "Years and Seventeen shall have a Bow and 2 Shafts. Men about Seventeen "Years of Age shall keep a Bow and 4 Arrows." and also that "The Inhabitants of every Town… shall cut Butts and shoot at them."

In 1542 a law was passed setting the minimum distance for a man of 24 or more at 220 yards.

(Incidentally laws also required imports from overseas to bring with them shafts of wood suitable for bow making, and made it illegal for aliens to own a bow!)

So we know that between about 1200 and at least the mid 1500s there were well practised, able bodied men capable of shooting at least 220 yards.

We also know, from records, that recognised commands included, "Ready your bows, Nock, Mark, Draw and Loose. Mark would be holding the bow to the right angle, fingers on the string, ready to draw (hand forward, fingers by the arrow). The gap between draw and loose was probably no more than a second or two.

Consider 5000 archers, for convenience 5 deep. That's 5 rows of 1000 archers. Assuming half a yard between them, you have a box of archers 500 yards wide, so your saturation zone is 500 X 50 yards starting at perhaps 250-300 yards out. If you are shooting at advancing infantry moving en masse, they should be able to move about 5-7 yards every 5 seconds, possibly less as the sky was darkened by 5000 arrows landing on them every 5 seconds or so… for the record, that's 1500 arrows landing on them before they have cleared 50 feet of ground, assuming they keep moving and that the archers do not adjust aim!

In fact we know that the French cavalry charge at Agincourt was rushed and undermanned, dogged by the wet heavy clay (that had been churned up by horses the previous day) and that of 2500 horse only perhaps 500 actually made the charge down a narrow valley with… "the heaviest longbows on the flanks were now ordered to shoot so-called "galling" arrows into the French lines. These arrows were not shot in great numbers as they were essentially meant to wound and disorientate. This act was seen as unchivalrous and angered the French nobility in particular."

The longbow was a game changer, because the simplest peasant could kill a high noble

@MajorB: You are entirely misunderstanding how this works. The "ten percenters" are not the only group. They are not even the largest grouping (obviously!). Any group of shooters can downgrade from the strongest bows that they play with. "Stanleys" are playing with their own body weight equal to their draw weight. So their war bow would be c. half that, or two-thirds, whatever. If the "dancers" drop to 70 lbs they will be suited to test this out. Stamina should be proven. Steadiness and the ability to hold should be proven. The group doesn't have to be capable of pulling over 150 lbs. Taking a test group from more common shooters that pull 70 lb bows, and handing them 45 lb bows, will be the same for them as "Stanley" dropping from a 180 lb bow to 120 lbs. The test on sustained shooting would be the same for both groups.

@Geoff: Roger Ascham presented "Toxophilus" to Henry VIII in 1545. Ascham's observation that scarce ten men in a thousand practice shooting is a denial that Henry's edicts bore any fruit. From 1511 to 1542, all those edicts were made restating earlier edicts, yet the 16th century ones failed to arrest the decay of archery in England. Yet they are instructive of the weapons and practices used, and thus also point to the same weapons and practices of previous centuries….

Do you have an actual source for that comment? I need to re-read my copy, but Toxophilus (the love of archery – curious a word he apparently invented) is mainly a conversational instruction manual:

Phi. What is the chief point in shooting, that every man laboureth to come to ?

Tox. To hit the mark.

Phi. How many things are required to make a man evermore hit the mark ?

Tox. Two.

Phi. Which two?

Tox. Shooting straight, and keeping of a length.

Phi. How should a man shoot straight, and how should a man keep a length?

Tox. In knowing and having things belonging to shooting; and when they be known and had, in well handling of them; whereof some belong to shooting straight, some to keeping of a length, some commonly to them both, as shall be told severally of them in place convenient.

Some 130 years after Agincourt, it is possible that Henrys edicts were an attempt to prevent a decay in archyet the first archery law dates to 1252 and we have reported that of 6000 men at Agincourt in 1415, 5000 were longbow.

Geoffrey Keating (1569 – 1644) mentions archery as having been practiced "down to a recent period within our own memory" so although the arrival of gunpowder weapons reduced it considerably, it appears to have still been in use into the late 1500s, so it seems reasonable to assume it was very active nearly 150 years prior.

Actually one must also bear in mind class distinctions of the period. Toxophilus was written "partly in defense of archery against those who found the sport unbefitting a scholar"

Equally many of the laws of the period banning other forms of entertainment, notably stick ball (cricket), tennis, kick ball or fute-ball (not the gentlemanly game of soccer we have today, but a mob game with upwards of 50 per side), quots, dice and 'other games inappropriate' were directed not at the scholarly nobility classes, but at the common man, who formed the mainstay of the forces.

Medieval legislation relating to arms is best not taken a face-value. repeated demands that 'all men' must practice archery really does n't mean that all me actually did, not does it mean that those who did ever became proficient. I've fired masses and masses of bullets – and with the benefit of highly-trained instructors – but I was always a dreadful shot. Practice made me slightly less bad, but at anything over 100 yards – maybe 200 – the target is pretty safe from me.
We should also be very wary of the 'Robin Hood' romantic view of medieval English armies. In the 1540s Ascham had already become a victim of archery romance and was harking back to day which did n't ever really exist…a bit like Major's 'spinster cycling off to evensong past the cricket green' sort of stuff.
The English won battles, but they did n't win many wars, and when they did (Wales and Ireland) it was, to some degree, a product of private enterprise on the part of the magnates and barons over decades. The longbow helped win actions, but not wars.
Wargamers are not alone in inflating the worth of the longbow; historians have done it for years.

