It is worth noting that further evidence of the short-range and penetration-oriented use of the Manchu bow comes from the fletching. Larger and longer fletching necessarily creates more drag, so you would only use such enormous fletching, in some cases over a third of the length of the shaft, if you wanted to maximize the alignment of the mass of the arrow behind the point very quickly after release. Doing this maximizes penetration, as an arrow going straight will penetrate much further than one impacting a target at even a slight angle. The loss of range from this type of fletching though will be significant, so presumably it would only be done if the expectation were for quite short range combat. My long standing hypothesis is that this bow style represents the last gasp of archery in a professional military context, where both the social surplus and metallurgical technology have resulted in more effective and relatively prevalent armor while longer range engagement became the domain of firearms. Thus the only area where the bow had strategic relevance was at medium-close range where it could deliver a significantly greater rate of fire than a firearm and adequate lethality. Great video!
Yes you are right. Such a long fletching indeed suggests a short range and very quick stabilisation of arrow with significant reduction of it's deflection immediatelly after release.
Late reply but yes youre right, some accounts during alte Qing dynasty focused on lighter draw weights compared to early Qing and it was due to their adaptation to musketry where most armies arent wearing armor anymore. They realized that have lighter bows combined with speed is pretty effective when fighting against muskets. Of course, it eventually lost out to better trained and drilled infantry, the Qing did field bows against muskets effectively to some extent.
I've seen a video on here, that I've been unsuccessfuly trying to find again for a month, of a manchu arrow from a 120 or 160 lbs bow, hitting a target. By "target" I mean a thick rectangular target fixed on a stand with 4 legs, made of something like 2 by 4s. The arrow penetrated to the fletching and the stand knocked over, not flying through the air movie style, but knocked over. It looked and sounded like a 38" spear from a canon and after seeing THAT I have little doubt that "could pierce two men with energy to spare" was just a saying. If that was a man and not a target it would probably go through all the way.
Yes manchu bows are designed to shoot heavy arrows at short distances. Modern archers suggest that the arrow weight should be about 1 gram (15 gr) per pound of draw weight. In this case the speed can be 160 fps (for fiberglass bows made by Jia Zhiwei, powerful horn bows maybe better). If the arrow is too light the bow will strike your hand very hard. In Qing dynasty there used to be arrows weighing more than 200 g. And you MUST draw it much further than usual self bows. For example if you are 170 cm tall you should draw at least 80 cm.
A reproduction 82lb Machu supposedly managed 190 fps with a very heavy arrow. If fletched like an English arrow, it would fly 240+ yards as I recall. I suspect it was arrow design more than low velocity that limited the range of Manchu archers. At any given weight, higher momentum means higher velocity.
To be fair to Pope, if I remember correctly he wasn't testing for overall effectiveness but for the bow that could shoot the greatest distance; at least that is the impression I gathered from "Hunting with the Bow and Arrow", maybe his other work details the testing differently.
Any chance this guy didn't know that Manchu bows had much longer draw lengths than a longbow? Maybe he was only drawing it to the chin/cheek and that's why he got such an unimpressive result?
He drew it a wide variety of draw lengths, including up to 36 inches. All with disappointing results. The bow just wasn't designed for that specific purpose. It'll out-penetrate a yew longbow up close, but the longbow will shoot further.
The Manchu bow was designed to fire heavy arrows at close range to exert its terrifying power, just like the Japanese bow, which used long and heavy arrows. A metaphor that is easier for modern Americans to understand is .45acp. It has a heavy bullet and low bullet velocity. It has a short range but can cause horrific damage. At that time, the disciples of the Eight Banners of Manchuria would use some bows with large draw strength and exaggerated sizes to practice their arm strength. The size of these bows was the same as the shoulder poles used by the Chinese to carry heavy loads, but these bows were very crude and did not have combat capabilities.In addition to the Manchu bows, Chinese horn bows also include several types of Ming bows commonly used by the Han people and the Mongolian bows commonly used by the Mongols. . . Reading this passage shows that the white people in the colonial era were full of arrogance and ignorance。
I agree with your assessment here, since there are different bows made with various different modes of construction and their corresponding intended usage and implements, I always wanted to make hornbows but the humid weather from where I am almost makes it impossible to preserve and be given proper care, so I settle for Yumi style construction methods with wood sealing materials at hand, any lacquer of good quality that has a forgiving elasticity is a good sealant for me but I don't want to risk it with sinew and fish glue; again good talking points are really made in your video!
