"Bows (and other missile fire)" Topic

Ooops. So much for knowing Japanese muscial instruments.

Now back to our regularrly scheduled programing.

Humphrey,

I hope you enjoy Curry's effort, whatever one may think of her conclusions assembling the source material like that in a single volumne is praiseworthy as it makes the work so much easier for the rest of us. We all like diffrent things for diffrent reasons, while I enjoy reading about Robert Guiscard, the osuthern normans, Bohemund and the eary crusaders the period doesn't appeal to me from a visual aspect which is why I don't wargame or reenact it.(Appart form a visit to Hastings back in 2000 as a mercenary spearman i Norman employ.)
Late Medieval warfare of the 1415-1500 period oth has a great visual appeal to me not to mention the evolution/revolution takign palce in warfare at the time.

The test was set up to mimic the effects of the mud alone, to get an idea of how badly it could have affected the ability of the men-at-arms in close combat. I'm quite convinced that with archery added in I'd been even more discomforted on my way forward. I/we planned a follow-up test involving archery but while we had developed a wooden blunt weighed with lead that had a weight and performance similar to that of a bodkin we could not solve the safety issues once we got to those kenetic energies. I do these experiments out of interest and the sheer fun of them and the safety margins with 70-90 pound bows were getting too slim if any thing went wrong.
The idea of using our standard 35 pound reenactment bows was rejected since the armour I wore absorbed those hits quite well even at 10 meters.

With regards to the mud I might be takign the point to far but then again I might not. Archery had an important impact as it IMO was the thing that made the French formation loose it's alignment and order as well as casue some casulties.
As is recorded in period military writings such as Le Jouvencel a formation of men-at arms which got disordered was at a disadvantage in the melee so this contribution woudl have been just as important or even more important than the 10-20% losses suffered from Archery.
However archery IMHO can't explain many of the problems experienced by the French men-at-arms in the melee which are recorded in the sources. The exahaustion which at it's greatest even allowed archers to wrench the weapons out of the hands of some french men-at-arms and turn them against their owners. The slipperiness which made the men-at-arms far more prone to loose their footing and fall over, a problem which even the English Men-at-arms experienced on a smaller scale. Last but not least the way in which the mud greatly increased the ability of the archers to fight effectively as not only were their opponents exhausted, the enemy men-at-arms had their mobility greatly impeded and was suffering from poor footing as well. IMO these effects were great enough to be decisive even without archery, however I'd say that the decisive English advantage in close combat was 60% due to the mud, 40% due to the archery. But on some days I go for a 40/60 split, I suppose we'll never fully know for sure, never mind agree 100% on an interpretation of the events and their causes. My opinion is that the effects of archery have been somewhat overrated while the effects of the ground have been underrated.

The Gesta has the archers running out of arrows, throwing down their bows and entering close combat. It's impossible to tell from the quote if the shortage of arrows was temporary or not.

You won't see me arguing against the crossbow, it is a weapon underrated by many wargamers as the defeat of the Genoese at Crecy somehow has become the supposed typical effect (or lack there of) and behaviour of crossbowmen in battle. As you well know the crossbow played a vital role in the tactics developed in Outremer and in the Baltic. Here in Sweden the crossbow even replaced the (not fully developed) longbow since crossbows were better suited to Swedish style warfare and possesed better penetration than the bows in use in Sweden at the time. By the late 15th C and Early 16th C Swedish crossbowmen supported by men with polearms were accustomed to beating the Danes and their German, Scots and French mercenaries (includign French and Scots archers with longbows) picture

I've also got some information on Vernuil, but will post that in a separate thread since the subject deserves a better fate than being simply 'buried' here.

I'll get back to your latest post soon.

Humphrey,

The problem I have with Rocky's work is that it doesn't fit with results I get from several sources wich have worked with armour and armour pentration indepently of each other. This is why I've asked Rocky both in this thread and in an earlier one to provide some details about the armour he tested so that I can compare it to my other osurces and fit it into a larger context. I've yet to read Klopstag&Pope but I do not that they are older sources, a lot of new information has emerged in the 50-80 years since they published their works and secondly that they are concerned with the study of archery not armour.

As I've pointed out before the type of material used, how it was treated and shaped plays a vital part in determing how well a piece of amrour resists penetration. I've seen far to many tests were the armour used for testing has very little in common with that used in medieval times. Now I'm not say that Rocky's armour was inaccuarate or flawed, I simply don't know anythign about it except his penetration claims which are directly at odds with the findings published by expertes in the field and my own testing of the armour I own. This is why I've asked Rocky to provide more detials, it was a real loss that the TMP server lost his last reply.

Given that fairly few sources provide trustworthy and accurate information on how arms and armour interacted I'm bit sceptical to the claims that such sources support any kind of findings by any one. It's easy to simply pick a source which says what you want and suddenly you have your period confirmation.

IMO fatigue, morale and battleifle psychology are often at least partly ignored by wargamers in favour of hardware related factors such as arms and armour. And as before i've always matained that soem French were killed by archeyr and more wounded but IMO the losses suffered were secodnary in effect compared to the disruptive effects. Vs less well protected targets archery could cause horrifying losses as was seen in the Anglo-Scots battles.

We all like diffrent things for diffrent reasons, while I enjoy reading about Robert Guiscard, the osuthern normans, Bohemund and the eary crusaders the period doesn't appeal to me from a visual aspect which is why I don't wargame or reenact it.(Appart form a visit to Hastings back in 2000 as a mercenary spearman i Norman employ.)

You sick, late period, degenerate heathen ;) How can anyone NOT like the look of the early stuff, kite shields, conical nasal helms, mail.

So you were at Hastings 2000. Jealousy is a sin. I am on my way to TNBO, Hastings 2006. I will be an English Ceorl local, joining the king's army when it arrives on Caldbec hill. link That's my character.

Late Medieval warfare of the 1415-1500 period oth has a great visual appeal to me not to mention the evolution/revolution takign palce in warfare at the time.

Then you probably liked the Gondorians in TLOTR more than the Rohirrim I gather. I, otoh, got "wet" just watching the Rohirrim. (Aside from the single visual faux pas, of seeing them all charging with their shields slung and useless. That bugs me each time I rewatch it.)

My opinion is that the effects of archery have been somewhat overrated while the effects of the ground have been underrated.

I agree.

Now I'm not say that Rocky's armour was inaccuarate or flawed, I simply don't know anythign about it except his penetration claims which are directly at odds with the findings published by expertes in the field and my own testing of the armour I own. This is why I've asked Rocky to provide more detials, it was a real loss that the TMP server lost his last reply.

Rocky's "armor" was simulated with steel sheet, curved, of the assumed temper, etc. I was not there. We lived apart during the time our rules were being hashed out by mail correspondence and occasional phone calls and even more occasional visits of his to Salt Lake City.

My own tests were far less "scientific." I created a bolt for my Whammo crossbow (80# draw, a "punky" crossbow). It was of solid, mild steel. I didn't even weigh it, but know it weighed considerably more than an arrow. I filed a four-pointed tip on it. Then I stood back from an oven door and let fly. The range was c. 20 feet. It penetrated right through the outer layer and seriously dented the inner layer of the steel thickness of which a typical oven door is made – I would guess 1/32 of an inch. Is an oven door tempered steel? I don't think so. Rocky's tests were far more comprehensive than my fiddling around. I was mostly into testing ranges, not penetration so much.

And as before i've always matained that soem French were killed by archeyr and more wounded but IMO the losses suffered were secodnary in effect compared to the disruptive effects.

I take this as meaning that the fear of possible injury was sufficient to make the men at arms keep their heads down, and flinch away from the incoming missiles, thus further reducing their forward speed. All I am saying (and I assume Rocky agrees) is that any test which conclusively "proves" that arrows could not penetrate the armor, and therefore did not kill the target, are mistaken for some reason or combination of reasons. It seems obvious that the French men at arms were afraid of the arrows, and they must have had good reason. Even if the percentage of effective hits causing wounds was less than one in 100, the sheer volume of incoming missiles made walking into that "storm" a dicey proposition. The longer you personally were getting shot at, the more likely it was that you were going to get hurt or killed. That fear contributed to the "bunching" and disorder observed in the French men at arms, in fact, it probably was the single-most factor creating it.

Actually I prefere the Rohirrim for several reasons, they've always been my favourite people since I read the books at 11 years old. The Rohirrim gear just 'feels' right even if it's not they way Tolkien described it
While early Gondorians were great in their mixed armour the plate armour worn by the 3rd Age soldiers of the White City just doesn't appeal to me. It doesn't help the the Gondorian plate is poorly fitted compared to the real stuff even if it's a lot better than most of the plate armour one usualy sees in the movies.

I hope you enjoy Hastings 2006, Hastings is IMHO one of the finest reenactment events in the viking/medieval period and back in 2000 I realy got the feeling "So this is what an army looked like". If I had the gear I would go in 2006 but I sold of my 'good stuff' to finance my degenrate taste for later periods ;-) and the thing's I still have are a bit below the standard I use today.

Nice gear, I like it when fellow reenactors put a lot effort into even the 'small folk' impressions. One of the things that made me leave the SCA was the "oh but I not a knight so I don't need nice (ie well made) gear" attitude.
Getting a helmet is a good choice as one can get 'head shots' by sheer accident in these larger fights. I even got one by a fellow team mate who managed to thrust the spear butt into the side of my helmet during a training fight back in 2000.

Well back on topic :-)
The degree of hardening is very important, modern mild steel such as that in your oven door has a hardness of around 100 VPH (Vicker's Pyramid Hardness scale) or similar to that of medieval wrought iron. 14th C steels such as found in the coat of plates from Visby and Knüssach have VPH's of 266 and 390 respectivly while a late 14th C steel helmet had a hardness of 110-195 VPH. The Milanese hardend steel armour tested by Alan Williams ranged in hardness from 300 to 400 VPH and the late southern German stuff is even better with 65% of the pieces having VPH numbers between 400 and 500. (ie close to the hardness of modern day hardend tool steels). As can been seen all steels are not equal.

