Longbow VS plate.

[KatherineJohnson]

Ahoy guys,

I'm having a discussion on another forum about plate armor and the likelyhood that it would be penetrated by arrows.

Personally, I'm not buying it but I'm starting to get into an area that I know little about so I wanted to see what you guys had to say on the subject since it's out of my admittedly limited knowledge pool <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />


Applogies in advance if this topic is done to death.

On Edit: Also, what would be an appropriette range of thickness for 15th/16th century plate? Most specifically the breastplate.

[Casper Bradak]

I have a video of some royal armouries experiments w/longbow vs plate from way back. It had little effect, but results seem to vary.
18 to 16 guage to generalize for field plate, if not bullet proofed.

[David Mastro]

Katherine,

There's at least one period account of Agincourt, which mentions plate being penetrated.

In addition, Sir John Smythe, in his Certain Discourses Military of 1590, noted that the maille panels of an arming doublet could be pierced (he mentions a specific plate-armored French knight who was killed because of this).

Generally speaking, the very best plate armor of the 1400s and 1500s was proof against archery of any kind (witness the longbow's comparative ineffectiveness against the Scottish nobility at Flodden), but not everyone had the very best plate. In addition, soldiers remained vulnerable in the face (even as late as 1571, Agostino Barbarigo, who commanded the Christian left wing at Lepanto, was killed by a Turkish arrow, when he raised his visor to shout orders). Horses were also vulnerable, which explained why knights on the Continent sometimes adopted the tactic of fighting "in the English manner" (i.e., on foot). Add to that the slow ROF (rate-of-fire) of early matchlock firearms, and the fact that not everyone had the very best plate armor to begin with, and its easy to see why archery remained viable right through the 16th century.

The biggest single factor that contributed to the abandonment of archery (in cultures where archery was a dominant form of warfare, as with the English and Turks) was the fact that it was not nearly as cost-effective as gunnery. As Professor John F. Guilmartin noted, it took a lifetime to make a competent archer, and the loss of a corps of archers could take literally years to replace, if it could be replaced at all (and this is exactly what happened to the Turks at Lepanto--their corps of naval archers was eradicated). In addition, as mentioned above, arrows could not pierce the best plate armor, but guns most certainly could. No armor was proof against the heavy Hispano-Italian musket, which fired a 2-ounce lead ball at about 1,000 feet per second.

Peace,

David

[J.Amiel_Angeles]

John Keegan's seminal "Face of Battle" and recent research by the so-called battlefield detectives (if you take their work as scholarly, which I do) suggest that at the battle of Agincourt, the arrows did far less killing than previously thought. At long ranges, the longbow would have been pretty useless against a good suit of full plate armour, although given the sheer numbers of arrows the English shot, a few were bound to do damage (for reasons stated above). At closer ranges, a few bodkin arrows may have punched through, but the battlefield detectives found that the iron-headed bodkin arrows were no match for good armour steel. For the most part, though, the longbows in Agincourt seemed to act more as suppresive fire, like an artillery barrage, and forced the French to bunch together out of instinct.

[Casper Bradak]

I think it stands to reason, that for every arrow that pierced someone's armour, there were hundreds that struck armour to no appreciable effect. Arrows will mainly inflict casualties on lesser protected individuals and horses, which constituted the majority of any army.

[Brian Hunt]

The other thing to remember about historic armour was that it varied in thickess throughout the piece. 18 - 16 gage would be fairly close to the thickness of a historicall piece, but it may be 18 gage towards the sides and may even be as thick as 14 gage in the middle where it is most likely to be struck. Today's reproduction armour is made from rolled plate, frequently worked cold to one basic thickness and that is that. If you look at historic pictures showing armour smiths at work, they are using a forge and they are able to adjust the thickness of the piece with skilled hammer work. Most modern day armour smiths do not have this type of skill, there are a few that far exceed the norm, and you will pay for their skills with your check book. <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

As for arrows and plate, at close range with a good bodkin type point, maybe. keep in mind that people in battle are in motion, and that helps increase the ability of the glancing surfaces built into a good suit of armour. No one in battle stands still and takes a blow as if they are rooted to the ground like a wall or a fence post.

just some thoughts on this.

Brian Hunt
GFS.

[Casper Bradak]

Absolutely. It makes repro armour about as accurate as repro swords.
To elaborate on that video I mentioned above, they got the thickness of various breastplates from the tower of london with an ultrasound measuring device, showing the varying thicknesses.
They then used a longbow on steel plating of the same thicknesses, using both bodkins and broadhead replicas, from varying ranges. The broadheads put small notches in the plate, and the bodkins put shallow holes in it, but it was all negligable, with a few bodkin hits that may have potentially drawn a little blood.
But here's the thing: they were shooting at a flat plate at 90 degrees. They then turned the plating to 45 degrees or so, a more realistic impact angle. Not a single arrow bit. They all deflected.

