In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew.
Pas-de-Calais is particularly beautiful this time of year, especially Azincourt. Grandpa Henry vacationed their once, but that was many, many, years ago.
One of the best videos I've ever watched. I'm 73 been working wood all my life, as my father before me did. Was "into" archery fifty years ago as a teenager. What I like and appreciate is the soft background music, great camera work, and NO endless chatter like so many woodworkers do in their videos; j Just the wonderful sounds of a true craftsman at work. Thanks a million, I'm a new subscriber as a result of stumbling on this video. PS: your canine friend is a nice touch too.
Richtig der englische Langbogen hatte ein hohes Zuggewicht ! beim Herstellen war viel Erfahrung erforderlich, besonders Verhältniss Splint zu Kernholz + Wuchs der Eibe. Nun zur Eibe, in England war die Eibe sehr verbreitet, unter Heinrich IV wurden ganze Wälder angeplanzt ! Heute noch gibt es in GB große Bestände an Eiben, teils sehr geradwüchsig und perfekt für Bögen ! In Mittel und besonders in Südeuropa war Eibe nicht so sehr verbreitet. GB hatte einfach mehr Eibe und das bessere Material ! Ausserdem durch die Ausbildung - Tradition und Handwerkskunst waren die Engländer im Vorteil. Bobenbau ist ein sehr Spannendes Thema.. Besonders in Asien - Japan gab und gibt es sehr unterschiedliche Bögen. Langbögen im Verbund - Japan, Mongolische Reiterbögen oft im Verbund als Kurzbogen ausserdem hatten Mogolen Umhänge die im Wind flatterten - mit die beste Pfelabwehr vor verfolgern. Best Regarts E. Hook
My favourite and most relatable bit of this is 07:30 when we inevitably end up in the kitchen doing something we'll inevitably get in trouble for later... 😀
Hello, I'm Jordan. One of Robert's students from Lake Bolac and I wanted to say, this is amazing! Seeing my favourite teacher in a video is absolutely flabbergasting, even one of my classmates were astonished from this. I was actually the first to see this by the way in my school. Again, I, along with the other classmates were flabbergasted and amazed 👏. I also like to thank the people behind the scenes who're shooting an incredible video, our teacher is absolutely inspiring.
I've recently finished reading Bernard Cornwell's books in his Grail Series, and the longbow is a key player in these stories. Great to watch one being made.
If YT would have been a thing with this video in HS when my buddies and I read Cornwell, we'd have all absolutely ended up trying to make our own in an attempt to seduce the Blackbird.
Wow - now i have an idea of how my bow was made. i don't know where i got it, but it's about 6', has a D cross-section without those horn points (just notches), no arrow-rest, just slightly thickened in the centre. it doesn't have a heavy pull - maybe 30lb at 1 yard (the full length of the arrow) - but plenty for me (i'm 5'2"). i've only done target with my local SCA Barony with it, but i've developed a weird way of using it: it's tilted about 30-45° to the right, so the arrow can rest on the bow next to my hand, since it doesn't have a spot that will hold it. Hey, it works! Love the craft-ship and craeft-ship of this. Beautiful!
Canting the bow over a bit is normal... there is no reason to hold a bow vertical unless it has sights fitted (spits on floor) or you are in a tight line of archers so close there is no room to cant the bow!
Absolutely amazing. You're ability to see quality timber, the ability to turn that timber into a piece of art and simply knowing how to work with your hands leads me to believe you're a master craftsman. Not a claim that can be made by many these days. Well done, I wish I had half your skills and ability. Great video as well, thank you for sharing.
I have a seven foot piece of Osage Orange, that has been aging in my garage for twenty years. I cut it from a thicket where it had been forced to grow tall and straight in low light, with slow growth producing fine grain. I always intended to use it for at least one bow, but I have grown old and have too much arthritis to do the work, not to mention shooting a strong bow. I wish I knew a bowmaker to give it to. Michigan, USA, near Detroit.
Good morning Mr. Burnett. I would LOVE to have that piece! I'm willing to pay the shipping cost, and give you something as a handling fee! Let me know if you're interested. Thanks, Nate. 😃
@@Master...deBater Burnett here. I don't have a social media account. Your message about wanting my Osage post came to my email box. When I tried to send you a reply, it ,did not go through. We need a way to communicate better.
Hats off to the bowyer for patiently explaining to many commentators the reason why three different wood types can be seen in this video. If people bothered to read through the comments before adding their own then there would be a lot less duplication.
Y si se explicara,nadie tendría que preguntar,genio.😊En el video,Por ejemplo,o en Subtitulos,o voz en off....ir de listos no le gusta a nadie,así no harás amigos😂
My parents have a lot of ironwood trees on their property and my dad and I have been keeping a few growing strong and straight for maybe 20 years so we can cut them and make bows
I thought a traditional English longbow had to be made from a specific section of the Yew tree with a mix of Heartwood and a springier outer section for compression and stretch as I wanted to make one in Woodwork class back in the 70's but the Teacher was not about to provide a suitable Yew section so I was given a scrap length of Plywood School desk which did not survive one pull!
and a draw of 110 lbs. takes a lot of upper body strength. this bow maybe 60 lbs draw i imagine. not a war bow to fight the French at 300 meters. maybe good for deer at close range.
