data on the Mary Rose bows/arrows

[Hillbilly]

Yes, this is getting quite silly. Seems like the forum says "English Warbow Forum" at the top, not "Immature Arguing and Name-Calling Area."

[Ian B]

hope this helps 


Well it seems that the arrows were of a length between 61cm and 81cm (24.02 inch to 31.89 inch long) and a thickness of about 27/64 up-to 1/2 inch


The bows were of length 187cm up-to 211cm ( 6.1352 feet or 73.6224 inches up-to 6.9226 feet or 83.0712 )

All this came from the Mary Rose Website. see here http://www.maryrose.org/ship/bows1.htm


This may also be of help  http://www.primitivearcher.com/smf/index.php/topic,10071.0.html.



As far as i know Chris Boyton was part of the the team that where the first to have a look and measure the bows and arrows.

Regards Ian

[Marc St Louis]

To say that I am a bit angry with what has been happening here is an understatement.  If this type of conduct were to be happening on your "englishwarbow" forum you guys would not be happy and people would get banned.  Some very unpleasant things were posted here that could be read by the general public and that is just unacceptable.  I have banned one guy, a ban that will last 30 days, and I may ban some more.

[Phil Rees]

I came across this small artical
   "Mary Rose" A Second Report: W.F.Paterson. Journal of the Society of Archer Antiquaries pp 4-6 Vol 24 1981
Hope it may be of some interest

[denny]

I really Have enjoyed the chat on meadevil bows. I resently produced 15 bows for the SCA function in Pennsylvania next week. These people take their sport pretty serious, however I don't think they can quite grasp the intensity or seriousness of this time. Like us we can only speculate, based on what we read or have heard. I just recently built a 80+lb 72" Hickory longbow which my 16 yearold can draw easily at 30 inches . It buries a 32 inch shaft to the fletching in a round target bale replica of that time. Now I am sure some of you know probably more history then I, but I have shot my bows Thru a chonograph and it isn't unusual to get 150 to 180fps with 60lb at 28inches . So why would it be so hard to believe some of the facts presented. I am 60 yearsold and have shot bows as long as I can remember, once shot a 75# bow 210 paces from my shop to the woods which we stepped off . The arrows went beyond into the woods never did find. Deer probably ate it.. Anyway, I did read and my memory does slip once and a while , that a yeoman skeleton could be idenified by the enlarge scapula or shoulder blade, undoubtablely from shooting so much. And I do belief from what I have read the men of that time where some what taller. Maybe some of our englihmen can verify that. None the less thats my too sense. Lets play nice and not fight over toys boys. denny

[ratty]

Ratty; The quote tells me that the book is addressed to gentlemen and yeomen. Gentlemen were the nobles, not gentle by the modern definition. They owed their position to their immediate readiness to fight for their king with the weapons and armour appropriate to their position. Yeomen, the higher class of peasants who owned their own land, were renowned as the finest warbow archers in existence. But you knew that, cidn't you ?  If very few ot the population could have used warbows, maybe you can tell me how the crown found ten archers for every man-at-arms at the end of the Hundred Years War ?

Triton; Since you don't consider the book worth anything because it is ignored, you might as well ignore it. Great reasoning !  Good luck making up history while ignoring it. That is a challenge. Perhaps you will come up with something so much better than your historical heritage.

                                                        Cheers,
                                                          Erik

i found this quote quite interesting

Toxophilus

The First Book of The School of Shooting.

Part 8 of 8

Philologe, the lack of teaching to shoot in England causeth very many men to play with the King's acts; as a man did once, either with the Mayor of London or York, I cannot tell whether, which did command by proclamation, every man in the city to hang a lantern, with a candle, afore his door; which thing the man did, but he did not light it: and so many buy bows, because of the act,[22] but yet they shoot not

what do you think?

[Kviljo]

Hehe, that's cool.