A lot of the 'test' I've seen over the years supposedly proving that bows pentrate steel armour have involved shooting hardend steel bodkins at armour made of unhardend mild steel. (Or even at 17th C wrought_iron_muntions armour)
The result is a foregone conclusion.The lack of padding and/or mail behind the plates increase the loopsidedness of the 'tests' even further. Testing has shown that adding 16 folds of linnen behind the armour increases the force need to achive effective pentration by 50 joules for a point and 80 joules for a blade.
Once again I'm not saying that Rocky's tests were of this kind I just want to explain why I'm such a sceptic.

All armour has weak spots even stell plate armour, not to mention that steel plate only became common in the post 1440 period. Prior to that we have a mix of iron and steel defences not to mention a mixture of full and partial plate harness. Which is why I've never supported the "men-at-arms were invulnerable at Azincourt theory". Tje coudl eb killed or harmed just not easily in great numbers.

However 'Milanese' style armour reduced those weak spots to a minimum post-1440 by the use of overlapping plate defences. There is a reason why many of the recorded missile wounds & deaths of late 15th C men-t-arms were due to them having lost, removed or opened up their parts of their armour. In the pre-1440 period armour was of a more mixed quality and composition. A mail avential instead of a plate bevor at Azincourt would have increased the vulnerability of the wearer to archery many times and so on.

It's interesting to note that diffrent soruces give rather diffrent impression on the effectiveness of archery vs the armoured men at Azincourt.

Des Ursins:
"the French were scarecely harmed by the arrow fire (ie shooting, translator error) of the English beacuse they were well armed"

Walsingham:
"Volleys of arrows struck helmets, plates and cuirasses. Many of the French fell, pierced by arrows here fifty, there sixty."

As you can seen one can find period quotes supporting both extremes of the arrows vs armour dispute. Either armour protected very well or not much at all. Whcih is why one must take great care in evaluating the written sources and comparing the ones that pass the test to other research. IMO Des Ursins and the Gesta are supported by the research of armour and armour penetration, Walsingham isn't.

One doesn't have to be vulnerable to incomign missiles to fear them. There are examples of tanks being driven of by machine gun fire or withdrawing due to light artillery or mortar fire, none of which are effective weapons against tanks. The sheer psyical impact of massed archeyr combined with the real chance of a weak spot strike would have been enough to cause a lot of fear among the men-at-arms especially during the last stage of the approach march when arrows were striking at close range and/or at the side of the armour rather than the front.

All armour has weak spots even stell plate armour, not to mention that steel plate only became common in the post 1440 period. Prior to that we have a mix of iron and steel defences not to mention a mixture of full and partial plate harness.

I made this point earlier. Agincourt is a "transitional" battle. There must have been a lot of harnesses on the field which were not your 300 and 400 VPH stuff. Perhaps the last fracasses of the HYW went to the French because the standard of plate had improved, and also the percentage of plate protection all around. (I know of the other factors as well, which swung the victories to the French. But this technical aspect would certainly make a hash of the English traditional defensive tactics, if their bowfire failed to produce the previous casualties, i.e. fear factor, in the French.)

Hi

I had another "lockfile" response, timing out on trying AGAIN to respond.

i will be simple. roundball musket at 28gms and 200m/s in RAW lead. verus Cheap Steel at 75gms and 75m/s. The concept is "sectional density" meaning in short english terms, "how much energy is focused on how wide an area". This affects range attentuation and penetration. If you can be popped by lead at 75 m, you can certainly be popped by the steel. THAT SIMPLE.

I have no "dog in this hunt". I have no "romance" about being a Knight or MAA or a Longbowman. I am just a machinery geek. I leave "romance" to HG.

Remember, I am saying 144,000 rounds in the first 2 sheeves of arrows producing a couple thousand effective hits.

Consider that, historically, about 15% casualties cause a unit to fail morale.

I could go on, but I expect that any longer and TMP is going to crash again. And I feel like I am wasting my time.

One question: which percentage of the French MAA at Agincourt were in wonderful Milanese armor? Which percentage were in family bits, this stuff is VERY expensive, that Grandpa' wore?

Rocky

Dear Rocky.

Where did you get your 15%number (not complaint just Curious)

the US ;mil strive to get a 50% distruction to render a unit combat uncapable. This is generally the number that our wargaming group uses.

For timing issues try typing in word or notepad and righclick it to the commint window.

Lord Ghee

Rocky,
and I've already proved by refering to the tests conducted by the experts at the Graz armoury your velocity for the 'lead' is way of. The slowest of the guns tested were a 1700 pistols which 'only' had a muzzle velocity of 385 m/s the muskets reach as hig as 533 m/s. The average muzzle velocity was 454 m/s, 6 times better than the bow. The 154 pound bows tested by Hardy and Strickland generated an intial impact of 134 joules, a 16th C pistol tested at Graz generated 907 joules at impact at a range of 8,5 meters.

Havign read numerous casulty lists from the 30YW and other Swedish wars I can say that both the Swedes and their enemeis routinely suffered 15% casulties without running. Veteran units could loose 40-60% ans still fight on.

One tip on how to avoid the TMP crashes is to write the post in another program such as Note pad or Word pad or soem such. That way TMP can crash without you loosing your hard work. It's SOP for me nowadays,loosing posts twice in one week was enough.

I've already covered the proportions of armour in an earlier post. Period sources are quite clear on the fact that the French were well harnessed.

I don't know if Rocky is thinking of another source, but John Keegan discusses the breaking point of units in "The Face of Battle". IIRC, of course. I haven't read it in a long time.

I've already proved by refering to the tests conducted by the experts at the Graz armoury your velocity for the 'lead' is way of.

Question: were these firearms tested for optimum velocity, or to reflect actual battle conditions? Firearms under battle conditions did not use patched balls. I would wager that the muzzle velocity is twice as high when patching the balls and using more powder than was used under actual battle conditions.

The weaposn were tested with the kind of powder loads recomended for battle use by period writers and no patching was used AFAIK. Though I seriously doubt that patching would double the velocity, the amount of gases which would escape arn't that large. The main effect of patching is to reduced the accuracy problems created by escaping gasses causign the shot to spin and tumble. Spherical shot have poor accuracy performance as it is.

Also 16th and 17th firearms used balls with a better fit than the later 18th muskets. Accuracy was a higher priority than rate of fire.

Dear Captian Gars, DEar Dear Cpt.

what would be the difference in Accuracy. Wargaming is the point data is the need, (bottom top guy,)

Lord Ghee

…I seriously doubt that patching would double the velocity, the amount of gases which would escape arn't that large. The main effect of patching is to reduced the accuracy problems created by escaping gasses causign the shot to spin and tumble.

Obviously neither of us is well-read on this topic. Rocky is. He assures me that the trouble here, is that the both of you distrust each other's sources.

The tests on firearms that you mention here are at variance with several (many?) extant sources which categorically list the muzzle velocities of 15th century firearms as much lower than your "Graz" statistics.

Actually I've quite familiar with the subject though the language barrier (english ain't my native language) poses some problems when discussing it.

I don't distrust Rocky's sources, I don't know what they are except the sources mentioned in conection with archery which I've yet to recive by intra-library loan.
The fact that the numbers and claims made by Rocky doesn't match the latest and most up to date research on several of the subjects we have discussed might be a reason for my apparent distrust of his sources.

The main problem seems to be that Rocky and I have rather diffrent reading habits on the same subjects.

I've yet to see a reference for Rocky's muzzle velocity wich was supposedly for a musket, a type of weapon which didn't even exist in the 15th C so I don't see how the muzzle velocity of that period is relevant to the comparison. Also a 15th C firearms can be a lot of things, from a primitive handcannon similar to the Tannenberg gun to what is basicly an arquebus in all but name. The two types would have rather diffrent velocities.

Hi

Actually, the perception I have is that as a reinactor you believe in the myth of your preferred armor, and assume that I am defending the longbow myth.

I am not.

The issue of muzzle velocity.

YOU MISSED MY POINT. I wasn't doing an arguement based on quoting my sources versus yours, or even that I have owned and shot the guns. Purely this. You made the arguement that the soft steel of the bodkin would collapse against the perfectly treated steel armor.

Ignoring the bullet of pure soft lead as a penetrator. "joules" isn't relevent for a couple reasons. And not for the ANCIENTS board.

I will make one statement. A modern patched, perfectly set up black powerder LONG arm only has a muzzle velocity of 514m/s. So, if these tests got 454 out of a 16the century pistol, they did something very wrong. This is faster, for instance, than a current SMOKLESS 9mm round.

this ain't dueling sources, this is something else.

It is simple, the sectional density, the concept that a 60gm weight on a 1mm point at 70m/s is going to penetrate better than soft lead focused on 20mm diameter area moving 2 or 3 or 4 times as fast.

If a hand cocked crossbow will penetrate, or a pistol will penetrate, then the bodkin will penetrate.

Rocky

Hi

And, yes, the 15% is quoted in Keegan. Waiting till 50 is unusual. Usually these become "last stands".

Rocky

Rocky,
I don't belive in any 'myth' but in facts, my argument is based on extensive research both on my own and that published by others such as Alan Williams or Kalaus & Krenn (neithher of which yoy are familiar with) and a few experminets based on the methods used in experimental archeology.

Once again you make up a statment I've not made anywhere in this thread. I've never written that "the soft steel of the bodkin would collapse against the perfectly treated steel armor" or soemthiogn to that effect which can be verified by use of the search function.

The shape and material of the pentrator is important, that's why a bullet need to deliver over 900 joules to the target to achive penetration of a 2mm air cooled medium carbon steel plate. Williams testign does take into account the effects of sectional density which you would know if you had read his book
A musket can deliver over 2300 joules to the target and in the tests at Graz a pistol delivered 907 joules, enough to penetrate an actual 16th C breast plate but not enough to cause effective damage to the wearer.