To answer your question Alan, yes yew long bows are made from a combination of sap wood and heart wood. But that’s kind of over simplifying a bit. You frequently have to adjust how much of each your stave has. Depending on where the yew has grown it can have a rather wide layer of sap wood that needs to be thinned out. Sap wood is nice and elastic but is also doesn’t store much energy. Heart wood stores lots of energy and compresses very well, but is brittle and will break. So as the bowyer is shaving down the bow stave he must must make decisions on how much of each he needs to leave and how much he needs to pair away. To much sap wood = too weak and will perform poorly. To much heart wood = to brittle and will crack and break. This is where the bowyers skill and experience comes to play. IMHO the bow in this video has too much sap wood and it’s cast (how it launches arrows) is dull and sluggish. Perhaps the bowyer in this video did this to ensure he had a functional bow that didn’t break by the end of the video? I suspect this is the case. But leaving that much sap wood will result in less than impressive performance from your bow. Again, this is not a criticism of the bowyer. Yew is a difficult material to work with and he may have had ample reason to lean on the side of caution. The point of the video is to end up with a functional and aesthetically pleasing bow, not necessarily a good performing one. In this the bowyer was entirely successful.
@@panzerlieb Given how devastating a weapon it was l have always wondered why it was not copied by the French but perhaps something so seemingly simple is actually very difficult to get right
@@jontalbot1 The English war bow was a very heavy draw weight and took years to build up to not just pulling it back but also controlling it. This kind of thing really didn’t suit feudal French society. Could be because French peasants (where the bulk of archers would be recruited) could and did move around the country quite a bit. In England the peasants/surfs didn’t have that option available to them. So it wasn’t that the French couldn’t adopt the long bow or even the crossbow ( most of France’s crossbow men came from Genoa) it’s that the mechanics of French society at the time made it impossible to achieve such a goal even if they tried to implement the same kind of system the English did. If you look at many of the archer centric societies you would see that archer training was started at a young age and built up into adulthood. This is true of English as well as the Mongols and Scythians. It also be seen that by promoting a system like this gives a nation’s army a ready made cadre of trained recruits to join the army as soon as they reach adulthood. But again, some societies can support such a thing, some cannot.
@@panzerlieb They could tell who were archers on the Mary Rose cos of the changes pulling a heavy bow makes on the body. It might the reasons you suggest but that is a pretty fancy ( and speculative) construction. Might be they tried with poor results, could be they never even tried.
Wonderful ❤ all my life i've been waiting to see all parts of the art of making longbow. My father build me my first bow when I was 6yo and that how it started :) grandfather was a woodworker so wood is the material that man can fall in love with 😂 i have been waiting very long and now Im happy. Best regards from Poland 🙌
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
Yorkshireman here. Thank you for making this video. Our histories tell us that the bow is made to the height fof the man for the purpose of being able to step inside the bow to cock it. The action of cocking the bow after stepping into it is to to place the string across the shoulder and push the bow forward with both hands while at the same time holding an arrow. When the bow it stretched to the length of the arms the left arm is locked at the elbow preventing the bow releasing. With the free hand place the arrow and hold it in place with the fingers on the stock and hold the string on each side of the flght with other hand. Thus the arrow is now holding the stretched bow. Step out of the bow carefully and the arrow can be shot at the target. This needs practice. A strong man can cock a bow to fire an arrow hundreds of metres. This is a deadly weapon and is propbably better than any othe type of bow because in the hands of a strong professional bowman it can deliver arrows at a fast rate.
I'd likely end up shooting myself and not the arrow. NB, I've NEVER heard of this before, let alone seen it being done, but then I've only been shooting since 1959. I'm still trying to figure it out, TBH.
It is mentioned in Trevelyan's English Social History. Master of Trinity College Cambridge if you want a reference, but making the bow to the height of the man is common folk wisdom. When you see the size and weight of arrows and arrow heads of the middle ages on display at York it is easy to understand the power needed to fire such and the long bow as I described it is the only way to effectively launch a long heavy arrow.@@tacfoley4443
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
Always good to see a bowyer at work. Good vid. Clean the face of the dial, I couldn't see what the draw was. The traditional English Superglue was a nice touch!
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
@@pedroclaro7822that was the apparatus that had the ropes that he was using to test bend the bow to see if the two leaves were bending equally. The process is called tillering.
Yup. Absolutely agree. This is one of the best tillering tree/stick/devices I've seen. I have an incredibly limited work space. This design solves all my problems. I can move it around and work anywhere I need. I changed it up in that I used a wider board and added holes that I could place a dowel in in case I ever needed to "lock" the bow at a certain draw.
I assume hide glue was used in medieval times for attaching the horns? Superb video. Useful to know that the wood had to be aged/dried for 3 years. I wondered about that after seeing Robert record the date on a new piece of wood. I also wondered what tools were used all those years ago when pull-gauges, metal rasps etc. weren't around. (I assume that's what the markings were for on the post.) Thanks for a very entertaining, informative and thought-provoking film . . . . AND not a trace of dreadful A.I. narration!!!! Hurrah! 10/10
Metal rasps date back 3,000 years or more, and drawknives / spokeshaves at least 1,000 years. Pull gauges certainly would not have existed in medieval England, but the draw weight could easily be checked by hanging known weights on the bowstring when set up on the tiller.