@MajorB: You are entirely misunderstanding how this works. The "ten percenters" are not the only group. They are not even the largest grouping (obviously!).

You are entirely misunderstanding my point. As usual. There are two separate issues here:

1. Can Stanley, or a group of Stanleys, deliver the sustained volley fire under command that you are talking about?

That has NOTHING to do with :

2. Is Stanley a "ten percenter" as you call him?

With regard to the latter assertion, I maintain that it is only an assertion with no basis in fact. Just because he doesn't fit your mental image of an "average medieval archer" you insist he must be in the top 10%. You cannot prove that he is not equivalent to an average medival archer.

Neither can I, but I prefer to hold a legitimate doubt than attempt to force the actual evidence (viz. a modern guy called Stanley can pull 180lbs without "dancing") to attempt to prove that "with that draw weight he must be in the top 10% of archer abilities".

Sigh. And there was me thinking we were finally getting somewhere.

Do you have an actual source for that comment?

On page 37 in The Simon Archery Foundation volume:

"Therefore these two things, traitness of time, and every man his trade of living, are the causes that so few men shoot, as you may see in this great town, where, as there be a thousand good men's bodies, yet scarce ten that useth any great shooting."

The entire passage (previous page onto the following page) is very enlightening, as it addresses the myriad reasons why a man cannot shoot/practice.

Notice that Ascham wasn't saying there were only ten archers out a thousand men; only that "scarce ten" spent sufficient time practicing to be considered proficient.

And with the king's renewed edits in place, no less….

With regard to the latter assertion, I maintain that it is only an assertion with no basis in fact.

And holding an opposite view is equally based on a lack of facts.

Look, Stanley was admittedly pulling "his own body weight". That is showing off with a hugely powerful draw weight. His physical posture shows this clearly. He managed to hit the metal plate once, barely inside the edge. He didn't hold long enough to aim and he was unsteady. But, he is a great long range (clout) shooter even with that show off bow.

If you can get him to demonstrate stamina by rapid shooting that would prove the point. Get each longbow shooter who pulls and "dances" to show off his stamina, or rather, lack thereof. That is proof that they are pulling a bow that they would never use in wartime.

Downgrade two-thirds, or even one-third. See what happens then. Collect the results. And over time you'll see that these guys are capable of drawing a bow near 100 lbs in wartime conditions.

How many out of the total archer populations pull bows in excess of 100 lbs at all? Very, very few. Most do not pull bows efficiently in excess of 50 lbs. And dedicated target shooters only pull c. 35 lbs.

Hunters typically shoot in the neighborhood of 70 lbs. But they also don't shoot repeatedly. Most of them would not be able to keep it up for more than a few minutes; just like Stanley et al. "war bow" shooters pulling their own body weight.

So, I was concentrating on mass effect, and you are still focused on my "one in ten" assertion.

The only way to approach the gathering of facts is to spend a considerable amount of time collecting results from individual shooters; and keeping tabs on how many out of the total shooters that you meet shoot which draw weight.

I'm confident that the "war bow" (or 100+ lbs) shooters make up a very small percentage of total shooters. And most of them are trying too hard in the first place and are going to break something.

But then, we don't know how many medieval longbowmen were only capable of shooting for a brief period of their lives before injury from the demands of shooting rendered them incapable….

How many out of the total archer populations pull bows in excess of 100 lbs at all? Very, very few. Most do not pull bows efficiently in excess of 50 lbs. And dedicated target shooters only pull c. 35 lbs.

Which archer populations?
Modern ones?
You are right, very few.

The English medieval archer population?
Ah, there's the rub. If only we knew. We have absoluterly no way of knowing the capabilities of the English medieval
archer. If we did we would not need to have this lengthy discussion. As it is, everything we have said is pure conjecture.

My view is that far more of them could pull 100lb plus than you think. I can't prove it. Neither can you.

The only thing the "company of Stanleys" experiment would prove is that it is humanly possible. And I believe it is. But again, neither of us can prove it one way or the other.

We do know that a considerable number of the bows brought up from the Mary Rose were in excess of #100. I'm guessing they didn't take those just for show (?)

From a current longbow archer: "…I myself am no Heracles but have been known to shoot 120#, there are many folk out there shooting 135# plus and a considerable number shooting up to 150# and beyond."

And with the king's renewed edits in place

Yes I read the whole passage, from the original question through to the next section. A few observations:

It was written over 100 years after the battles in question (Crecy, 1346, Agincourt, 1415) and at a time we knew that archery was on the decline, or at least in danger of becoming so, which also explains Henry VIII attempt to prevent it sliding. How successful that was, especially as the 1500s was starting to see the arrival of the arquebus and leading to the musket, may be questionable.

Toxophilus was written with the intention of waxing lyrical about the romantic image of the longbow which seems to coincide with Henrys desire to keep it.

Curiously that passage also refers to 'in this town'. Not sure where it was written or to which town he was referring, or indeed whether this was a localised issue or nationwide, or possibly an indication that it was on the decline in more densely populated areas (which may or may not mean that it was also affected in more rural areas).

Hi, I've been reading this very interesting debate. I have heard mention of the Mary Rose several times. I believe analysis of the skeletal remains of some of the crew revealed pronounced localised muscle scars and bone deformity, believed to be evidence of a lifetime of drawing on heavy war bows.

Are we missing the second page of this thread?

Yes. The second page is gone. And new posts don't show up. The BUG is back….