<B>I have several problems on the arrows can not penetrate chain and plate argument.
1)Rorik you preformed your test with my guess is 14 or 16 gauge rings and a modern 60-pound bow with my guess is pine, or balsa wood shafts. Those woods are soft. The problem is longbows were 150 pounds, and arrows made of hard wood such as oak. The other problem is we make our armor of thicker steel to withstand the hits from rattan. Medieval armor was thinner than SCA standard from all I’ve read.</B></font><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
First, during the age of *mail* (not chain) the longbow wasn't in use yet, and those bows were considerably lighter. The use of the longbow didn't become widespread until the age of the transition when plate started to get added, so Rorick's test seems perfectly valid for that period.
Second, longbows were more like 80-120# according to the most recent research I've read, not 150#.
Third, *some* medieval armor was thinner, but not all. Breastplates, for example, were often heavier than 14 guage, and, in the 15th century, were often reinforced with a plastron over *that*! Yes, limb armor was much thinner than SCA limb armor, but it was also narrower and much more heavily curved than a breastplate, making for a better glancing surface. So when someone makes a 18 guage breastplate ('cause everyone *knows* how thin medieval armor was, right??) and shoots an arrow at it, they're making two flaws: First, the guage is so thin and the striking surface so wide that the arrow has a much better chance of penetrating than it would in real life. And, of course, all of this ignores the fact that a lot of better armor was hardened; they even tested some of it to make sure it was invulnerable: This is called plate of proof.
<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">2)The argument that arrows only have force at close range is flawed. That is true if I fire straight across a field, but when they are fired up, lobed at the enemy, the arrows gain velocity when the fall. There energy measured in joules increases not decreases. </font>
Sorry, but this proves that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. On another list we discussed this, and a physicist on the list proved that the amount of force so added is negligable compared with the impetus of the bow itself. So the force is *hugely* greater right out of the bow, so to speak, and drops off rapidly after that.
Here's another thing: I was at Mac's shop one day for a fitting, and I was playing around with a war hammer he had made. We started discussing its effects, and decided to test it.
Mac set up a piece of curved 16 gauge steel (mild, not hardened; he wasn't doing that yet), and I swung as hard as I possibly could straight into the metal with the bec de faucon; the very sharp spike end of the hammer. Now, I can hit hard. Really hard, believe me. You know what? That vicious little spike only entered the steel about an inch. That's all. The force of my blow was probably many, many times what a longbow could put out at any realistic range, yet I didn't even sink that point in far enough to actually wound the wearer (remember that a properly-fit breastplate sits away from the wearer's body by quite a bit).
I know someone on here posted about an arrow going through a breastplate, but that must either have been a weak spot, or a gap between the breastplate and the fauld, or have been shot from a powerful crossbow at short range. I also think the source was Froissart, and while I love him dearly, he mostly reported hearsay... and you know how soldiers love to exaggerate! There are a *wealth* of just out and out *inaccuracies* in Froissart.
Heck, even padded jacks seem to have been sufficient to stop arrows. This is an exerpt from the ordinances of Louis XI of France. They're talking about how jacks should be made (25-30 folds of cloth and a stag's skin), and at the end it says:
"...for never have been seen half a dozen men killed by stabs or arrow wounds in such jacks, particularly if they be troops accustomed to fighting."
Enough said.
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Hugh Knight
"Welcome to the Church of the Open Field, let us 'prey': Hunt hard, kill swiftly, waste nothing, make no apologies"
People are portraying different eras in the SCA. I am playing a Landsknecht in the 1540s and the longbow was not really in use then, but heavy crossbows and arcubuses were. If I am on a SCA field with Vikings how do the arrows affect them and me? We both would have open face helms, so if hit in the grill we die, but if it hits my breastplate do I consider it a longbow of 150 pounds or a bow of 60? If the battle is a 600 AD battle then am I wearing plate? See what I mean? We are all talking about different eras and the longbows effectiveness of our time, but how does that apply to personas of a different era? That is what I mean about an agreed on era.