Didn't know that about metal rasps being so old (historically speaking), but obvious when it comes to known weights . . . just that it never occurred to me. Thanks for the information.@@jackx4311
up near the treeline on the west coast (UsA and Canada) the loggers push all the slash into large piles . We'd go up to pull out the yew wood (and some interesting other woods) and cut cants and send them to Herters' Outfitters for wood crossbows . You needed a magnifying glass to count the growth rings. Now the bark is medicinal, but back in the 80's the logging would simply burn the slash piles. as required for fire reasons. It would cost more to pull the wood down to the highway.
English yew was not considered the best for longbows, back in the day, as our climate is too moist, so the annual rings are quite thick. The finest was imported from Italy, where the much drier climate made for much narrower tree rings - as you describe on timbers cut from up near the treeline. That very dense grain gave Italian yew the best combination of strength and toughness - especially for warbows, which usually had a draw weight (when drawn right to the ear) of about 140 lbs.
@@jackx4311 thanks; I took Archery in college from a US Olympic coach. I couldn't imagine even as a farm boy pulling 140 lbs.!!! i.e. when I went to LA I did 79 pullups and the next closest student did 25, then 14, as I had been pulling hay in all summer by hand!! (grade 8)
Lovely. Though it didn't seem clear for those not acquainted with the process, which side of the biow is heart wood, and which is newer growth as this helps give it the killer spring.
This is lovely, and I prefer the one on Japanese long bow construction - not because either is better, but because I like to know the wood chosen, and all of the other details that you put in the other post - this may be older, I don't know.
Do you not come to Sweden and shop down our yews, haha. I know where they grow :) Jokes aside, this bow does not work well in the extreme cold. For that, the Ash flat-bow works better, for it does not break in cold as easily. Also the Composite bow made out of horn, wood, sinew and glue, would not work, for the rain would delaminate the bow badly. The flat bow from the stone-age made out of Ash or better Scots Elm, would do the thing, certainly well if impreganted in blood, animal fat or flax-oil. Of cource your bow is beatiful, I just wanted to tell some history. Of cource with a friendly eye :)
Thank You for that... I'm from British Columbia I agree that Mountain ash cured with a decent animal fat is the way to go Deer is plentiful from hunters. I'm thinking of some fish oil next season after I do some testing on local wood. I test with freshly cut sticks and immerse them in an oil /alcohol mix looking for the max intake they can support.
When loosing the arrow, don't drop your right hand forward as the arrow looses momentum and accuracy as you never drop the hand in the same way every time. It should still be pulling towards the back of your neck, only the fingers need to loose up.
Dad earmarked those trees because i kept trying to make poor quality laminated recurve bows when i was in high school using his workbench supplies. In my defense, i got a 120 yard shot off a bow i made when i was 14 that was surprisingly accurate with no training or instruction
Traditional English Longbows were made from the wood of the yew tree Taxus Baccata which does not grow in Australia. Yes you made a bow but only in the style of a Traditional English longbow but nothing like the real thing. Have a look at some of the bow staves recovered from the Mary Rose and you will see the difference.
Yew trees grow in NZ. Introduced by migrants over a century ago. Occasionally a sharemilker who doesn't know what they are loses cattle when they eat the leaves. Don't see why they aren't in Oz.
What ppl don't realise is, a longbow is the easiesr bow to make, given limited resources it was the weapon of peasant hunters, welsh geurillas, and was general issue in the army for just that reason. No bending, no laminating, minimal tooling, no glue required. Compared to the contemporary recurve laminated bows, it was almost as powerful, but slow and crudely made. And, yes, there was also the small bow, a similar single stick bow, for children, youth and women.
@@iufrfrhjgfv9189 true that. Balancing the arms by feel is tricky. Simple but subtle. Keeping in mind, a lot of them were mass produced as replacements. A yew bow might only last 3 to 12 months in regular military use. Not that a laminated recurve had an especially long life either; it's why being a bowyer could be a lifelong fulltime specialty profession. Bows were always wearing out or breaking. And that's nothing, imagine the losses in arrows. Hundreds of thousands.
@@iufrfrhjgfv9189he's not saying it's easy, he's explaining why it was common. The simplicity of making it was crucial in the mass produced to be efficacious for an army of Bowmen.
Further historical note, the string was not drawn back by the right arm (assuming one is right-handed), rather the string was held at one’s jaw line, and the bow was then pushed outward by the left arm to complete the draw.
@@uxb1112 You may be correct, I was mulling over how to describe the draw; my reference and a quick perusal of Wikipedia did not provide a detailed description of where the right hand was held. Notice that I said “jaw line”, may I ask what your reference is ( title, author)? Modern archery videos show the right hand holding on the jaw line; this may be because of all the sight devices that are now used.
simply for a question of postural structure, the traction at the ear keeps the skeleton in axis and the loading with the back and the shoulder blades help to draw very powerful bows, any historical book from Toxophilus to Saracen Archery talks about this method. traction on the lip or jaw is relatively modern and also very wrong
I think what also needs taken into consideration is how the archer is shooting. Are they drawing for a long distance volley shot? Ear. Are they picking their targets in a close range defense or hunting? Then I'd say jaw.