I think MAKING it under humid weather maybe the problem? But that didn't stop the crab bow from existing though, granted it is not true tropical environment.
@@Finnv893 I'm in the tropics (southeast asia), usually rains 2-3 times in a week, I'll try moving up the elevation up to my old man's shack in my next attempt where it is safer once I have my time off work, I kinda mess up the gluing and drying phase during my first time which ruined my tiller, I'm usually not well versed with traditional adhesives yet, since the only experience I have is making Yumi bows back at Kansai during my overseas work with my wife's dad, where they taught me a bit but I never graduated from epoxies as of the moment, although a silver lining that I have is that I can make laminated bows out of Blumeana stalks which is a really tough bamboo material.
I'd say that's probably one reason why slings used to be popular around South-east asia and in Polynesia/Micronesia in general, alongside self-bows. Making good composite bows with horn/sinew probably won't work well in the region. I live in Australia, which has some really awesome native woods in general... except they don't make for good bow 'wood' at all. If there is a god of bows, the god of wood cursed most of the native woods in Australia to be bad for bows, but good for everything else!
Pope's analysis if very scientific and I side with him. Bow performance depends a lot on limb mass and string diameter as pope obviously understood, as he tried a thinner string. Please refer to the "Traditional Bowyers' Bible." Limb shape, design and construction, type of wood, all have a lot to do with performance of the bow. Mongol/Asian bows were typically laminated horn, sinew, and wood, as on the steppe they didn't have large trees for bow staves. Of course bamboo bows were used in Japan and Korea.
Engineering-type analyses still have to be balanced with anthropological considerations. The Manchu bow specimen he got his hands on was - as mentioned in the video- likely a strength training bow for exercise. So it's not totally fair to pass judgment on the whole species just by the example of that one bow. I'd also recommend checking out Peter Dekker's website for a very good discussion of why Manchu bows were designed the way they were. They had their reasons...
I'd also refer to the TBB's commentary on where the added limb mass of composite bows starts to actually reap dividends: at high draw weight/high energy storage, the tradeoff starts to become worthwhile. And that description fits the Manchu bow to a "T".
I remember reading about a bow like this in the Bowyer's Bible, where it was said to be a training bow for building up strength or demonstrating their ability to draw a heavy bow.
It's controversial in China as well. Many people on the Chinese internet are calling Qing bow or Manchu bow as ‘javelin launcher'. sometimes as criticism, sometimes as complement. It's a bow design to face more and more common early firearms used by Ming dynasty army at the time. I read it was designed to have more penetration power (so higher 'kill rate'?), the opposite design compares to Turkish or Korean bows which looking for efficiency and max rang for a bow.
Close the bow had nothing to do with firearms as the basic design pre-dates them. It was a heavy game hunter and a variation was in use by the Ming and the Kazak nomads also. While the Ming certainly had early muskets and cannon, they had not yet replace the Ming bows as a primary weapon of war. On the other hand it was one of the last bows to see regular duty on the front lines, so it certainly held its own against early gunpowder.