So every time a scientist or historian reaches a diffrent conclusion than you or get diffrent results from their tests they have done somethign wrong? Or perhaps it's as simple as that that you are wrong?
The Graz tests were conducted by the munitions and weapons experts of the Austrian armed forces together with the experts of the Landeszeughaus.A current 9mm round uses a smaller powder charge and while slower out of the muzzle will retain it's velocity a lot longer thanks to a superior ballistic shape. The velocity will alsp depend on the round some rounds such as the old Swedish 9mm is a lot more powerfull than the standard 9mm. (450 m/s vs 360 m/s)

Hi

You said"Once again you make up a statment I've not made anywhere in this thread. I've never written that "the soft steel of the bodkin would collapse against the perfectly treated steel armor" or soemthiogn to that effect which can be verified by use of the search function."

but earlier you quoted:
" the arrows were defeated and actually shattered."

You say:So every time a scientist or historian reaches a diffrent conclusion than you or get diffrent results from their tests they have done somethign wrong? Or perhaps it's as simple as that that you are wrong?" NO, I am saying you have ONE source that disagrees with the tests and sources of everyone else.

You say armor needs 907 joules to be penetrated and a pistol has 900….this means 7 joules to KILL with?

I keep accepting YOUR numbers and then disagreeing with your conclusion guy. Range attenuation is such that pistols would only work if pressed against the target. Round ball sheds speed and therefore KE with a C/D approacing unity.

Your experts… got something wrong. Or you did. Black powder isnt modern smokless. The MV you quoted exceeds later more modern black powder rounds. They would have unpatched 15th century guns outshooting 18th century rifles. Sorry. They did something wrong, or you misunderstood what they did.

And it is still illogical. The biggest costs of the march through france is paying the troops and feeding them. By your assertians, the english would have been much better off just having ordinary pesents with a shild and spear supporting the KNIGHTS. They would have been happy with a lot less pay!

Rocky

I've already stated that the pistol shot in question pentrated the cuirasse but did not cause any effective damage behind it. This was at 8.5 meters, the maximum range recomended for pistol fire vs armoured troops. The prefered distance was 3-4.5 meters or touching.

The shaft of an arrow can and often will shatter upon an non-enetrative impact, especially if the strike is a glancing hit. Besides it wasn't a claim of mine it was a description of what happend in Jones test of a 70 poudn bow vs wrought iron. Nice way of taking it out of context

They didn't get anythign wrong though I understand that you desperately need to claim that since the test point out how flawed your claims and knowledge are. The material is published and can be read by any and all provided you know German. The powder used was a modern black powder.

Actually I' have multiple sources by the some of the foremost experts in the field, the authors and name sof which I've quote repeatedly. Besides no one has ever analysed armour to the degree done by Prof. Williams before. Hence his work is superior to anything published before. But I'll repeat the list here just to prove once aigan that you once again is in the wrong.

A. Williams
The Knight and the Blast Furnace
B. S. Hall
Weapons & Warfare in Renaissance Europe
R. Hardy & M. Strickland
The Great Warbow
P. Kalaus
Schiessversuche mit historische feurwaffen des Landeszeughauses Graz und der Prüf-und Versuchstelle für Waffen und Munitionen des Amtes für Wehrtechnik"
P.N Jones
A short history of the attack on Armour
The Metallography and Relative Effectiveness of Arrowheads and Armour durign the middle ages
TPD Blackburn, D. Edge, A.R Williams, CBT Adams
Head protection in England before the first world war

That's 7 sources, not one and I've not even finished the list.

And you still havn't understood that I've never claimed that the archers was utterly useless, that claim is yours and yours alone as you once again fabricate a lie and atribute it to me. The English archer armed with a 100-150 poudn bow was a very usefull soldier even in the 15th C but his effectiveness as man killer diminished due to the improvements in armour during 1400 and 1450. He wasn't as superior as in the 14th C. It's as simple as that.

The English archer armed with a 100-150 poudn bow was a very usefull soldier even in the 15th C but his effectiveness as man killer diminished due to the improvements in armour during 1400 and 1450. He wasn't as superior as in the 14th C. It's as simple as that.

It's not as simple as that. You and your sources are convinced that 70# bows are incapable of penetrating the armor that the rank and file of the 15th century wore in battle. Yet the original sources will support the view that the 70# warbow was the standard, not only for the English but for the Asiatic horsearcher as well. The beefy archer with his 100# bow was a comparative rarity. So when we are looking at the HYW battles, it is a mass of 70# bows which shoots into the armor of the French men at arms.

The trouble with the modern tests, from what I understand you to have said, is that they are taking the optimum (latest tech) steel and saying that this is what the longbow was up against. We are accustomed to thinking of the French men at arms as all cutting edge guys in the latest plate. When most of them would have been still wearing a lot of mail and the far more common and less expensive plate that was being overhauled by the new steel. It doesn't require a 100# bow to get the effects that the sources apparently describe.

So the simplest statement of the entire disagreement here, as I see it, is that you don't believe the bows were 70#ers. Yet to accept that 100#ers were the norm is to claim that a medieval man with an inferior diet (in the midst of the Black Death no less, when Europe's men were at their all-time smallest physical size) could out perform well trained archers today.

What percentage of archers are pulling 100# plus bows? – and I don't mean for showing off, but repeatedly drawing and loosing six arrows per minute without letting up for long periods of time without getting exhausted. I wager it is c. 10% as always.

Well TMP ate my reply since I got careless and skipped writing it in another program first.

Let's name some names, just which "original" sources support the view of the supposedly standard 70 pound longbow. Original i.e primary sources not secondary ones like Rocky or Klopstag or Pope. Archeolgocial finds will do fine as well. The latest archeologicals finds and analysis doesn't support a 70 pound bow nor does the latest testing of armour and armour penetration. If the 70 pounder can't do the job nor can't be found it's not a likely candidate as the standard warbow.

The various tests involved diffrent materials, both iron and steel. Williams is primarily concerned with steel while Jones only tested iron plates. Blackburn, Edge, Williams and Adams looked at various materials including iron supported by padding. Jones tests clearly show the limits of the 70 pounder, Blackburn & co say that one needs 125 joules to get effective penetration through a 1.9 mm plate of iron supported by 16 layers of linnen. Can the 70 pounder generate such energy? Given that Jones test suggest that the 70 pounder has problems with_iron_armour (without padding), those problems will increase as low and medium quality steel begins to show up (which it in the 14th C) not to mention the better suits from Milan that began to arrive in the early 1400's.

Actualy the price of the armour didn't increase hugely between full iron harness and full steel harness. The arrival of an effective blast furnace kept the price down on steel. Determining the cost of armour is hard because we seldom know just how much the preice was affected by thign slike gilding, etchigns and such. Sure the Duke of Orleans armour cost 83 Livre Tournois compared to the 25 Livres for a Men-at-arms panoply of 1360 but how much is due to the diffrences in time frame, ornamentation and the material and craftsmanship.

Even if clad in the earier, 'cheaper' iron plate armour and mail mix the combination of various layers would have provided the wearer with a lot of protection from a 70 pound bow. The question is can it get the job done?
I'd be happy to change my mind if this can be proved, at the moment no valid proof has been forwarded that is based on the latest armour research. Rocky has yet to provide any details which allow me to compare his test plates to actual preserved armour.

Archeolgocial finds will do fine as well.

Rocky is going to be able to supply the source material better than I can. What I "know" largely comes second-hand from his kind of studying. As he said, I am a "romantic", and my natural method for comparison is to take the prosaic descriptions of effects of bow and crossbow fire and make the more dramatic ones more effective. For example, I would read the passage in the Carmen that says crossbow bolts destroy shields and compare that to arrows which do not, and make crossbows more effective. Rocky takes the mechanics and makes mathematical models out of it, then translates that into results tables for wargaming.

I have this to ask about the constantly brought up Mary Rose longbows: is this ship Henry VIII's "flagship" or not? If it is an especially important ship, then the longbows aboard her are equally special. In other words, Henry VIII's hand-picked archers for his "flagship" can hardly be expected to be ordinary longbowmen. Ergo, the longbows aboard the Mary Rose should not be held to be typical of an entire army of longbowmens' weapons.

Other archeological discoveries are equally problematic, being grave finds for the main part. And iirc, many seem to be unfinished staves. An unfinished stave will begin at say 150# and when finished be under 100# draw weight. The range of estimated draw weights in extant examples of original "longbows" is between 50# and over 200#, from what I have read – which is mainly Internet commentaries on discusion boards, quoting sources that I have not personally read.

The Mary Rose wasn't the flagship, it was one of the larger ships, true, but that particluar honor belonged to the 'Great Harry' aka Henry Grace a Dieu. I'm not sure that the Mary Rose indentures support a view that the men were hand picked but it's been to long since I read the study on those to allow me to recall the stuff correctly.

Grave finds of well preserved bowstaves are rare as with all wooden materials. Commonly the well preserved bows are those found in bogs and lakes and similar types of ground such as the Vimose (multiple finds), Nydam (multiple finds), Balinberry (single find) and Hedeby (single find) bows. The Nydam, Balinberry and Hedeby bows are all 100+ pound bows.
None of them are unfinished staves. If the 100 pound or more bow was so uncommon, why is it overrepresented in the archeological material, ie the above plus the Mary Rose bows? Granted the Mary Rose bows could be those of an elite force but the other, random finds??

The Nydam, Balinberry and Hedeby bows are all 100+ pound bows.

These are surely estimated draw weights? I mean, the bows are in unusable fragments. So it is arguable at best what the actual draw weights were.

Some dude took one of the Mary Rose bows and strung and shot it. I recall the article in the National Geographic years ago. That was one stiff bow alrighty.

I have read also (and Rocky's memory agrees) that the Mary Rose bows were in fact unfinished bow staves, Rocky says (perhaps not correctly) that the lot were on their way to Spain where they would be finished. Selling bow staves in an unfinished condition was normal commerce.

Other students, of course, consider the lack of tips on the Mary Rose bow staves to be the result of errosion of the horn tips. But aren't the bow staves somewhat triangular? If so that would indicate an unfinished condition, and explain also the lack of finished tips on them.