@@SB-yn7mj the shooting style is partly given by what you have to do and partly by the bow you are using, if you make a placed shot you have all the time to position your structure, I would not use a longbow in hunting just as I would not use it from horseback , I draw by ear even when I do horseback archery except if I have a bow that doesn't allow me to draw beyond a certain draw length. the important thing is to respect the anatomy of the body and its mechanics
what sort of timber did you cut down? was it Aussie wood or some kind of introduced, feral wood? Just found your answer which you need to edit into your introduction please. There's going to be a lot of people asking this question over time: To fit the filming of examples of stages in the whole process into the one day: started with cutting oak; moved on to roughing out elm; finished tillering on a piece of yew.
Beaty as an example for a long bow- I have been working on an old yew stave and turning it into a bow. Appears that there are cracks showing on the back opposite the handle. Guess I can only make the bow more uniform and thinner and hope for the best. I think Osage orange works better if you're going for a flat bow. 😂
I see you cutting down the oak 'saplings'. But you're in Oz presumably? So do oaks grow out there like weeds??? How about the yew? Or are they from imported timber (the elm is imported, right)???
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
Nice work on your yew longbow ❤
Nice, but none of the 3 pieces cut looked like yew to me, I fact the first one had oak leaves on it....
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew.
@@robertgeddes5417 thanks for the response, I thought my eyes were playing tricks!
@@robertgeddes5417thank you for clarifying that Robert 🤝🏼
@@robertgeddes5417 What is the width to depth ratio of the limbs?
This is how I prepare for my holidays to France as well!
Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelt of elderberries!
beautiful
Ha!
😂
Pas-de-Calais is particularly beautiful this time of year, especially Azincourt. Grandpa Henry vacationed their once, but that was many, many, years ago.
One of the best videos I've ever watched. I'm 73 been working wood all my life, as my father before me did. Was "into" archery fifty years ago as a teenager. What I like and appreciate is the soft background music, great camera work, and NO endless chatter like so many woodworkers do in their videos; j Just the wonderful sounds of a true craftsman at work. Thanks a million, I'm a new subscriber as a result of stumbling on this video. PS: your canine friend is a nice touch too.
You took the words out of my mouth!
Richtig der englische Langbogen hatte ein hohes Zuggewicht !
beim Herstellen war viel Erfahrung erforderlich, besonders Verhältniss Splint zu Kernholz + Wuchs der Eibe.
Nun zur Eibe, in England war die Eibe sehr verbreitet, unter Heinrich IV wurden ganze Wälder angeplanzt ! Heute noch gibt
es in GB große Bestände an Eiben, teils sehr geradwüchsig und perfekt für Bögen !
In Mittel und besonders in Südeuropa war Eibe nicht so sehr verbreitet. GB hatte einfach mehr Eibe und das bessere Material ! Ausserdem durch die Ausbildung - Tradition und Handwerkskunst waren die Engländer im Vorteil.
Bobenbau ist ein sehr Spannendes Thema.. Besonders in Asien - Japan gab und gibt es sehr unterschiedliche Bögen.
Langbögen im Verbund - Japan, Mongolische Reiterbögen oft im Verbund als Kurzbogen ausserdem hatten Mogolen
Umhänge die im Wind flatterten - mit die beste Pfelabwehr vor verfolgern.
Best Regarts E. Hook
Wow! It's truely an honor to watch a true master craftsman at work.
My favourite and most relatable bit of this is 07:30 when we inevitably end up in the kitchen doing something we'll inevitably get in trouble for later... 😀
Every DIY job no matter how big or small, ends up being finished in the kitchen😅
Hello, I'm Jordan. One of Robert's students from Lake Bolac and I wanted to say, this is amazing! Seeing my favourite teacher in a video is absolutely flabbergasting, even one of my classmates were astonished from this. I was actually the first to see this by the way in my school. Again, I, along with the other classmates were flabbergasted and amazed 👏. I also like to thank the people behind the scenes who're shooting an incredible video, our teacher is absolutely inspiring.
هل أنت من الأردن حقا؟🎉
Master Bowyer! I love watching craftsmen at work !
I've recently finished reading Bernard Cornwell's books in his Grail Series, and the longbow is a key player in these stories. Great to watch one being made.
now all we have to do is stand with our arms out until sunset, for the strength we'll need. Onward, the White Company!!
If YT would have been a thing with this video in HS when my buddies and I read Cornwell, we'd have all absolutely ended up trying to make our own in an attempt to seduce the Blackbird.
@@coryj597 🤣
Beauty , simplicity and wonderful craftsmanship.
Wow - now i have an idea of how my bow was made. i don't know where i got it, but it's about 6', has a D cross-section without those horn points (just notches), no arrow-rest, just slightly thickened in the centre. it doesn't have a heavy pull - maybe 30lb at 1 yard (the full length of the arrow) - but plenty for me (i'm 5'2"). i've only done target with my local SCA Barony with it, but i've developed a weird way of using it: it's tilted about 30-45° to the right, so the arrow can rest on the bow next to my hand, since it doesn't have a spot that will hold it. Hey, it works! Love the craft-ship and craeft-ship of this. Beautiful!