Thank you for the video! Always informative and with new knowledge! On the point of this bow being a strength bow: the emperor's manchu bows preserved in the forbidden palace museum are 174cm to 179cm (draw weight from around 45# to 143#, measured at somewhere longer than 28'' of course) , this bow's 74'' (188cm) is considerably longer. There are also a few bows that are much shorter, the shortest being 137cm. blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_494410460102w2pt.html You may see the pictures from the above link. Notice the 143# bow (the 5th picture from the top, its length is 178.5cm, and it looks not too bulky.) A recent test of a newly made 72#@85cm horn sinew composite manchu bow, made by Qingyang Li, resulted as such: @Draw length approximately 87cm: 82g (1265gr) arrow, 130fps, 92g (1419gr) arrow, 130fps, 100g (1543gr) arrows, 127fps, initial kinetic energy 74.92J
Could be the magic of sectional density? In firearms the 6.5x55SE firing 160gr bullet is renowned for it's penetration ability. The same for 7x57mm 175gr that was the favorite of a infamous elephant hunter.
The Manchu archery system was gradually developed and matured based on their hunting practice and the existing Chinese bow design. It was designed to project heavy arrows at short distance and penetrate armour. A report from the then Chinese minister Xu Guangqi to the Ming emperor after the defeat in Sarhū states: "The enemies release arrows within five feet, aiming specifically at faces. Each shot brings a fatal consequence and we were unable to counter them. (贼于五步之内，专射面胁，每发必毙，谁能抵敌)" Although this phrase was originally written to demonstrate the low quality of Ming army's armour, but it describes fairly accurately the characteristic of Manchu archery and the tactic used by Manchurian troops.
Manchurian bow for deck sailor was large n meant for relatively long distance, I simply think pope had the wrong bow (strength bow), wrong techniques (under draw , poor release), wrong arrow n wrong mentality
And generally speaking, bows with large siyah are meant for heavy arrows (peneratration as mentioned by others), u don't see FITA recurve archer using 21XX arrows in 70m, cause it will be slow n outta range even in today standard
Hmmm, I wonder if the Ancient Indian bamboo longbows such as those used in India by the Mauryan Empire were in a similar 'boat' as the Manchu bows. Supposedly the archer was supposed to prop the bow-limb down via the foot before drawing back, so they must have been some powerful bows.
@@ryddragyn And now that I also think about it, Sentinelese bows probably operate in a similar manner to Manchu bows. Just by looking at the footage, it almost seems as though they are launching darts rather than arrows... and at a fair distance too.
methodology , its tough to get unbiased methodology . I am kinda, but not really helping, Roland Bohr , with a bow making field course . i'm cheap help(free) with a camera, so at the end of this he has some amature video to add to his report ,lol . in feb ,i joined him and a couple students going to a bison ranch, to harvest some wood , and start to shape staves . that and some willow for arrows . winter is the time to harvest the staves ,so i am told . and start shaping . thing is we are using draw knives , depending which time we are trying to replicate,is a modification of the methods . that and having saw horses to sit on and hold the staves . not something common on the northern plains before contact . so is this experimental archeology? or modern crafting ? it can be called both . since the experiment is dealing with compressed time lines. tool choices can help that . its a compromise . it does change the experiance ,which can be construed as bias ? i think its overblown and easily rectified if acknowledged . times have changed since Pope , but a lot of his bias or perspective ,( i think that would be better ). prevails . i like your choices and rolands,in presenting your ideas and interpretations . we are modern people looking back . so ?? cheers
Cool video. But I really don't think Manchu bowmen trained for war would consider a bow that is only 98lbs @28 inches (likely 120ish @32) a strength training bow. Maybe it was heavier back in the day and had degraded in strength considerably by Popes time?
The manchu would consider drawing 28" to be pathetically bad showing. It was typically drawn to 33 to 36inches. Standard military weight was 82# measured at 36". So it was on the fingers lighter than ELB but has higher but flatter DFC than the ELB. Also used much heavier arrows.
@@ehisey My point was simply that, even if drawn to 32 inches, 120lbs would be more of a standard weight used in war. Not exactly a strength test bow. It does look like a strength bow though, so I would suspect it has lost some weight over the years.