Another question: doesn't the effect of time in a bog or under the sand in sea water have something to do with the draw weight of a shootable bow? I know that an eastern composite bow gets stiffer with age. The last longe range shot should theorectically be the longest before the bow finally breaks. I imagine that a single wood "stick" would react the same way, ergo, a very old bow stave should be a lot stiffer than the original bow was intended to be when it was first made.

(Talking to Rocky last night about our three-way conversation here: he says that in earlier conversations with you on TMP, that he has already given you his sources on the breakdown of archers and draw weights. I learned this in the beginning from Rocky: that in a bow-using society, the norm is a 40# to 50# hunting bow – never mind whether selfbow, longbow or composite bow, it is the draw weight we are talking about. A "warbow" is c. 70#, with c. 10% of the archers able to pull a 100# bow all day long. Thus, for example, in the HYW the hand-picked longbowmen are all 70# with double the rate of 100# pullers, or an estimated 20% pulling the heavier bow; but at home for the WotR, the main mass of longbowmen mustered are pulling 50# longbows, 25% are pulling 70#ers and 10% 100#ers. A Steppes horde on the warpath would be all 70# composite bows, with 10% to 20% 100# composite bows; but if you attacked the tent village, you would run into the ordinary guys (and gals) and their 50# composite bows, with only 25% pulling 70# warbows and 10% pulling 100# composite warbows.)

Hi

Actually, i said they were SPANISH YEW coming TO england. England had pretty much harvested the good yew in the UK by this time. (In the americas, indians usually used Osage d'bois which performs about the same way).

Some staves were recoverd in the day. Are described by Pope who then prepered a copy of one surivivor then finished it off as an experienced boyer. Described the entire thing. And killed a Kodiac with it later. After being dressed and finished, it was 85#, but only after he shortened it to stiffen it a little.

Anyway, I am glad you have read 7 books. But you are quoting numbers that just are against my own experience. As a black powder shooter, I know from experience that 1700fps/533mps is about the practical limit of 3f powder out of a LONG GUN..we are talking a 34" Sharpes Buffalo rifle here. Not a pistol. Worse, I cannot think of a service pistol that makes anything close to 533mps with modern smokeless. A Pistol barrel is just not long enough.

If that is what it takes, you are asserting that a modern .44 magnum could not penetrate your armor!

As I said, your quoted numbers just don't work.

Rocky

The Hedeby, Nydam and Balinberry bows are all intact bow staves, not fragments.

Rocky is wrong about the Mary Rose bows, they were finished bows complete with horn nock's and all. (The tips show evidence of the presence of the horn and at elast one actual nock has been found.)

On their way to Spain! The Mary Rose was a war ship sunk on active service during a battle 1545, not a trader. The idea that they had aboard unfinished bow staves intended for overseas sale is very, very far fetched to say the least.
If you and Rocky don't belive me just check the official website of the Mary Rose at maryrose.org

The effects of exposure and age can be determiend and then factored into a calculation so one can recreate the nature & performance of the original bow. Here I'm stumbling to fidn the right Engliish words since I suspect that my terminology is not 100% right. (Not to mention that one can measure the bow, identify the material and then make a copy.) Hardy&Strickland devotes an entire chapter to this, Hardy is the custodian of most of the Mary Rose bows and arrows. In the photos I've seen the tips look a bit triangular (in toder to fit the nock?) but the bodies of the bows are round D-staves.

I'm still waiting for the names of the suposed period, primary sources. Not secodnary ones. I've taken the time to provide authors and titles several times when refering to an actual primary source. Surely Rocky can do the same since he so sure that I'm in the wrong.

Once agian Pope woudl not have had acess to any of the properly recovered and preserved Mary Rose bowstaves recovered from 1979 onwards. He was quite dead by then.
The only Mary Rose bows he coudl have had access to are those recovered in the early 19th C and then actioned of. Not only were those staves improperly preserved and treated, forgeries of those staves have been in circulation on the antiques market as well.

The claim that the bows were imports is just as far fetched as the first claim that they were exports. The Mary Rose was a war ship equipped with no less than 250 bows and 400 sheaves of arrows. It's all there in the equipment rolls.

I never said that a pistol produced 533 mps and 16th c pistols have longer barrels and use larger charges than any of the service pistols I've carried over the years. Get the German original text and read it if you want to know the detailed nature of the test and their results.
You make the claim about the magnum and 'my' armour, not I. Once more you make a lie and put it in my 'mouth', a formal complaint about this has been sent to the editor.

I never said that a pistol produced 533 mps…

…You make the claim about the magnum and 'my' armour, not I. Once more you make a lie and put it in my 'mouth', a formal complaint about this has been sent to the editor.

In this, I have to say that the number is correct (see your post of 1 Nov 1:22 p.m. PST), even though you did not specifically state "pistol". All the numbers seem impossible to those of us who have shot black powder.

And the point of these numbers is to establish kinetic energy to impact armor with. right? You later (in the same post) state that the Graz testers got "436 m/s" "testing a pistol." That's pretty close to "533 meters per second", or over 1,400 f/s! Wow, I wonder what black powder those Grazie boys were using! Surely something the 15th century gunners would have killed to get their hands on. When I shot black powder revolver, I had an 8" barrel and tight round balls (shaving a ring of lead off to get the ammo packed into the cylinder) against 30 to 40 grains of powder. The most such a firearm will generate is c. 800 f/s. The firearms of the 15th century, using unpatched balls (not tight at all), and inferior gunpowder, could not possible achieve such velocities as 1,400 f/s with any pistol, period. I concure with Rocky on this, something is fishy about those statistics.

I suggest that you lighten up, my friend. Rocky isn't personally attacking anyone. You are the first one to call someone a liar, and that only undermines your credibility.

Just a little friendly advice, because I enjoy talking with you.

Now, back to on topic:

The distribution of archers using 50#, 70# and 100# bows is a CONSTANT. Training will not do more than double your natural strength (the U. S. Marines claim that trained men are twice as strong as when they arrive at boot camp). An archer can "show off" with a bow twice as stiff as the one he can use all day in battle. That means that many an archer using a 70# bow could draw a 100# plus bow a few times, but that isn't good enough in sustained combat. If Roger Ascham says that One in Ten archers in England can pull the stronger bow, and he is a contemporary of the Mary Rose, isn't that significant? I mean, a whole ship full of 100#ers? Sounds like a picked crew to me.

(Btw, the Mary Rose WAS the flag ship earlier, just not in the battle in which she sank.)

As for the other bow finds, yes, if the tests and estimates are accurate, it is strange that the stronger bows are (so far) disproportionately represented in the few bows that have been discovered. But that doesn't prove anything.

I've never ever claimed that the Graz numbers were produced by 15th C firearms. Which can been seen clearly in the post of Nov 1. 1:22 PM PST. Indeed in the post of Nov 8 2:42 PM PST I've provided further detail and expressly said that the 533 MPS result was achived by a musket ,not a pistol. To me a diffrence of 97 MPS or (22%) isnt' 'very close'.
The 15th Centiry and it's firearms was brough tinot the discussion by you and Rocky.

The powder used was Jagdschwartzpulver Marke Köln-Rottweil Nr. 0, made by Dynamit Nobel. Further details can be found in Kalaus which I don't have at the moment.

8 inches is a bit short compared to the 12-25 inch barrels sued by many 16th C and early 17th C pistols. 8-10 inches is about the shortest I've seen on military service issue pistols

Now the issue of wether 16th to 18th C firearms can achive the muzzle velocities I've quoted from Kalaus is a sidetrack with only limited bearing on the issue at hand.
Instead of us three quoting various numbers based on tests and personal experience the time coudl have been better spent disucssing the nature of the armour test plates used by Rocky and comparing them to actual armour.

Adn that of course is the main problem which makes this such an infected issue. The discussion at hand challenges and questions soemthign that Rocky has put a lot of time and effort into and hence has a lot of prestige invested in. He's defending his personal work, if it's proved wrong then he 'messed up'.

I'm 'merly' usign the stuff I've picked up in long hours spent reserach libraries and in discission with the staff and curators at Livrustkammaren, The Royal Armoruies and the Landeszeghaus in Graz. I can always retreat if proven wrong by pointing out that I acted in good faith based on what appeared to be credible information published by noted reserachers.

Do explain how atributing a statement with ridicolous content I've never written to me isn't a lie intended to slur and discredit me? Where I come from that is considered a rather serious thing to do, as is calling some one a lair which is why I kept telling Rocky to drop the habit of atributign errnous claims to me before it got that far.

I do see your point and I'll conced that in 1545 the archers of the Mary Rose represented a picked crew. Wether they woudl have been a picked crew back in 1415 is another matter. Was the 150 pound capable bowmen of the Mary Rose "one in ten" in 1545 because the standard of archery practice had declined. I.e fewer well trained men= fewer archers wielding 150 pound bows. Or is it the effect of an inherent genetic physical limitation on the strenght available as you claim, a constant? i've yet to see any credible proof of this.
The USMC is right but natural strenth is created both by inbred ability or the lack of it and how that strenght is nurtured. Some one growing up doing farm work well fed on medieval diet is goign to be a lot stronger when he arrives at boot camp than the computer geek raised on junk food. The end result of them dubbling their strenght will be quite diffrent. I've put conscripts though boot camp as a proffesional so I'm quite familiar with how much you can or cannot increase someone's strenght.

Hmm, archeological finds doesn't prove anything… I'll allow that the number of non Mary Rose bows is on the low end to allow for broad conclusions to be drawn from them but to call the finds useless sounds like sour grapes to me ;-)

I'll suppose that the only way to solve this is to get a 70 pound bow into the museum and take a few shots at the AVANT armour before security cracks down on the intrepid testers.