Canting the bow over a bit is normal... there is no reason to hold a bow vertical unless it has sights fitted (spits on floor) or you are in a tight line of archers so close there is no room to cant the bow!
Nice to see a bowyer's knot being used. I can make a good bow string but have trouble making it the right length. A bowyer's knot simplifies that.
Absolutely amazing. You're ability to see quality timber, the ability to turn that timber into a piece of art and simply knowing how to work with your hands leads me to believe you're a master craftsman. Not a claim that can be made by many these days. Well done, I wish I had half your skills and ability. Great video as well, thank you for sharing.
You just remove the parts that aren't a bow.
Nothing makes an Englishman more proud than a well made longbow.
You sir are not speaking the truth, it’s a good yard of ale!
Nice job! Also I'm happy the video isn't full of nonsense and just gets to the point. Brevity is the soul of wit as that guy once said.
I wish this was an hour long, could watch this all day.
One of the most high tech weapons of it's time. Very interesting to see the process!
true. It is basically a gun.
I have a seven foot piece of Osage Orange, that has been aging in my garage for twenty years. I cut it from a thicket where it had been forced to grow tall and straight in low light, with slow growth producing fine grain. I always intended to use it for at least one bow, but I have grown old and have too much arthritis to do the work, not to mention shooting a strong bow. I wish I knew a bowmaker to give it to. Michigan, USA, near Detroit.
Good morning Mr. Burnett. I would LOVE to have that piece! I'm willing to pay the shipping cost, and give you something as a handling fee! Let me know if you're interested. Thanks, Nate. 😃
@@Master...deBater Burnett here. I don't have a social media account. Your message about wanting my Osage post came to my email box. When I tried to send you a reply, it ,did not go through. We need a way to communicate better.
Hats off to the bowyer for patiently explaining to many commentators the reason why three different wood types can be seen in this video. If people bothered to read through the comments before adding their own then there would be a lot less duplication.
Y si se explicara,nadie tendría que preguntar,genio.😊En el video,Por ejemplo,o en Subtitulos,o voz en off....ir de listos no le gusta a nadie,así no harás amigos😂
Yeah that drying part can take a year or more or something. To get your staves dried.
Why didn't they explain it in the video itself
@@yann664 I thought it was oak, going by the leaf shape. Didn't look anything like a yew tree.
@@SurvivalAussie The final one was yew, as you can see the heartwood/sapwood line running down the middle.
Watching this has made me want to go back and read the Thomas of Hookton Grail quest by Bernard Cornell,thank you
Great book
My parents have a lot of ironwood trees on their property and my dad and I have been keeping a few growing strong and straight for maybe 20 years so we can cut them and make bows
Excellent. Imagine the maker of all the cutting tools back in the 1100's ??!
I thought a traditional English longbow had to be made from a specific section of the Yew tree with a mix of Heartwood and a springier outer section for compression and stretch as I wanted to make one in Woodwork class back in the 70's but the Teacher was not about to provide a suitable Yew section so I was given a scrap length of Plywood School desk which did not survive one pull!
and a draw of 110 lbs. takes a lot of upper body strength. this bow maybe 60 lbs draw i imagine. not a war bow to fight the French at 300 meters. maybe good for deer at close range.
To answer your question Alan, yes yew long bows are made from a combination of sap wood and heart wood. But that’s kind of over simplifying a bit.
You frequently have to adjust how much of each your stave has. Depending on where the yew has grown it can have a rather wide layer of sap wood that needs to be thinned out.
Sap wood is nice and elastic but is also doesn’t store much energy. Heart wood stores lots of energy and compresses very well, but is brittle and will break.
So as the bowyer is shaving down the bow stave he must must make decisions on how much of each he needs to leave and how much he needs to pair away. To much sap wood = too weak and will perform poorly. To much heart wood = to brittle and will crack and break.
This is where the bowyers skill and experience comes to play.
IMHO the bow in this video has too much sap wood and it’s cast (how it launches arrows) is dull and sluggish. Perhaps the bowyer in this video did this to ensure he had a functional bow that didn’t break by the end of the video? I suspect this is the case. But leaving that much sap wood will result in less than impressive performance from your bow.
Again, this is not a criticism of the bowyer. Yew is a difficult material to work with and he may have had ample reason to lean on the side of caution. The point of the video is to end up with a functional and aesthetically pleasing bow, not necessarily a good performing one. In this the bowyer was entirely successful.
@@panzerlieb Given how devastating a weapon it was l have always wondered why it was not copied by the French but perhaps something so seemingly simple is actually very difficult to get right
@@jontalbot1 The English war bow was a very heavy draw weight and took years to build up to not just pulling it back but also controlling it. This kind of thing really didn’t suit feudal French society. Could be because French peasants (where the bulk of archers would be recruited) could and did move around the country quite a bit. In England the peasants/surfs didn’t have that option available to them. So it wasn’t that the French couldn’t adopt the long bow or even the crossbow ( most of France’s crossbow men came from Genoa) it’s that the mechanics of French society at the time made it impossible to achieve such a goal even if they tried to implement the same kind of system the English did.