@@dgriswold93 First it likely would not have been 120# at 32in do to the very different and flatter draw curve of this type of bow, it was more likely only about 116#. Also maintained hornbows lose surprising little weight over time. Second you missed my point entirely, The issue was not the weight, it is the build of the bow. Strength bows started below 100# as they were training tools both for archer and wrestling, also we have sales records of such bows. Strength bows were intentional overbuilt bows that used raw hide strings as described by Pope, the warbows used either a silk or cotton strings. The over built design was incredible poor for shooting as it was a very slow bow by design having been made more concerned about not breaking on accidental release or getting twisted by bad pulls that occur in heavy draw training. The typical shooting manchu bow is a surprisingly touchy design even the war bows, which required the archers to adept at the care and maintaince of the working limbs.
This video isn't about Mongolian bows. It's about Manchu bows. He was just testing the Manchu bow using the wrong methodology. Longbows will outdo Manchu bows for DISTANCE quite consistently, but not for up close penetration.
When you do the Math his comment about that bow Contradict him self. I think his comment on that bow is subjective. You will not pun on the record that your country's bow is inferior to it.
And you would be wrong, by hard proven fact: ua-cam.com/video/iC2v_akhsAg/v-deo.html . Also the large bow above is not Mongolian, it is Chinese Qing dynasty.
A long overdue retort to Mr Pope's assertions, well considered and well presented Grasshopper.
It is worth noting that further evidence of the short-range and penetration-oriented use of the Manchu bow comes from the fletching. Larger and longer fletching necessarily creates more drag, so you would only use such enormous fletching, in some cases over a third of the length of the shaft, if you wanted to maximize the alignment of the mass of the arrow behind the point very quickly after release. Doing this maximizes penetration, as an arrow going straight will penetrate much further than one impacting a target at even a slight angle. The loss of range from this type of fletching though will be significant, so presumably it would only be done if the expectation were for quite short range combat.
My long standing hypothesis is that this bow style represents the last gasp of archery in a professional military context, where both the social surplus and metallurgical technology have resulted in more effective and relatively prevalent armor while longer range engagement became the domain of firearms. Thus the only area where the bow had strategic relevance was at medium-close range where it could deliver a significantly greater rate of fire than a firearm and adequate lethality.
Great video!
Yes you are right. Such a long fletching indeed suggests a short range and very quick stabilisation of arrow with significant reduction of it's deflection immediatelly after release.
Its like comparing 223 rifle to a 44 mag pistel
@Abu Troll al cockroachistan No arrow could penetrate steel armor, not even the fastest modern compound bow could do it.
Late reply but yes youre right, some accounts during alte Qing dynasty focused on lighter draw weights compared to early Qing and it was due to their adaptation to musketry where most armies arent wearing armor anymore. They realized that have lighter bows combined with speed is pretty effective when fighting against muskets. Of course, it eventually lost out to better trained and drilled infantry, the Qing did field bows against muskets effectively to some extent.
Actually it's been defined as close in weapons in the army of Qing dynasty. Different stereotypes，their long-range weapons were musket and cannon.
I've seen a video on here, that I've been unsuccessfuly trying to find again for a month, of a manchu arrow from a 120 or 160 lbs bow, hitting a target. By "target" I mean a thick rectangular target fixed on a stand with 4 legs, made of something like 2 by 4s. The arrow penetrated to the fletching and the stand knocked over, not flying through the air movie style, but knocked over. It looked and sounded like a 38" spear from a canon and after seeing THAT I have little doubt that "could pierce two men with energy to spare" was just a saying. If that was a man and not a target it would probably go through all the way.
always a pleasure to see your videos. Great work
I’m always amazed at people that describe things when they never walked in the shoes of those who lived it.
In reference to Pope or myself?
ryddragyn-pope.
Yeah, folks from different cultures shouldn't study and try to understand one another.
Yes manchu bows are designed to shoot heavy arrows at short distances. Modern archers suggest that the arrow weight should be about 1 gram (15 gr) per pound of draw weight. In this case the speed can be 160 fps (for fiberglass bows made by Jia Zhiwei, powerful horn bows maybe better). If the arrow is too light the bow will strike your hand very hard. In Qing dynasty there used to be arrows weighing more than 200 g.