So if the written sources and archeologicla finds are inconclusive as far as bow strenght is concerned (since no bow find is connected with the 100YW period)the main question remains:
Can a 70 pound bow effectively penetrate iron and steel armour supported by a mix of mail and padding? Alan Williams has done tests on this, Jones actually tested 70 pound bow as have Rocky. The main problem for me is that I still have no way of comparing Rocky's tests to the others due to a complete lack of infromation about a wvital part of the tests. The armour test plates. Which is why I've been nagging Rocky about those details. Providing them would be the surest way of convincing me that the tests are accurate and effectively challenge Jones and Williams findings.

Hi

Sigh:"soemthign that Rocky has put a lot of time and effort into and hence has a lot of prestige invested in. He's defending his personal work, if it's proved wrong then he 'messed up'."

You keep wanting to make this personal. Like you, read old obsolete obviously incorrect sources by your estimation. And, out of curiosity, I made equipment and tested it. As my tests satisfied me that the sources were substantially corrct, I moved on. I have no "prestiege" invested. I am not defending my personal work, this is not academia where prestiege means tenure and salary. And being proved wrong doesn't break my heart. I am completely unsure why being proved to have "messsed up" would have any meaning to ME. This may say more about your values than mine.

You explained better plate made the bow obsolete, then guns made armor oboslete until better body armor among the Poles made guns useless. Your gun numbers have problems. But the evolution of effect is yours, and easier to address.

So. We have reached the point where no one is reading this except us. You dont have my sources and don't believe them in any case because they disagree with your chosen sources and experiences. I have my sources that don't agree with yours as do not my experiences.

This is called an "impass".

So, simple. I surrender. Plate infantry are invulnerable to missle, but lost at agincourt because they had mud in their eyes.

Rocky

Your last missive proves that for you the this has been personal for a long time, missquotes, innuendo, exaggerations and ridicule all wrapped into the same package. Why it is personal I don't know,I took a stab at explaining it but obviously I was wrong there. You obviously just dislike me.

For example I never said that better armour among the poles made the gun obsolete, I simply used polish armour in 1410 and 1610 as an example of the fact that guns made the earlier armour obsolete and forced a change in the thickness and materials used.

Old sources have a lot of problems, they are in no way automaticly obsolete but 60-80 years of additional reserach and improvements in methodolgy and technology is bound to provide new data & facts which in turn allow for new and improved conclusions to be made.

I've repeatedly asked you for the information that would change my mind, some simple verifiable facts since unlike the sources I've quoted the numbers and facts of your testing isn't published or accessible through a library. (Or if it is you havn't provided me with the information to do so)
That you have not done so despite ample time to do so can by this stage only mean one thing. That your tests don't stand up to comparison with historical armour. Why else wihthold information that has the potential of decivsively proving me and my sources wrong and you right?

I've never ever claimed that the Graz numbers were produced by 15th C firearms.

I realized that, after I clicked "submit". But is there any significant advancement between say 1450 and 1550 in the guns employed? I don't think so. Certainly nothing on the order of increasing f/s from 600-800 to well over 1,000. The kinds of musket vollies that armor was subjected to en masse remained unpatched round ball with lower muzzle velocities until well after the turn of the 19th century.

The 15th Centiry and it's firearms was brough tinot the discussion by you and Rocky.

Probably in an effort to bring this back to 15th century missile versus 15th century armor. Extending the effects of bullets upon steel armor of the later 15th century, comparing 16th and later guns, muddies the waters a bit, imho. All Rocky's point was, is that if the kinetic energies of an arrow are equal or superior to those of a soft lead ball, that if the one will penetrate stell armor, so will the other. This entire discussion over the "numbers" is because the math is not being accepted by you, because you trust the Graz velocity numbers, which do not agree with already established statistics on muzzle velocities, and our own experience with much later (advanced) black powder firearms.

8 inches is a bit short compared to the 12-25 inch barrels sued by many 16th C and early 17th C pistols. 8-10 inches is about the shortest I've seen on military service issue pistols…

True, but then we would want to factor into the comparison, the difference in calibre. The much larger calibre balls of the older pistols (iirc, something on the order of 60 plus calibre was common?, in any case, well over 50 calibre) makes for a much dirtier projectile, i.e. quickly slowing down and wandering off target. Up close of course makes all the difference. But a tightly packed smaller round ball, with better (faster burning) powder, is going to have a faster muzzle velocity than the earlier pistols. (My, this has tended to wander off topic somewhat, but it is interesting.)

Now the issue of wether 16th to 18th C firearms can achive the muzzle velocities I've quoted from Kalaus is a sidetrack with only limited bearing on the issue at hand.
Instead of us three quoting various numbers based on tests and personal experience the time coudl have been better spent disucssing the nature of the armour test plates used by Rocky and comparing them to actual armour.

What I just said, parenthetically…. I agree.

I can always retreat if proven wrong by pointing out that I acted in good faith based on what appeared to be credible information published by noted reserachers.

This is a healthy attitude to have. I share it. I have taken many things on good faith myself, for many years. But if my "knowledge" in more serious areas of my life (e.g. specifically religion) can "suffer" a complete remake, so too can my "knowledge" of the mechanics of war. I remain open to change in everything, so i remind myself every time this sort of discussion "snares" me. :)

Do explain how atributing a statement with ridicolous content I've never written to me isn't a lie intended to slur and discredit me? Where I come from that is considered a rather serious thing to do, as is calling some one a lair which is why I kept telling Rocky to drop the habit of atributign errnous claims to me before it got that far.

The 44 mag statement was a comparison, not a quote of yours, meant to illustrate how silly the Graz muzzle velocity stats are, when they out perform modern pistol; and your agreement that 7 joules remaining would not seriously injure the wearer. Since modern pistol rounds don't get the kind of muzzle velocities the Graz stats are claiming, it follows that (somewhat hyperbolically, to make the point) a 44 mag wouldn't penetrate YOUR armor then. Rocky wasn't quoting you, I repeat, just illustrating the point by looking at another hypothetical situation.

I know how Rocky expresses himself when trying to make an obvious point yet again. He was not attacking you or in any way accusing you of being a liar. Merely mistaken in what you accept as the truth. This will always happen when two radically different approaches to learning produce wildly differing results. Both Rocky and I find the Graz claims incompatible with what we think we know. But especially Rocky does, I gather, because he has done so much mathematical work on this topic and has far more experience than I do shooting a wide variety of firearms, both modern and early.

I do see your point and I'll conced that in 1545 the archers of the Mary Rose represented a picked crew. Wether they woudl have been a picked crew back in 1415 is another matter. Was the 150 pound capable bowmen of the Mary Rose "one in ten" in 1545 because the standard of archery practice had declined. I.e fewer well trained men= fewer archers wielding 150 pound bows. Or is it the effect of an inherent genetic physical limitation on the strenght available as you claim, a constant? i've yet to see any credible proof of this.

Rocky is my "source" for the CONSTANT

My old service issue SMG fired the 9mm mark 39B round at velocity of 450 MPS, at least that what the manual said. In the same leauge as the Graz rounds. Just to explain where I come from I hold a reserve commsion in the artillery and hence have worked a lot with modern firearms and ballistics.

The Graz test results are "silly"? A rather strong claim for some one who doesn't know much about them. The international research comunity didn't find them so in the process of peer review. But I suggest that you read the original test report and make up your own mind. I did. But lets dropp the Graz & firearm part of the discussion since we obviously disgree on it and it doesn't add to the main discussion at hand

I've always agreed that the arrow is a better penetrator which is why it achives pentration at much lower impact energies than a bullet. However a firearm will produce a lot more impact energy to begin with.

We can establish what kind of impact energy it takes to penetrate a armour plate effectively by diffrent menas and then establish wether or not a arrow shoot from a bow of a certain poundage can generate it. It is a simpel as that. Additionaly we can test fire arrows at atargets and see what happens. I've repeatedly refered to such experiments that have been conducted in a scientific manner and the results published but you seem to reject them out of hand apprently based on Rocky alone. Do correct me if I'm wrong about this or have misunderstod you(?) And leaving out the meltdown in communication between Rocky and me for which I'm also partilay responsible I've yet to see any data from Rocky that convinces me that those results in the wrong.

And therin lies the problem, much of this argument hinges on wether or not Rocky is right. So far Rocky has directly or indirectly claimed superior knowledge to all of the researchers I've quoted be they historians, archeologists, metallurgists or ballistic experts. He knows and understands medieval armour better than Alan Williams, a man who has spent a lifetime studying it. The Mary Rose bows better than the people who recovered, conservated and then studied them and so on. Effectively anyone&everyone who isn't Rocky is in the wrong and has simply produced silly results. I don't buy that, it is as pure and simple as that.

IMO points are better made without hyperbole and unclear quotes espcialy over the net and where a language barrier exists.

I've never ever claimed that the Graz numbers were produced by 15th C firearms.

I realized that, after I clicked "submit". But is there any significant advancement between say 1450 and 1550 in the guns employed? I don't think so. Certainly nothing on the order of increasing f/s from 600-800 to well over 1,000. The kinds of musket vollies that armor was subjected to en masse remained unpatched round ball with lower muzzle velocities until well after the turn of the 19th century.

The 15th Centiry and it's firearms was brough tinot the discussion by you and Rocky.

Probably in an effort to bring this back to 15th century missile versus 15th century armor. Extending the effects of bullets upon steel armor of the later 15th century, comparing 16th and later guns, muddies the waters a bit, imho.

All Rocky's point was, is that if the kinetic energies of an arrow are equal or superior to those of a soft lead ball, that if the one will penetrate steel armor, so will the other. This entire discussion over the "numbers" is because the math is not being accepted by you, because you trust the Graz velocity numbers, which do not agree with already established statistics on muzzle velocities, and our own experience with much later (advanced) black powder firearms.

8 inches is a bit short compared to the 12-25 inch barrels sued by many 16th C and early 17th C pistols. 8-10 inches is about the shortest I've seen on military service issue pistols…

True, but then we would want to factor into the comparison, the difference in calibre. The much larger calibre balls of the older pistols (iirc, something on the order of 60 plus calibre was common?, in any case, well over 50 calibre) makes for a much dirtier projectile, i.e. quickly slowing down and wandering off target. Up close of course makes all the difference. But a tightly packed smaller round ball, with better (faster burning) powder, is going to have a faster muzzle velocity than the earlier pistols. (My, this has tended to wander off topic somewhat, but it is interesting.)

