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The History of the Longbow

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Winter Hawk:
Longbow: A Social and Military History by Robert Hardy.  I just finished it, and it is a fascinating read, recommended by the good folks at Traditional Archery Society.  The author was one of Britain's great actors.  For those who watched All Creatures Great and Small on PBS, he played the veterinarian Siegfried Farnon.  He was also a world authority on the English longbow.  I bought the latest edition (1993) on Amazon.  It is out of print but there seem to be lots of copies available.

He goes through the history of the longbow, going back to prehistoric cave drawings and working through up to the present.  Emphasis is on the English using it for war, as at Agincourt, Crecy etc.  But then he continues on with field archery in Britain, the American archery of the Thompson brothers, Pope & Young with Ishi, Howard Hill, and hunting with the bow.  There is even a section on making your own bow and arrows, the types of wood to use, etc.

The book finishes off with a discussion of the bows found on the Mary Rose, Henry the VIII's warship which went down during a confrontation with the French.  The first edition of this book was published in 1976 and was a reference used by the archeologists working on the Mary Rose.  They then contacted Mr. Hardy and he became involved with their work.

It is not necessarily the easiest book to read, but for those interested in archery it is definitely worth while.  I learned a lot from reading it and recommend it wholeheartedly.

~Kees~

Eric Krewson:
I read the book when I started my bow making journey 20 years ago.

Paulk:

--- Quote from: Eric Krewson on October 04, 2018, 10:03:34 AM ---I read the book when I started my bow making journey 20 years ago.

--- End quote ---





Started my longbow shooting journey ~35 years ago. Read it sometime back then. I take it out periodically and re-read about the English battles.

Eric Krewson:
I started shooting trad before there was such a thing as tradition bows, around 1957 or so, in the early 70s I was lured to the darkside but never felt like I was carrying a bow because of all the wheels and such. After 18 years or so on the dark side and having two of these abominations break while I was drawing on deer (one a monster buck), I cast them aside and went back to my trad roots in 89. I made my first failure of a bow in 1995 followed by a bunch of bows in 96 that were so-so shooters.

I just put bow#156 in my log book, I am sure there are more but sometimes I forget to log them in. With so many bows it is hard to think back and pinpoint one that may have escaped the logbook.

Ohio Joe:
My bow interest started with the wheel bows about 20 / 22 some odd years ago, but back around 2002 I just started reading about Self-Bows and never looked back.  I read "The Great Warbow" by Matthew Strickland & Robert Hardy many years ago and knew I'd never be able to pull a Yew Warbow back, so I started making my own Longbows (Board-Bows) from Hickory, Maple, Birch, Ash, and even started to laminate some of those woods together for greater strength and durability. Once I started building them it was like eating cashews, I just couldn't stop. Got to the point where I even made my own birch target arrows and set up a 25 yard Archery Range in my side yard.

All in all, I've really enjoyed my journey backwards in Archery, and I doubt I'll ever shoot anything other then  wood bows the rest of my life. I find them way more interesting and enjoyable. And it goes hand in hand with traditional muzzleloading IMHO.  :bl th up

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