If you look at many of the archer centric societies you would see that archer training was started at a young age and built up into adulthood. This is true of English as well as the Mongols and Scythians. It also be seen that by promoting a system like this gives a nation’s army a ready made cadre of trained recruits to join the army as soon as they reach adulthood.
But again, some societies can support such a thing, some cannot.
@@panzerlieb They could tell who were archers on the Mary Rose cos of the changes pulling a heavy bow makes on the body. It might the reasons you suggest but that is a pretty fancy ( and speculative) construction. Might be they tried with poor results, could be they never even tried.
I really enjoyed watching this, thank you. It’s inspired me to have a go at making one myself 🏹
Go for it!
Really needed explanation on what was being done,no mention of the wood apart from in other peoples comment's.
Wonderful ❤ all my life i've been waiting to see all parts of the art of making longbow. My father build me my first bow when I was 6yo and that how it started :) grandfather was a woodworker so wood is the material that man can fall in love with 😂 i have been waiting very long and now Im happy. Best regards from Poland 🙌
What a great fascinating video....excellent work and craftsmanship!
Thank you very much!
Absolutely enjoyed watching every second of this, great skills beautiful bow, thankyou for the upload
Amazing video. Beautiful work! Love all the ASMR!
The finished bow is yew the footage of the cuttings are oak. Very nicely made as well.
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
Great video. I am in Brisbane area and wondering what woods you suggest that grow here in Eastern Australia.
Thank you again!
-Rob
I haven't watched a bow-making video since I watched the late great Chris Boyton. Such an amazing process from start to finish.
Wow, thank you!
Yorkshireman here. Thank you for making this video. Our histories tell us that the bow is made to the height fof the man for the purpose of being able to step inside the bow to cock it. The action of cocking the bow after stepping into it is to to place the string across the shoulder and push the bow forward with both hands while at the same time holding an arrow. When the bow it stretched to the length of the arms the left arm is locked at the elbow preventing the bow releasing. With the free hand place the arrow and hold it in place with the fingers on the stock and hold the string on each side of the flght with other hand. Thus the arrow is now holding the stretched bow. Step out of the bow carefully and the arrow can be shot at the target. This needs practice. A strong man can cock a bow to fire an arrow hundreds of metres. This is a deadly weapon and is propbably better than any othe type of bow because in the hands of a strong professional bowman it can deliver arrows at a fast rate.
I'd likely end up shooting myself and not the arrow. NB, I've NEVER heard of this before, let alone seen it being done, but then I've only been shooting since 1959. I'm still trying to figure it out, TBH.
It is mentioned in Trevelyan's English Social History. Master of Trinity College Cambridge if you want a reference, but making the bow to the height of the man is common folk wisdom. When you see the size and weight of arrows and arrow heads of the middle ages on display at York it is easy to understand the power needed to fire such and the long bow as I described it is the only way to effectively launch a long heavy arrow.@@tacfoley4443
bullshit. show me one video of this?
wonderful work, what wood is it made of?
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
That's some old school woodworking! Well done.
Always good to see a bowyer at work. Good vid.
Clean the face of the dial, I couldn't see what the draw was.
The traditional English Superglue was a nice touch!
Outstanding
Cuts an oak and finishes with yew... The is magic !
Nice work though.😊
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
ok, your idea of a tillering tree is pure genious. I'm sorry but I'm stealing that lol.
Tree? What
@@pedroclaro7822that was the apparatus that had the ropes that he was using to test bend the bow to see if the two leaves were bending equally.
The process is called tillering.
@@panzerlieb yo. I know the general gist of a bowyers task, tillering as well. I was just confused by the term tree next to tillering
@@panzerlieb I just didn’t know the tillering jig was called
Tree
Yup. Absolutely agree. This is one of the best tillering tree/stick/devices I've seen. I have an incredibly limited work space. This design solves all my problems. I can move it around and work anywhere I need. I changed it up in that I used a wider board and added holes that I could place a dowel in in case I ever needed to "lock" the bow at a certain draw.
This was a fun video. The process from selection of saplings to finished bow was fascinating to watch.
Enjoyed your craftsmanship. Very nice work.
Outstanding. Thank You. And the bird calls make me homesick too.
I loved the video, just wished there was explanation of what/why you were doing during the process..
Doesn't he just made it look to easy??
I very much enjoyed your video and I gave it a Thumbs Up
Awesome. Made it look so dang easy. Thanks for sharing
Thanks for watching! ❤️🙌🏼
нормальный пригодный к практическому применению лук так сделать не получится, только игрушка для детей
Incredible….a true Artisan at work 👏
Thank you! Cheers!
Those bows could pierce plate armour....won us battle of Agincourt..among other battles..nice too see how there made... thank you 😎👍from u.k
Beautiful bow
Thank you! Cheers!
I’d say that is a traditional Australian longbow. The video looks and sounds very much like it is filmed in Australia.
Mate! What a great job ❤ from Australia 🇦🇺
Hey, thanks!
"It would be even more amazing and captivating with your voice narrating in the video."
Love archery, bow crossbow n this post
Wow. Just amazing work. Thanks for sharing this with us!