…the time coudl have been better spent disucssing the nature of the armour test plates used by Rocky and comparing them to actual armour.

What I just said, parenthetically…. I agree.

I can always retreat if proven wrong by pointing out that I acted in good faith based on what appeared to be credible information published by noted reserachers.

This is a healthy attitude to have. I share it. I have taken many things on good faith myself, for many years. But if my "knowledge" in more serious areas of my life (e.g. specifically religion) can "suffer" a complete remake, so too can my "knowledge" of the mechanics of war. I remain open to change in everything, so I remind myself every time this sort of discussion "snares" me. :)

Do explain how atributing a statement with ridicolous content I've never written to me isn't a lie intended to slur and discredit me? Where I come from that is considered a rather serious thing to do, as is calling some one a lair which is why I kept telling Rocky to drop the habit of atributign errnous claims to me before it got that far.

The 44 mag statement was a comparison, not a quote of yours, meant to illustrate how silly the Graz muzzle velocity stats are, when they out perform modern pistol; and your agreement that 7 joules remaining would not seriously injure the wearer. Since modern pistol rounds don't get the kind of muzzle velocities the Graz stats are claiming, it follows that (somewhat hyperbolically, to make the point) a 44 mag wouldn't penetrate YOUR armor then. Rocky wasn't quoting you, I repeat, just illustrating the point by looking at another hypothetical situation.

I know how Rocky expresses himself when trying to make an obvious point (to him) yet again. He was not attacking you or in any way accusing you of being a liar. Merely mistaken in what you accept as the truth. This will always happen when two radically different approaches to learning produce wildly differing results. Both Rocky and I find the Graz claims incompatible with what we think we know. But especially Rocky does, I gather, because he has done so much mathematical work on this topic and has far more experience than I do shooting a wide variety of firearms, both modern and early.

I do see your point and I'll conced that in 1545 the archers of the Mary Rose represented a picked crew. Wether they woudl have been a picked crew back in 1415 is another matter. Was the 150 pound capable bowmen of the Mary Rose "one in ten" in 1545 because the standard of archery practice had declined. I.e fewer well trained men= fewer archers wielding 150 pound bows. Or is it the effect of an inherent genetic physical limitation on the strenght available as you claim, a constant? i've yet to see any credible proof of this.

Rocky is my "source" for the CONSTANT in bow-using societies. The rationale behind this conclusion would never occur to me, or to even imagine such a subject in the first place. I don't think that way naturally. It has to be spelled out for me, i.e. someone has to reveal this kind of statistical analysis to me, or I wouldn't even think to approach the subject this way to begin with.

Rocky has other sources which (afaict) he hasn't mentioned here. Some early eastern source by a dude named "Tybugha" (sp), and he has a "couple" of early Arabic sources on archery. I gather that from these he can see the consistency in bow usage, which agrees with the statement by Roger Ascham for the 10% archers in England which use the 100# plus bows.

This isn't scientific, but it has been my experience that nearly all experienced archers today use bows under 70#, with a few "macho" guys insisting on using the c. 70# bow. Back in the day when I practiced archery, the modern compound bows were just taking off. This skews the entire comparison with earlier archery. But of the archers insisting on continuing to use traditional bows, I saw very few shooting long periods of time with even 70# bows. And I don't recall meeting even one who was comfortable with a 100#er. That doesn't mean that the stronger archers couldn't pull a 100#er. I could barely pull a 70# a couple of times before I felt like I was going to break something inside of me. My bow at my draw length was c. 55#, and it could make me somewhat tired after shooting off a couple dozen arrows. I can pull 35 to 45# all day however (when I am fit that is). I did earlier posit that practiced archers today would show the same breakdown as in other (earlier) bow-using societies: i.e. most using c. 50#, roughly 25% using c. 70#, and only 10% using stronger bows approaching 100# or even higher. I don't know how this could be researched today. There are, afaict, very few archers using traditional bows today, except those into target competition, and then these are all very light, c. 35#. So all we have to go by are the time-motion studies of documented battles (which Rocky is into, and I wouldn't even know about the existence of at all, if he hadn't brought them to my attention years ago), which reveal how strong the bows had to be to get effective shooting at various ranges. And the writings of archery experts from the old days from around the world. These are few in number, but Rocky (again) has gathered up as many as he could come up with. And all of that went into our missile results tables.

The USMC is right but natural strenth is created both by inbred ability or the lack of it and how that strenght is nurtured. Some one growing up doing farm work well fed on medieval diet is goign to be a lot stronger when he arrives at boot camp than the computer geek raised on junk food. The end result of them dubbling their strenght will be quite diffrent. I've put conscripts though boot camp as a proffesional so I'm quite familiar with how much you can or cannot increase someone's strenght.

I appreciate what you are saying. Today inbred ability is the same as it has always been. Just because so many people don't tap their potential doesn't mean that the ability to become strong isn't genetically present to begin with.

But the problem I have with believing in a nation of longbowmen pulling 100#ers is the claims that they were particularly well fed (the Brits, as prone to prejudice as any people, have for centuries harbored the suspicion/belief that their ancestors were taller and stronger than the diminutive folk of the mainland, which research has shown to be utterly unfounded). Other than the upper classes, nobody was well fed in Europe by the 14th century. The population was too high and the food production too inadequate by then to allow everyone a good diet of "medieval food." Famines and bad crop years were common. This very condition was what contributed to the Black Death and made it into an epidemic instead of something that remained endemic.

I am no expert on this study either, but it is my understanding that comparison of human remains from the period indicate that the stature of adults by the 14th century was at an all-time low, and didn't start to recover until near the end of the industrial revolution when food production gained over population, i.e. very recent times (arguably) within the last 150 years. Europe's population was relatively well-fed from Roman times until the high middle ages. From the c. 13th century on the problem of increasing population and inadequate food production continued until it peaked with the Black Death and the related calamities of the late 14th century: Europe's population was reduced by c. half within 50 years. So I have difficulty believing that the longbowmen of England would pose an exception to this, and be strong enough to draw 100# warbows in numbers exceeding 10%.

Btw, even a kid on junk food (which is highly nutritious by any standards) would have to be extremely sedentary to wind up with noodle arms. Most kids today are fairly active, so I don't think that the material you have to work with in your military training is in any way inferior to the body of men in the middle ages who learned archery. We are accustomed to looking at the worst examples of the sedentary people in our midst, and imagining that that is where the entire human race is heading. Yet in any time period, you have people exerting themselves only as much as they have to to get the job done and no more. Imagining that medieval peasants (yeomen) worked out every day, and were behind the plow the rest of the time, isn't reality.

Hmm, archeological finds doesn't prove anything… I'll allow that the number of non Mary Rose bows is on the low end to allow for broad conclusions to be drawn from them but to call the finds useless sounds like sour grapes to me ;-)

I do know the taste of sour grapes. But I didn't mean to imply that the finds so far are "useless." Merely, as you say, not numerous enough to satisfy our need to know specifics ("broad" doesn't satisfy anything). We need a LOT more bow finds before we can begin to identify anything like an average draw weight, based on the archeological evidence alone.

I'll suppose that the only way to solve this is to get a 70 pound bow into the museum and take a few shots at the AVANT armour before security cracks down on the intrepid testers.

That WOULD prove something useful, wouldn't it! But surely, that isn't the ONLY way. I want accurate reproductions of the period bows, and accurate armor clothing a manequin that has the same properties of resistence and mass as the human body. I want field tests, not laboratory simulations using various impacting machines. Surely, this is not asking too much?

Can a 70 pound bow effectively penetrate iron and steel armour supported by a mix of mail and padding?

Yes, and no. I agree with you, that the tests so far indicate that an arrow impacting the sheet iron and steel face of the plate armor in use will have little if any chance of inflicting a mortal or even a serious injury. As these surfaces are what is in the high 80th percentile of available targeted surface, it follows that no less than 90% of the arrows which even strike the target are going to do nothing except make a great deal of noise and vibration. Some will snag by partially penetrating, creating further distraction.

But if you recall, not too far back, Rocky said "maybe a couple of thousand effective hits out of 144K". This volume of fire would have been emptied into the target body of men at arms within a very few minutes, which equals c. 25% casualties in the first battle of men at arms. And at close range, the enfilading fire would have struck into the thinner edge armor, penetrating enough to hurt or kill. The English manner of arranging their longbowmen (e.g. Agincourt) to maximize their view of the enemy, would make for effective hits through simple volume of fire at close range. But the tests, afaict, do not allow for this, and simply imply that longbows cannot hurt people through plate armor. That is a falacious conclusion, ignoring too many battlefield factors – many of which we have raised and batt(l)ed back and forth during this excellently entertaining conversation.

The main problem for me is that I still have no way of comparing Rocky's tests to the others due to a complete lack of information about a vital part of the tests…Which is why I've been nagging Rocky about those details. Providing them would be the surest way of convincing me that the tests are accurate and effectively challenge Jones and Williams findings.

Rocky's tests were against the sheet metal only, iirc. He said as much earlier on (alluding to the pics that he forgot that I have never seen), describing how the back side of the penetrated sheet would have"stapled leaves" into the wearer. Ergo, Rocky's penetration tests are nowhere near as comprehensive as the tests that you quote from. No recording of foot-pounds, or impact angles, or various "Rockwell" hardness comparisons, or iron and steel composition studies were any part of the penetration tests. Simply, the metal surfaces equated with medieval plate armor were obtained and shot at with various types of point out of a 70# bow at different ranges. The observed results of penetration, or the lack thereof, constituted the results that were evidently photographed and recorded.

But those testers you mention are apparently not taking into consideration many of the factors that we are (ncluding yourself). Their tests appear to be simple mechanics only, and at that, only laboratory simulations, which might carry inherent, unrecognized, inaccuracies. (Thus my insistence upon field tests only, replicating the actual conditions of use as closely as possible: I don't see why replicated "exactly" is out of the question.)