And you MUST draw it much further than usual self bows. For example if you are 170 cm tall you should draw at least 80 cm.
A reproduction 82lb Machu supposedly managed 190 fps with a very heavy arrow. If fletched like an English arrow, it would fly 240+ yards as I recall. I suspect it was arrow design more than low velocity that limited the range of Manchu archers. At any given weight, higher momentum means higher velocity.
Thanks for the great Info.✌
Thanks
The bow was made for close quarter armor piercing shots.
it was also used for killing horses and lunching fire balls over walls.
Well presented.
Well explained, thank you.
Not distance but penetration...
To be fair to Pope, if I remember correctly he wasn't testing for overall effectiveness but for the bow that could shoot the greatest distance; at least that is the impression I gathered from "Hunting with the Bow and Arrow", maybe his other work details the testing differently.
Any chance this guy didn't know that Manchu bows had much longer draw lengths than a longbow? Maybe he was only drawing it to the chin/cheek and that's why he got such an unimpressive result?
He drew it a wide variety of draw lengths, including up to 36 inches. All with disappointing results. The bow just wasn't designed for that specific purpose. It'll out-penetrate a yew longbow up close, but the longbow will shoot further.
@@ryddragyn oh good I was worried he didn't even give it a fair chance ha.
Yessir, history time with the dragon. Listen up kids!
The Manchu bow was designed to fire heavy arrows at close range to exert its terrifying power, just like the Japanese bow, which used long and heavy arrows. A metaphor that is easier for modern Americans to understand is .45acp. It has a heavy bullet and low bullet velocity. It has a short range but can cause horrific damage.
At that time, the disciples of the Eight Banners of Manchuria would use some bows with large draw strength and exaggerated sizes to practice their arm strength. The size of these bows was the same as the shoulder poles used by the Chinese to carry heavy loads, but these bows were very crude and did not have combat capabilities.In addition to the Manchu bows, Chinese horn bows also include several types of Ming bows commonly used by the Han people and the Mongolian bows commonly used by the Mongols. . .
Reading this passage shows that the white people in the colonial era were full of arrogance and ignorance。
I agree with your assessment here, since there are different bows made with various different modes of construction and their corresponding intended usage and implements, I always wanted to make hornbows but the humid weather from where I am almost makes it impossible to preserve and be given proper care, so I settle for Yumi style construction methods with wood sealing materials at hand, any lacquer of good quality that has a forgiving elasticity is a good sealant for me but I don't want to risk it with sinew and fish glue; again good talking points are really made in your video!
I think MAKING it under humid weather maybe the problem? But that didn't stop the crab bow from existing though, granted it is not true tropical environment.
@@Finnv893 I'm in the tropics (southeast asia), usually rains 2-3 times in a week, I'll try moving up the elevation up to my old man's shack in my next attempt where it is safer once I have my time off work, I kinda mess up the gluing and drying phase during my first time which ruined my tiller, I'm usually not well versed with traditional adhesives yet, since the only experience I have is making Yumi bows back at Kansai during my overseas work with my wife's dad, where they taught me a bit but I never graduated from epoxies as of the moment, although a silver lining that I have is that I can make laminated bows out of Blumeana stalks which is a really tough bamboo material.
I'd say that's probably one reason why slings used to be popular around South-east asia and in Polynesia/Micronesia in general, alongside self-bows. Making good composite bows with horn/sinew probably won't work well in the region.
I live in Australia, which has some really awesome native woods in general... except they don't make for good bow 'wood' at all. If there is a god of bows, the god of wood cursed most of the native woods in Australia to be bad for bows, but good for everything else!
Pope's analysis if very scientific and I side with him. Bow performance depends a lot on limb mass and string diameter as pope obviously understood, as he tried a thinner string. Please refer to the "Traditional Bowyers' Bible." Limb shape, design and construction, type of wood, all have a lot to do with performance of the bow. Mongol/Asian bows were typically laminated horn, sinew, and wood, as on the steppe they didn't have large trees for bow staves. Of course bamboo bows were used in Japan and Korea.