Glad you enjoyed it!
This is amazing! Would you be interested in making 2500 of these plus arrows by next harvest?
I assume hide glue was used in medieval times for attaching the horns? Superb video. Useful to know that the wood had to be aged/dried for 3 years. I wondered about that after seeing Robert record the date on a new piece of wood. I also wondered what tools were used all those years ago when pull-gauges, metal rasps etc. weren't around. (I assume that's what the markings were for on the post.) Thanks for a very entertaining, informative and thought-provoking film . . . . AND not a trace of dreadful A.I. narration!!!! Hurrah!
10/10
Thank you!!
hand wood tools even today are a different type of iron from machine wood tools.
@@DwightStJohn-t7y - so what?
Metal rasps date back 3,000 years or more, and drawknives / spokeshaves at least 1,000 years. Pull gauges certainly would not have existed in medieval England, but the draw weight could easily be checked by hanging known weights on the bowstring when set up on the tiller.
Didn't know that about metal rasps being so old (historically speaking), but obvious when it comes to known weights . . . just that it never occurred to me. Thanks for the information.@@jackx4311
I remember reading that the best bows were made from imported Spanish yew staves back in the day when bows were in common use.
It was both Spanish and Italian mountain grown ewe that was paid as duty on imports of alcohol from Europe to Britain .early arms trade ?
Nice to see you used traditional superglue to attach the cow horn nocks.....
up near the treeline on the west coast (UsA and Canada) the loggers push all the slash into large piles . We'd go up to pull out the yew wood (and some interesting other woods) and cut cants and send them to Herters' Outfitters for wood crossbows . You needed a magnifying glass to count the growth rings. Now the bark is medicinal, but back in the 80's the logging would simply burn the slash piles. as required for fire reasons. It would cost more to pull the wood down to the highway.
English yew was not considered the best for longbows, back in the day, as our climate is too moist, so the annual rings are quite thick. The finest was imported from Italy, where the much drier climate made for much narrower tree rings - as you describe on timbers cut from up near the treeline. That very dense grain gave Italian yew the best combination of strength and toughness - especially for warbows, which usually had a draw weight (when drawn right to the ear) of about 140 lbs.
@@jackx4311 thanks; I took Archery in college from a US Olympic coach. I couldn't imagine even as a farm boy pulling 140 lbs.!!! i.e. when I went to LA I did 79 pullups and the next closest student did 25, then 14, as I had been pulling hay in all summer by hand!! (grade 8)
Lovely.
Though it didn't seem clear for those not acquainted with the process, which side of the biow is heart wood, and which is newer growth as this helps give it the killer spring.
This is lovely, and I prefer the one on Japanese long bow construction - not because either is better, but because I like to know the wood chosen, and all of the other details that you put in the other post - this may be older, I don't know.
Thanks for the feedback! I'll keep it in mind for future videos.
Homey is first pick for my apocalypse all-star team.
My absolut respect for this skills 🙂
Do you not come to Sweden and shop down our yews, haha. I know where they grow :) Jokes aside, this bow does not work well in the extreme cold. For that, the Ash flat-bow works better, for it does not break in cold as easily. Also the Composite bow made out of horn, wood, sinew and glue, would not work, for the rain would delaminate the bow badly.
The flat bow from the stone-age made out of Ash or better Scots Elm, would do the thing, certainly well if impreganted in blood, animal fat or flax-oil.
Of cource your bow is beatiful, I just wanted to tell some history.
Of cource with a friendly eye :)
Well said, but what would you consider the extreme cold limits of a yew longbow? -15 celcius?
Thank You for that... I'm from British Columbia I agree that Mountain ash cured with a decent animal fat is the way to go Deer is plentiful from hunters. I'm thinking of some fish oil next season after I do some testing on local wood. I test with freshly cut sticks and immerse them in an oil /alcohol mix looking for the max intake they can support.
Inspiring and beautiful film. Thank you! Worry not about what others say. I am sure you don’t.
Thank you very much!
Impressive craftsmanship.
True craftsman sadly something the world is loosing :( great video
When loosing the arrow, don't drop your right hand forward as the arrow looses momentum and accuracy as you never drop the hand in the same way every time. It should still be pulling towards the back of your neck, only the fingers need to loose up.
Absolutely spellbinding...needed to see that.
*Heads off to the garage to check what timber I have lol
Nice video. Reminds me of everything we do on my own bow making courses. That horn nock came up schmick, very nice.
Thanks 👍
Dad earmarked those trees because i kept trying to make poor quality laminated recurve bows when i was in high school using his workbench supplies. In my defense, i got a 120 yard shot off a bow i made when i was 14 that was surprisingly accurate with no training or instruction
Damn marvellous!
Very sweet. Great skills
Thank you! Cheers!
Beautiful thanks for sharing with us 👍
My pleasure
Lovely bow. Well done.
What do you call the contraption that you put the stave in to reduce it with the draw knife? It looks like a 17th century workout machine, lol!
Like a real man, doing his work in the kitchen...
Traditional English Longbows were made from the wood of the yew tree Taxus Baccata which does not grow in Australia. Yes you made a bow but only in the style of a Traditional English longbow but nothing like the real thing. Have a look at some of the bow staves recovered from the Mary Rose and you will see the difference.