I have no idea how I managed to post only part of my response at 11:29. How weird….

We can establish what kind of impact energy it takes to penetrate a armour plate effectively by diffrent menas and then establish wether or not a arrow shoot from a bow of a certain poundage can generate it. It is a simpel as that.

Except that only replicates the arrows into the main plate defenses, which I have agreed (and it appears Rocky tacitly does also) is not where the casualties from longbow missiles are coming from. The vulnerable spots in front, and especially on the flanks are not taken into account with these simple arrow versus sheet plate tests. The sheer volume of fire producing inevitably effective hits, in significant numbers to effect the unit's strength and morale, are also not considered in the conclusion that "arrows do not effectively penetrate plate armor."

Effectively anyone&everyone who isn't Rocky is in the wrong and has simply produced silly results. I don't buy that, it is as pure and simple as that.

I think that because of the number of niggling points that have been argued on this thread, that the disagreement is more apparent than real. For instance, if Rocky says "2,000 effective hits out of 144K", is that directly at variance with the tests you quote from? (I agree, we can drop the whole gunpowder and early firearms stuff for now.)

The whole issue over bow poundage is problematic, because we don't KNOW what the quality of the target was that the French men at arms presented. Yes, we have the muster roles, and the requirements to muster in full harness. But we have no evidence that they were particularly effective, and no indication (afaict) what the "penalty" for failure to comply would be for a man at arms who came in incomplete equipment. Would the commanders of the French army simply tell them to go home and do better next time, or give them the nod to join the camp? I suspect, knowing human nature as much as I think I do, that the latter is the more likely. (E.g. the Byzantine empire had strict requirements – laws – on how the provincial militias – themas – were to be equipped. Yet when it came time to muster them for campaigning it was found during some periods that they only had a "paper army." All the money collected for equipping the army had been pocketed by corrupt officials and the equipment was nonexistent.) Commissions of array were established to prevent laxness and maintain quality. But during the Agincourt period, with France divided and almost in a civil war, how can we be certain that requirements were upheld successfully and that full harness was even the norm? The fact that the arrow fire at Agincourt was as effective as it apparently was, indicates one of several possible explanations: either the bows were 70#ers and the armor was not of a uniformly high quality (i.e. incomplete harness on a lot of men at arms), or the longbows used were 100#ers and Rocky (and by association myself) is mistaken, or the testers have failed to account for the other factors which do produce a significant number of effective hits.

(Btw, I find it interesting that the two extant paintings of Agincourt that I have recently seen, from the middle of the 15th century, show a high proportion of men at arms in "half" armor, with their legs utterly unprotected. This is supposedly predating the tendency toward shedding armor, and should be at the high point of armor usage. If anything, then, these paintings of contemporary armor should show the higher development and usage typical of the end of the HYW, ergo, better quality than at Agincourt. In both of these paintings, the effectiveness of the arrows is graphically indicated. Most are seen protruding from horseflesh and the unarmored areas of the French men at arms' bodies. But a significant number are also shown having penetrated fully (mortally) through the armor itself.)

As you said above, the highest representation of bow draw weight in the slight number of finds so far is toward the 100# end. If further finds confirm this, I would have to conclude that Rocky is mistaken about European longbow (selfbow) usage. That would raise our HYW English armies to 100% "Bow 4" (instead of Bow 3). Also, the Viking and Norman bow would be "Bow 3" (instead of Bow 2). The siginificant difference would be in the over all numbers of bow available, which until the English in the HYW, is decidely lacking, usually numbering in the hundreds rather than the thousands. (There are exceptions, e.g. the "Saracen" archers at Benevento 1266, which evidently numbered in the many thousands, "5,000" iirc.) This change would need to effect an upgrade in the amount of "plate" armored troops over what we assume right now. Otherwise, the French first battle would not reach the English lines at all in a wargame of Agincourt.

(Hmm, how does one do the Italics you use for my quotes? It sure does make the reply much easier to read)

Impact energy testing can be done on any type armour. i.e the weak spots covered only by mail and/or padding making it perfectly pssoible to get a fairly good if not complete picture of the effect on non-plate armour troops as well.
By varying the thickness and quality of the plate one can mimic the weaker areas on the flanks and rear as well.

I agree with you that in the 1410's we don't know very accurately how well the requirements were followed but the army at Agincourt was a paid one and a man in incomplete harness would run the risk of not being hired. Of course the process was far from being perfect and the the earlier has some pretty damning as well as funny descriptions of the pratcices followed by dishonest captains and nobles.
On the other hand the descriptions of the ordonnace companies describe a very well equiped force indeed.

One should also not forget the pride of the "knightly" class who provided most of the French men-at-arms, to posses a good suit of armour was as important to them as havign the right cars and "bling-bling" is to the Jet-set today. Also they were professional fighting men who would have to risk their life in the stuff which always a sure motivator to get the best one can get ones hands on.

Le Fevre who was present at Azincourt describes the French men-at-arms thus: '…were armed with long coats of mail, reachign below the knees. Below these they had leg armour and above white harness. In addition they had bascinets with aventails.'

And the question on how effective the archery at Agincourt realy was is still open to much debate. As I showed with the quotes from Des Ursin's and Walsingham both sides can find supporting sources and then we're back to a "battle of the quotes".

My view on archery effectivness is that it depends on 3 main things:

1:The power of the bow and type of arrow
2:The protection level of the target
3:The number of arches, i.e the volume of archery produced.
All 3 has to be 'right' to produce full effects. For example at Poitiers during the last assault, the bows were the right tool for the task but the volume of archery was to small to produce any noticable effects on targets as well protected as the French.

Pictorial sources are notoriously unreliable and few can be safely used as reliable evidence. For example I have seen paintings of Azincourt being fought by armies encased head to foot in plate armour, men-at-arms and archers alike. Other sources show drastic effects of weapon impacts which actual field testing has proved to be next to impossible.
Extensive verification is needed to determine if a picctorial sources is valid or not.

Removing armour to increase mobility was done under certain circumstances througout the period such as at Auray 1364 where English mercenary men-at-arms held as a reserve removed their leg harness to be able to move more freely to the critical spots.

I doubt that we'll ever find enough bows to satisfy either of us fully. The 137 bows recovered from the Mary Rose was an increible lucky find which increased the number of surviving complete bows by a factor of 8 or 10 IIRC.

"Le Fevre who was present at Azincourt describes the French men-at-arms thus: '…were armed with long coats of mail, reachign below the knees. Below these they had leg armour and above white harness. In addition they had bascinets with aventails."

So was this french word the one for Mail, as in chain mail

and Bascinets is a helm correct? and Aventail is ??

Thanks Lord Ghee

The word "chain mail" is an invention of the 19th century, that kind of armour is properly called mail. A Bascinet is a helmet, the aventail is the mail defence which hangs from the helmet and protects the neck and throat. In the early 15th Century the plate armour defences for the throat were also sometimes called aventails.

A bascinet with a aventail varmouries.com/tran_09.html
The avential is missing the vital padding which was worn under the mail to provide a complete defence.

White harness is simply plate armour, "white" beacuse it is polished and thus reflective giving it a white shine at a distance. The famous mercenary "White Company" got their name because they wore brightly polished plate leg armour and breast plates.

The French described thus could have looked like this link or this picture

Hi

You have repeatedly said variants of " Effectively anyone&everyone who isn't Rocky is in the wrong and has simply produced silly results"

Which doesn't seem "personal" to you. And you accuse me of being angry, but YOU reported a "strike" to Bill about ME.

This is a wargaming forum, not a scholarly journal of debate. If I posted all the charts I prepared, the articles published, and so on, that would make this EVEN longer.

I don't see how the gun issue is off target. Simply this, yes, the Graz tests produce pistol numbers similar to the 9mm you are familiar with. HOWEVER, there is a massive difference between course grain early black powder smooth bore pistols of whatever barrel length AND A SMOKLESS POWDER CARTRIDGE WEAPON.

so, what part do I discuss here? You make comparisons about energy and penetration. And JUST the raw unqualified number doesn't make sense.

As I keep saying, a number of people have done a lot of work on the subject over the years, and I cast doubt that ONE NEW source, disagrees, Curry. Which was your first point.

And irrelevent.

The thread starter asked if the rules he had seen had bow too effective. I have no idea what his rules were.

My opinion is that my own tests confirm all those sources you haven't read. AND? That is irrelevent. You are happy with your sources.

OUR sources were used for OUR rules and produces the results described in those sources. If previous versions of those battles were just all wrong, then our rules are wrong. Curiously, when applied to other fights, we still get appropriate results.

So, what would YOU suggest? Can 144,000 arrows in 5 minutes of shooting produce 1000 effective hits? 2000? That is assuming the "old discredited" number of 6000 archers. 8000 archers, fine, that 192,000.

Since these guys were the best paid non-noble soldiers in the western world, how many hits was Hank paying for?

How would you game this?

This IS a wargaming page.

Rocky

The comment that you quote is an accurate but slightly exaggerated conclusion based on how you have responded in this debate. Most challenges to your claims have been met with ridicule and scorn, not counter arguments showing why I'm wrong. Essentaily just about all of my sources are wrong because you say so, no other argument has been offered. Take forexample you you dismissed Prof. Williams ground breaking study of medieval amrour by simply writing

"Errors of assumption:
1)surviving armor is typcial. That is like saying a knocked out tank from WW2 is the one that survives." (Your post of 27 Oct 8:46 AM PST) "
Not only is the comparison between a preserved piece of armour and a tank destroyed in combat erronous but your principle applied to WW2 tanks would mean that the intact tanks preserved around the world are useless as sources to how well they were protected. Of course this argumetn is an easy way to dismiss any archeological artifact and analysis which challenges your notions. Indeed your conclusion is that we should not study any archeological finds because the very fact that they have survived means that they are invalid as sources.