Sort of the same thing as we had here in Norway, where the law said you had to have such and such weapons. Most chose to have an axe, because an axe is more useful than a other weapons. Guess warbow-shooting wasn't as popular a hobby back then as it is today

[Oggie]

When people talk of the Bows and equipment found on the MR, I often hear said,sentences which give this impression... "The Mary Rose was Henrys Flagship so it must have had the best and strongest Archers with no expense spared on equipment"..
 However, I believe that the MR was not the Flagship of the fleet but just one of three refitted ships with the Flagship being the much larger Henry Grace á dieu known as the Great Harry. Therefore the MR Archers may be just ordinary levied soldiers armed with "ordinary" 90-190# Bows and "ordinary" arrows and equipment!
   Wonder what the Archers and the Bows on the Great Harry were like!!
Mark.

[bow-toxo]

i found this quote quite interesting

Toxophilus

The First Book of The School of Shooting.

Part 8 of 8

Philologe, the lack of teaching to shoot in England causeth very many men to play with the King's acts; as a man did once, either with the Mayor of London or York, I cannot tell whether, which did command by proclamation, every man in the city to hang a lantern, with a candle, afore his door; which thing the man did, but he did not light it: and so many buy bows, because of the act,[22] but yet they shoot not

what do you think?

 I think that English kings constantly tried to get their archers to improve and tried to block distractions such as football, tennis, and gambling games that they never managed to legislate out of existence in England. As we know, the English archers were very effective in the Hundred Years War and the Wars of the Roses. Henry VIII issued more legislation than any previous king, partly because archery was becoming less effective. By Aschan's time it was getting harder to maintain public interest and at Flodden the archery was not considered to have had much to do with the outcome of the battle even though there were archers who still shot strongly.

[Rod]

Any competent archer who reads Ascham will recognise that the man knows what he is writing about.
What he says rings true in many details regarding practice and attitudes.

What draw-weights he used is a matter of speculation, but I think it likely that in those days it would be usual to shoot more than what might be considered ordinary these days.

But a discussion of Ascham is perhaps a little off topic here.

Rod.

[Rod]

Making all the arrows, bullets, rifles, bows, kit, etc. the same for everyone makes practical sense. Therefore, all arrows can be shot by all bowmen.

Except that bows and archers are not standardised to the same degree as rifles and cartridges, and this can affect where the arrow goes.
It might not be too significant if just shooting barrage fire to a distance, but when an individual has to be laterally accurate such standardisation could be a significant disadvantage.

I would not be surpised to learn that skilled marksmen selected and set aside shafts from the general stock, which even if dimensionally standardised, would contain a range of variation in shaft performance.

Rod.

[jb.68]

When people talk of the Bows and equipment found on the MR, I often hear said,sentences which give this impression... "The Mary Rose was Henrys Flagship so it must have had the best and strongest Archers with no expense spared on equipment"..
 However, I believe that the MR was not the Flagship of the fleet but just one of three refitted ships with the Flagship being the much larger Henry Grace á dieu known as the Great Harry.

I know this is going a bit off topic, but there is reference to both as being Henry's flagship. It seems that in 1512, the "Mary Rose" was the flagship, but by time of her sinking she had been replaced by the "Great Harry." Though the "Mary Rose" remained Henry's favourite ship.
The Henry Grace á dieu was a much bigger ship and was also the vessel used to take Henry to France to meet Francis I on the occasion of the "Field of the Cloth of Gold."
She caught fire at Woolwich and was destroyed (1553)

An earlier incarnation of the Henry Grace á dieu was Henry V's flagship and she was also quite a large ship for the time (over 200'). She only sailed on one voyage (as the role she was built for no longer existed). She was then laid up on the River Hamble where she was later struck by lightning, caught fire and burnt down to the water line (1439)

jb

[Rod]

I just recently built a 80+lb 72" Hickory longbow which my 16 yearold can draw easily at 30 inches . It buries a 32 inch shaft to the fletching in a round target bale replica of that time.

"A round target bale replica of that time"?

You might get such a shaft up to it's fletches in a straw bale, but a properly made boss of tightly coiled straw would stop such a shaft very well indeed until the centre has been softened by continual use.
Then and only then will you get a pass through.
These things when new (I own ten of them) are not so easy to shoot through.

Rod.