Yew trees grow in NZ. Introduced by migrants over a century ago. Occasionally a sharemilker who doesn't know what they are loses cattle when they eat the leaves. Don't see why they aren't in Oz.
That long bow wasn’t even a long bow insomuch as both D shapes were wrong .
where does the inside of the wood log face when you hold the bow. towards you or towards the target?
What a great skill just found this channel
Yew did a great job
Haha
That was amazing. Thanks
Glad you enjoyed it!
Lovely sound of he bow.
What ppl don't realise is, a longbow is the easiesr bow to make, given limited resources it was the weapon of peasant hunters, welsh geurillas, and was general issue in the army for just that reason. No bending, no laminating, minimal tooling, no glue required. Compared to the contemporary recurve laminated bows, it was almost as powerful, but slow and crudely made. And, yes, there was also the small bow, a similar single stick bow, for children, youth and women.
Just because it's easier doesn't mean it's easy.
@@iufrfrhjgfv9189 true that. Balancing the arms by feel is tricky. Simple but subtle. Keeping in mind, a lot of them were mass produced as replacements. A yew bow might only last 3 to 12 months in regular military use. Not that a laminated recurve had an especially long life either; it's why being a bowyer could be a lifelong fulltime specialty profession. Bows were always wearing out or breaking. And that's nothing, imagine the losses in arrows. Hundreds of thousands.
Excellent review 👏
@@iufrfrhjgfv9189he's not saying it's easy, he's explaining why it was common. The simplicity of making it was crucial in the mass produced to be efficacious for an army of Bowmen.
Bore off
A madeira do arco é teixo.A das flechas não me lembro.
Pode me dizer qual é?
Muito bom seu trabalho!
Lots of complaints from these chair dwellers. I enjoyed watching that process and look forward to my own project even more now thank you.
You’re very welcome
😮bravo ,bella opera.compliment😊
Further historical note, the string was not drawn back by the right arm (assuming one is right-handed), rather the string was held at one’s jaw line, and the bow was then pushed outward by the left arm to complete the draw.
Further historical note, the string was drawn to the ear, not jaw.
@@uxb1112 You may be correct, I was mulling over how to describe the draw; my reference and a quick perusal of Wikipedia did not provide a detailed description of where the right hand was held. Notice that I said “jaw line”, may I ask what your reference is ( title, author)?
Modern archery videos show the right hand holding on the jaw line; this may be because of all the sight devices that are now used.
simply for a question of postural structure, the traction at the ear keeps the skeleton in axis and the loading with the back and the shoulder blades help to draw very powerful bows, any historical book from Toxophilus to Saracen Archery talks about this method. traction on the lip or jaw is relatively modern and also very wrong
I think what also needs taken into consideration is how the archer is shooting. Are they drawing for a long distance volley shot? Ear. Are they picking their targets in a close range defense or hunting? Then I'd say jaw.
@@SB-yn7mj the shooting style is partly given by what you have to do and partly by the bow you are using, if you make a placed shot you have all the time to position your structure, I would not use a longbow in hunting just as I would not use it from horseback , I draw by ear even when I do horseback archery except if I have a bow that doesn't allow me to draw beyond a certain draw length. the important thing is to respect the anatomy of the body and its mechanics
loverly to see craftmanship surviving
environmentalists should be interested in such cutting of trees in the forest
Fun to watch a boyer work the craft. Even more so doing it. Especially like his shave horse design and that of the tillering machine.
I heard that you’re supposed to age the wood stave before making it into a bow, is this true?
Yea you are supposed to stretch it and let it age with a specific oil.
what sort of timber did you cut down? was it Aussie wood or some kind of introduced, feral wood? Just found your answer which you need to edit into your introduction please. There's going to be a lot of people asking this question over time: To fit the filming of examples of stages in the whole process into the one day: started with cutting oak; moved on to roughing out elm; finished tillering on a piece of yew.
Thank you Josephine. I went ahead and added that crucial information to the intro subtitles at around 0:20, as well as the description. 👍
@@ProcessMaestroChannel subtitles are not available : / Can't just say what kind of timber you use?
Beaty as an example for a long bow- I have been working on an old yew stave and turning it into a bow. Appears that there are cracks showing on the back opposite the handle. Guess I can only make the bow more uniform and thinner and hope for the best. I think Osage orange works better if you're going for a flat bow. 😂
An important question for me...at what time of the year was the wood harvested?...Also...how long matrued and how?...
I see you cutting down the oak 'saplings'. But you're in Oz presumably? So do oaks grow out there like weeds??? How about the yew? Or are they from imported timber (the elm is imported, right)???
What a guy! 💕
Great work and process here. Love the effort and detail.
But what pound/draw weight in the end was the bow? Looked like about 45lbs on the tiller?
What an awesome video.
Glad you liked it!
Very Nice job!!!👌💯👍
"This is also how I prepare for my holiday in my hometown."
Very nicely done! Yew?
In order to demonstrate and film the various stages of the process in the time we had, we started cutting oak; roughed out already seasoned elm; finished the tillering on yew. The wood is also dried for 3 years.
Are you gonna for those leafsprings into all the blacksmiths tools?