The discussion of firearms is a side track which I'm not longer wasting my time on

Sorry Rocky but I've never used Curry as a source with regards to the effects on archery vs armoured men as I've repeatedly told you. For example in my post of 27 Oct 1:51 PST, indeed I've even refered to exactly how she described the archery at Agincourt in my post of 28 Oct 11:40 PST. So bashing Curry seems a bit pointless since she's not even part of the subject.

Actually the energy numbers makes perfect sense since they establish an easily understood common way of comparing weaponry and/or seeign if a particular weapon would be effective. It takes a certain amount of energy to generate effective penetration using a certain type of penetrator. For example the Blackburn article shows that the 16 layers of linnen used as padding increased the energy need to achive pentration by 50 joules for a point type penetrator but by 80 joules for a blade. The points superior performance is clearly seen. Then it's a simple matter of calculation wether a cerain bow firing a particular arrow can generate the energy needed or not. It all there in the material published both by Blackburn & Co and by Williams.

Btw. the old number was 5000 archers not 6000 and Curry's new numbers are 7000 to 7800 roughly.

You miss the simple fact that both our sources & results can't be right at the same time and that wargames rules shoudl be based on the set of sources fo results which reflect real life weapons performance. Shooting arrows a sheet metal which doesn't even have close to the resistance of actual historical armour doesn't prove a thing, no matter if one can dig up a medieval sources which supposedly supports it. Not all primary sources are equal in value and accuracy.

(Hmm, how does one do the Italics you use for my quotes? It sure does make the reply much easier to read)

By HTML tags: you type the opening tag and ending tag like this – <.i.>TEXT<./.i.> – only without the periods (if I had just typed the tags, they would have been invisible in this post!). If you want BOLD, you use a "b" instead of an "i".

Humphrey,

The problem with field testing is that it's quite expensive, especially the armour. Even if one used single pieces rather than complete suits the cost would be quite high for some that is effectively 'destructive' testing. Not to emntion one would have to find the experts who could actually produce the needed bows, arrows and armour. There are only a few armoreers today which are as good as the masters of Milan and Augsburg at their best. The same goes for the makers of the padding worn under and at times over the armour. And we would need multiple pieces of diffrent quality to be able to judge the effects properly. Steel and Ironarowheads of diffrent historical types woudl have to be forged
Not to mention the fact that we would have to get everyone to agree that the test subjects were accuratly made in the first place…

I agree partly with you with regards to laboratory tests vs field testing but both have their value. Impact machine testing will tell us a part of of the truth if not the whole truth. It will determine what happens in a 'good' strike with little or no impact angle reasonably well. If a strike won't penetrate under such conditions, it probably won't do so under less favourable ones.

Machine tersting doesn't (fully) take into account such things as the subtle shaping and reinforcements the Italians and Germans worked into the armour. Some of the Milanese stuff is pretty amazing in the way it increase the protection against strikes in certain areas. Some areas are skillfully engineer to make arrow and lance strikes glance off.
There are other examples of course, impact machine testign is a usefull to create a fundation and then one has to work fromt here with other methods.

The results of the impac machine test can indeed be taken too far, as the 'Battlefield Detectives' Tv show and books did. FWIW I know that some of the people used as consultants were less than happy with how parts of their results were presented in the end. I've not heard a_serious_ researcher invovled in armour reserach proclaim that a man clade plate armour is completly invulnerable meerly that it is very hard to kill man in it. Which is why killing a man in armour wether by arrow, poleaxe or longsword depended so much on striking were the armour wasn't rather than on getting through it were it was. In archery that meant producing a volume of 'fire' large enough to produce many strikes in the ever smaller and better protected weak spots. In close combat the fighting techniques aimed at either allowing you to strike directly at a gap in the armour or to create a situation were you can deliver such an attack easily in the follow up. That is why close combat between armorued men at arms invovled a lot grappling and wrestling combined with thrusting with the point of the weapon.

Reagrding the number of arrows which first actually hit a target and secondly achived effective penetration. Modern day research shows that with assault rifles and well trained shots it still takes on average 2 shots to hit a standing man sized target in the open moving towards the shooter. I doubt that English archers with longbows did much better so we are down to 72000 arrows actually striking home. Rocky said IIRC 1 hit in 100 was effective so that's 720 men hit by effective strikes and killed. Roughly 9% of the 'pre-Curry Van', some 12-14% of the 'Curry' Van. High but not impossible. If Rocky's 1 in 100 number took into accoutn the inherent lack of accuracy during battle field conditions we would have 1440 effective hits enough to rpoduce 18% casulties to the Pre-Curry Van and 24-29% casulties in the Curry Vanguard. Enough to cause the units to route according to Rocky and Keegan.

Taking your 10% effective hits gives us 7200 effective hits or enough to completly move down the entire 'Curry' Van and most of the 'pre-Curry' Van as well. No to mention the 10% number applied to the full 144000 arrow strikes number.

But that's assuming that ever effective arrow strike hits a diffrent man. I recall widly the poor sod at Visby found with no less than 3 crossbow bolts lodged in his skulle, all from the same salvo. is it even possible to calculate how many men would be struck by multiple effective strikes? Thus in a roundabout way lowering the casulty number further. Simply caculating the probable number of effective strikes won't tell us how many men would be 'killed' or rendered ineffective by archery, one has to factor in the dispersion of the strikes across the formation as well. As if things were not complicated enough before.

With regards to the question of nutrition and the physicla size and such I need to do some more reading, I do have a lot on this but nothing that applies directly to the area we are discussing. I'm not comfortable stretching the mostly Scandinavian data I have that far, local diffrences could be and were important. I do know that here there was a reduction i size roughly mid-14th C due to malll nurishment and other factors but the Balck Death effectively removed the population surplus and then some casuing an improved food supply which lasted into the 1560's when nurishment and size dropped again and would not reach the same levels until the 1850's

[I don't see how the gun issue is off target.]

And we get some funny puns here too, even if inadvertant.

So was this french word the one for Mail, as in chain mail

and Bascinets is a helm correct? and Aventail is ??

Thanks Lord Ghee

"Maille", I think, is the Old French spelling for the "chain" armor.

Bascinet is the popular helm of the period. It often had a "pigface" visor, which was even more often removed, leaving the head fully protected but the face exposed.

Aventail is a mail attachment of a "coif" with it raised in front of the lower face and laced into place. The correct term is "la ventail", shortened in English (incorrectly, I presume) to "aventail."

I've not heard a_serious_ researcher invovled in armour reserach proclaim that a man clade plate armour is completly invulnerable meerly that it is very hard to kill man in it.

You make observations which I totally agree with, and Rocky must agree with this one too, or I am going to be surprised. Again, muddied waters and a tendency toward misunderstanding – too much use of hyperbole and illustrative examples in the above discussion – has muddied the waters. I really don't think that what you expect out of plate armor and the arrows, and what we expect, is in separate courts. A couple thousand effective hits out of over 144,000 arrows is hardly reflecting the drilling of plate armor by arrows, now is it? Rather, these would mainly be the weak spot hits and some outright, pointblank penetrations up close (from the 100# users? we allow 20% of those in the HYW English armies).

Reagrding the number of arrows which first actually hit a target and secondly achived effective penetration. Modern day research shows that with assault rifles and well trained shots it still takes on average 2 shots to hit a standing man sized target in the open moving towards the shooter. I doubt that English archers with longbows did much better so we are down to 72000 arrows actually striking home.

Oops! Don't go off dragging into this firearm examples again. The type of shooting is totally different. For all except pointblank shooting the English did clout (volley) shooting only. This was very similar to artillery saturation technique. There was no aiming per se except to dump the arrows into a "clout" area (practice was at a spread cloth or marked out area on the ground). The effect was most likely less than one in every two arrows striking any part of the target, but we have no way of knowing. In any case, the fewer arrows out of c. 144K which actually strike means a greater effectiveness of the bow and arrow being used, because that means that those "2,000" effective hits (wounds and kills) then becomes a greater percentage of the total strikes.

Taking your 10% effective hits gives us 7200 effective hits or enough to completly move down the entire 'Curry' Van and most of the 'pre-Curry' Van as well. No to mention the 10% number applied to the full 144000 arrow strikes number.

I don't want to go looking for something that I am 99% sure I didn't say. "10%" iirc, is only applied as the total of 100# bow users in England's longbowmen population. If you can find where I ever said "10% effective hits" I want you to point it out to me, so that I can officially kill it. I agree with Rocky's "1K to 2K" total effective hits out of 144K or more arrows shot. But these are not all kills or even serious wounds: just enough damage/trauma to take the Frenchie out of the battle.

…is it even possible to calculate how many men would be struck by multiple effective strikes?

Yes, but not ONE way of calculating it. Ergo, not without a lot of disagreement, ergo again, useless.

<.i.> want you to point it out to me, so that I can officially kill it.<./.i.>

<.i.>As these surfaces are what is in the high 80th percentile of available targeted surface, it follows that no less than 90% of the arrows which even strike the target are going to do nothing except make a great deal of noise and vibration. Some will snag by partially penetrating, creating further distraction<./.i.>
From your 12 Nov 1:04 AM PST post

I reduced the number arrows which actually hit a target to begin with before removign 90% of them. The assault rifle example was just a way to point out that most missile weapons used under battlefield conditions miss.

I know about clout shooting but took an earlier post by you to mean that it wasn't used much except at long range. Just to establish an understanding, what is the pointblank range for a bow according to you?

I'm not sure if by the the 1-2K 'effective hits' you mean the number of men actually removed from battle by way of arrow induced trauma or the number of arrow strikes which are effective but it's unclear how many French are struck down by them?
1K men struck down by arrows would be 17-20% of the French Vanguard as suggested by Curry, 12,5% of the 'Old' Vanguard. 2K twice that, i.e enough to make the French rout according to Rocky. Heck even by my numbers only real hardcore units go on fighting past 25-35% let alone 40% losses. Espcially if those losses are taken before contact.

(You need to get rid of the periods, then those italics will show up nicely, oh and make sure you don't leave any spaces between the characters.)