[JeffGentry]

Hey Folk's

I think this is a subject i know a little about, i used to shoot alot of bow and am fairly knowledgeable on gun and how projectile weapon's in general act.

they were shooting at a flat plate at 90 degrees. They then turned the plating to 45 degrees or so, a more realistic impact angle

that is a big thing with an arrow on a smooth surface it has to hit somewhere around 0% oblique or it is not likely to bite it is the same as a bullet on smooth surface the angle will cause it to ricochet.

The bow itself is a device to store energy and it is a transmitter to the arrow, so the range will also have something to do with the ability to penetrate armour, the more stored energy you can build in the limb's of the bow the better, that is why the longbow was so effective with the length of the limb's and the yew wood,with the heavy draw weight they were capable of storing alot of energy at full draw, so the larger the amount of stored energy(kinetic energy) the further the projectile will go inversly though the further it goes the less kinetic energy it wil have, so you have to determine what is important range or power(kinetic energy), there is acheological evidence that the archer's of the day had a large "node" type protrusion on the shoulder used to draw there bow's, from the year's of practice with the heavy draw weight of the longbow, when the crossbow came into use it was some what smaller and easier to learn to use and the mechanical advantage could give them even more draw weight so the effective range and power(kinetic energy) were now increased, they were slower than a longbow because in the beginning they had to set them on the ground and rig a cocking device to cock them inversly almost anyone could learn to shoot a crossbow as is the case of the gun.

That is my long winded way of saying that from the emperical avidence i have seen and my knowledge of bullistic's i don't think a bow could penetrate a good breastplate it would definately be effective on chainmail or other lite armour though.

Jeff

[David_Knight]

I admittedly know very little about archery, but I've often wondered if some longbow practice should augment our studies with melee weapons? I imagine that drawing the bow is an excellent form of resistance training.

Are there any primary sources for medieval archery aside from artwork?

[Ryan Ricks]

is there evidence of soldiers greasing up their armor to make it more slippery and thus facilitating the deflection of arrows, spears, lances, etc?

ryan

[Douglas S]

On the History channel or somesuch, there was a program about Agincourt, and the experts concluded that the arrowheads, since they were made to be thrown away, were made out of iron, while the French armor, since it was made for upper class knights, was likely to be good steel.
Very little was made of shooting the horses out from under them, by the way.

[David Mastro]

David,

I admittedly know very little about archery, but I've often wondered if some longbow practice should augment our studies with melee weapons? I imagine that drawing the bow is an excellent form of resistance training.

Archers were hardy folk. It should also be kept in mind that the English yeomen had their own martial arts besides longbow archery--they also used the bill, the quarterstaff, and the sword-and-buckler (the last one mentioned was a common sidearm combo for archers).

Are there any primary sources for medieval archery aside from artwork?

Yes, Roger Ascham's Toxophilus or the Schole or Partitions of Shooting partly in defense of archery against those who found the sport unbefitting a scholar, which was written in 1545.

Another thing that should be kept in mind is this--it is often said that if armor was useless, it wouldn't have been used, and I agree wholeheartedly. However, it is likewise logical to postulate that, had the longbow been ineffective, it would not have been used either.

Armor outlasted the longbow, but not by much.

Peace,

David

[Mike Habib]

"Very little was made of shooting the horses out from under them, by the way."

I would be very interested in looking up literature that talks about casulties amongst heavy calvary mounts from arrow fire. Intuitively, I should think that it would be very difficult to drop a horse at any significant range with a bow if it had barding and was coming head on or at a sharp angle of approach. I have noticed a tendency amongst modern secondary sources and tv programs to underestimate the effect of war mount body size.

A partially armored, 1,500 pound animal will probably not drop easily to arrows. Sadly, testing this is rather unethical, but if anyone has references I would much appreciate it.


Cheers,
--Mike Habib

[James_Knowles]

I know that this is a few hundred years beforehand, but one thing I found interesting in the Strategikon was the use of arrows shot as rapidly as possible at a high angle for supression rather than killing. To paraphrase the text, "accuracy is nice, but go for speed."

This was used primarily with large formations that consisted of mounted archers surrounded by mounted lancers with heavier armour. The idea was to harass the heck out of the enemy troops (and kill a few of them) before, during, and after direct contact by the "up front and personal" troops.

I've never been really clear on the use of bows in western Europe, but I get the impression that the harassment factor was not ignored.

Can anybody comment on this?

[James_Knowles]

An interesting episode of the European adaption of arms and armour to the prevaling conditions was with the early North American colonists.

I can't find the source for this off hand -- one of my books -- so I'm a bit fuzzy on the whys and wherefores.

By then the firearm had supplanted the bow, and the cuirasses had developed to deflect the lead balls. In one demonstration of this to the local Indians, they discovered that while proof against balls, the cuirasses were not proof against the native arrows. I can't remember the reason for this off the top of my head, but it had to do with forging tailored for deflecting soft lead balls moving very fast; left it sufficiently brittle IIRC.

In the later battles with the Indians the colonists fell back to using jack and brigadine, which was better against the arrows. In the account one fellow was described as looking like a porcupine. <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

In war, use what works.