Engineering-type analyses still have to be balanced with anthropological considerations. The Manchu bow specimen he got his hands on was - as mentioned in the video- likely a strength training bow for exercise. So it's not totally fair to pass judgment on the whole species just by the example of that one bow.
I'd also recommend checking out Peter Dekker's website for a very good discussion of why Manchu bows were designed the way they were. They had their reasons...
I'd also refer to the TBB's commentary on where the added limb mass of composite bows starts to actually reap dividends: at high draw weight/high energy storage, the tradeoff starts to become worthwhile. And that description fits the Manchu bow to a "T".
I remember reading about a bow like this in the Bowyer's Bible, where it was said to be a training bow for building up strength or demonstrating their ability to draw a heavy bow.
The bow as described in Pope's book is almost an exact match a bow solid in Chengdu explictly for strength training.
It's controversial in China as well. Many people on the Chinese internet are calling Qing bow or Manchu bow as ‘javelin launcher'. sometimes as criticism, sometimes as complement. It's a bow design to face more and more common early firearms used by Ming dynasty army at the time. I read it was designed to have more penetration power (so higher 'kill rate'?), the opposite design compares to Turkish or Korean bows which looking for efficiency and max rang for a bow.
Close the bow had nothing to do with firearms as the basic design pre-dates them. It was a heavy game hunter and a variation was in use by the Ming and the Kazak nomads also. While the Ming certainly had early muskets and cannon, they had not yet replace the Ming bows as a primary weapon of war. On the other hand it was one of the last bows to see regular duty on the front lines, so it certainly held its own against early gunpowder.
Thank you for the video! Always informative and with new knowledge!
On the point of this bow being a strength bow: the emperor's manchu bows preserved in the forbidden palace museum are 174cm to 179cm (draw weight from around 45# to 143#, measured at somewhere longer than 28'' of course) , this bow's 74'' (188cm) is considerably longer.
There are also a few bows that are much shorter, the shortest being 137cm.
blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_494410460102w2pt.html
You may see the pictures from the above link. Notice the 143# bow (the 5th picture from the top, its length is 178.5cm, and it looks not too bulky.)
A recent test of a newly made 72#@85cm horn sinew composite manchu bow, made by Qingyang Li, resulted as such:
@Draw length approximately 87cm:
82g (1265gr) arrow, 130fps,
92g (1419gr) arrow, 130fps,
100g (1543gr) arrows, 127fps, initial kinetic energy 74.92J
Could be the magic of sectional density? In firearms the 6.5x55SE firing 160gr bullet is renowned for it's penetration ability. The same for 7x57mm 175gr that was the favorite of a infamous elephant hunter.
That was in a bygone era, then came the magnums.
The Ackley Improvements and wild cats came before the magnums.
Like all those crazy broadhead desiggns archers have now.
The Manchu archery system was gradually developed and matured based on their hunting practice and the existing Chinese bow design. It was designed to project heavy arrows at short distance and penetrate armour. A report from the then Chinese minister Xu Guangqi to the Ming emperor after the defeat in Sarhū states: "The enemies release arrows within five feet, aiming specifically at faces. Each shot brings a fatal consequence and we were unable to counter them. (贼于五步之内，专射面胁，每发必毙，谁能抵敌)" Although this phrase was originally written to demonstrate the low quality of Ming army's armour, but it describes fairly accurately the characteristic of Manchu archery and the tactic used by Manchurian troops.
What about draw length? These bows are meant to be drawn 34".
Or longer. The basic build can pull 36 plus inches.
