Steven Till has a nice article about the history of Anglo-Saxon and Viking archery. I attempted to comment on it at his blog, but was caught in an anti-spam filter . . . seems that my school is a reputed source of spam in the world – hmmm. Anyway, the gist of his article was that the Anglo-Saxons and the Vikings both used the bow mostly for hunting; its effectiveness in combat was minimized by the armor of their opponents. It wasn’t until the English longbow that Europeans began using the bow in combat with any degree of success. My comment to Steven was going to mostly be about the parallel development of the bow and its use in combat. For example, during the same era, the Mongolians and their use of the horsebow is well documented, as is the use of the horsebow by the Parthians throughout modern day Iran and Afghanistan. The Japanese also had some military successes with the Yumi until the arrival of the musket, which ended the use of the bow as a viable military weapon.
I enjoyed his article very much and would encourage other intersted readers to see what he has to say. Steven made a comment about the longbow being in a completely seperate discussion . . . so . . . Mr. Till? Is another article coming?
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