Manchurian bow for deck sailor was large n meant for relatively long distance, I simply think pope had the wrong bow (strength bow), wrong techniques (under draw , poor release), wrong arrow n wrong mentality
And generally speaking, bows with large siyah are meant for heavy arrows (peneratration as mentioned by others), u don't see FITA recurve archer using 21XX arrows in 70m, cause it will be slow n outta range even in today standard
Hmmm, I wonder if the Ancient Indian bamboo longbows such as those used in India by the Mauryan Empire were in a similar 'boat' as the Manchu bows. Supposedly the archer was supposed to prop the bow-limb down via the foot before drawing back, so they must have been some powerful bows.
ua-cam.com/video/89n-DtdRo6Y/v-deo.html
@@ryddragyn And now that I also think about it, Sentinelese bows probably operate in a similar manner to Manchu bows. Just by looking at the footage, it almost seems as though they are launching darts rather than arrows... and at a fair distance too.
methodology , its tough to get unbiased methodology .
I am kinda, but not really helping, Roland Bohr , with a bow making field course .
i'm cheap help(free) with a camera, so at the end of this he has some amature video
to add to his report ,lol .
in feb ,i joined him and a couple students going to a bison ranch, to harvest some wood , and start to shape staves . that and some willow for arrows .
winter is the time to harvest the staves ,so i am told . and start shaping .
thing is we are using draw knives , depending which time we are trying to replicate,is a modification of the methods .
that and having saw horses to sit on and hold the staves . not something common on the northern plains before contact .
so is this experimental archeology? or modern crafting ? it can be called both .
since the experiment is dealing with compressed time lines.
tool choices can help that . its a compromise .
it does change the experiance ,which can be construed as bias ?
i think its overblown and easily rectified if acknowledged .
times have changed since Pope , but a lot of his bias or perspective ,( i think that would be better ).
prevails . i like your choices and rolands,in presenting your ideas and interpretations .
we are modern people looking back . so ??
cheers
A Big Game caliber bow
yes
Pope draws a premature and frankly arrogant conclusion, this phenomenon unfortunately is seen in much of science on a whole range of other subjects.
Cool video. But I really don't think Manchu bowmen trained for war would consider a bow that is only 98lbs @28 inches (likely 120ish @32) a strength training bow. Maybe it was heavier back in the day and had degraded in strength considerably by Popes time?
The manchu would consider drawing 28" to be pathetically bad showing. It was typically drawn to 33 to 36inches. Standard military weight was 82# measured at 36". So it was on the fingers lighter than ELB but has higher but flatter DFC than the ELB. Also used much heavier arrows.
@@ehisey My point was simply that, even if drawn to 32 inches, 120lbs would be more of a standard weight used in war. Not exactly a strength test bow. It does look like a strength bow though, so I would suspect it has lost some weight over the years.
@@dgriswold93 First it likely would not have been 120# at 32in do to the very different and flatter draw curve of this type of bow, it was more likely only about 116#. Also maintained hornbows lose surprising little weight over time.
Second you missed my point entirely, The issue was not the weight, it is the build of the bow. Strength bows started below 100# as they were training tools both for archer and wrestling, also we have sales records of such bows. Strength bows were intentional overbuilt bows that used raw hide strings as described by Pope, the warbows used either a silk or cotton strings.
The over built design was incredible poor for shooting as it was a very slow bow by design having been made more concerned about not breaking on accidental release or getting twisted by bad pulls that occur in heavy draw training. The typical shooting manchu bow is a surprisingly touchy design even the war bows, which required the archers to adept at the care and maintaince of the working limbs.
He must have been doing something wrong. There's no way. A forty pound Mongolian bow will outshoot a long bow all day long.
This video isn't about Mongolian bows. It's about Manchu bows.
He was just testing the Manchu bow using the wrong methodology. Longbows will outdo Manchu bows for DISTANCE quite consistently, but not for up close penetration.
When you do the Math his comment about that bow Contradict him self. I think his comment on that bow is subjective. You will not pun on the record that your country's bow is inferior to it.
5’2” people shooting 100 pound bow
Bullshit
The bow was only 45/60 pound bows
Mongolian bows
Welcome to Northeast China noobs 😒
And you would be wrong, by hard proven fact: ua-cam.com/video/iC2v_akhsAg/v-deo.html . Also the large bow above is not Mongolian, it is Chinese Qing dynasty.