[G. Bezanson]

Ok, Dan, you win. I just figured what little i could offer would have at least SOME merit.

Moving on. As to the whole idea about getting hit in the face with a lifted visor, exposed part, etc., this is a rather likely occurence, and i have read that many knights and nobility,wearing the very best gothic armour, were slain since they decided not to use the bevor in favor of ventilation. A direct hit from a weapon (arrow, bolt or otherwise) to the face or throat would most certainly kill or horribly injur someone, although i really don't think you could say that it is 'defeating' the armour, as it is only bypassing it. Perhaps i'm splitting hairs, since the end result is a dead or injured person.

Another thing, it seems many people look only at if the arrow can kill the person strait out, not considering wounds, and any possible insuing amputations, infections, etc. Would an enemy soldier who can't fight be any more of a threat than a dead one?

[Nat Lamb]

Interesting to note some of the , umm, "medical" equipment specifically designed to help extract arrows from faces. 1 I have seen that was used to get arrow heads out when the shaft became detached was impressively designed, quite ingenious.

[Jeff Morrow]

Archers were more than just thier bow and arrows. They also fought close contact and had equipment to do so.

[Dan Howard]

[G. Bezanson]

Just something else to add, since the topic has unfortunately died for a while, IF such armies as the english in the hundred years war really were composed of 80% longbowmen, and they could pierce it as easily as some would suggest, what would be the point of going to the expense, weight and bother of obtaining, maintaining, and wearing plate?

[Helge B.]

The role of the longbow during the Battle of Agincourt is much debated. There is just one question which never came up during the threads I found so far.

I think the the longbow had a fair chance of at least wounding a men-at-arms in full plate at a distance below 20 metres. Since the french had been hampered by the mud and the tightness of their formation they would not have been able to close these last metres so quickly. This would have given the English bowmen enough time to get off some point blank shots close enough to even aim at vulnerable body parts. Even a glancing hit at the helmet from this distance should knockout a knight long enough to cause him trip and get trampled by the rows behind.

Maybe the bow still had the major share for the success of the English during this battle as it originally was credited?

[Dan Howard]

But how long into the battle did the English run out of arrows? Even if each soldier carried 60 arrows they would have run out in 5 minutes if firing 12 arrows per minute. It would have taken the French much longer than five minutes to get within 20 meters.

[Glennan Carnie]

[Jean Thibodeau]

Ideally there would also be lot of arrows bags full of arrows just behind the lines if a major battle was planned for and 60 arrows might be a limiting factor only if supplies where running short or where the only arrows carried where for a " chevauché " or a raid with no ready resupply close by?

Logistics would be important here as a tired and low on supplies army of archers would be in a bad way compared with a fresh army with cartloads of arrows numbering in the hundreds or more per archer.

The rate of fire might be variable as Glennan mentioned: One might fire volleys at long range to harass but keep most of one's arrows for the medium ranges where they would be more effective with aimed shots and where one might benefit from a high volume of fire.

At very close range the problem is how fast the well armoured opponents can cross the distance: If one has an obstacle to slow down the advance then carefully aimed volley in high volumes could be devastating, and again without actually having to pierce armour.

Add muddy terrain and exhaustion and archers ready and willing to close with spears, mallets, bills or even poleaxes ( don't know if low status archers would commonly have a poleaxe historically ? But a strong godendag type spiky club or a war flail could do a lot of damage if used by agile troops against bogged down in mud Knights ).

I don't think there needs to be a " winner " or " loser " in these types of discussions it is rather just bringing up different points for discussion and theoretical analysis. ( This can be done purely historically as in what we know was true or can come close to infer from the relevant historical texts, but one can also do some speculative thinking about how weapons and weapons systems might be used tactically even in ways that we know where not used in such a way ..... Naturally it's good to keep both types of discussions clearly in mind so as to not talk at cross purposes or get all too " intense " about it. )

[Justin King]

My personal feeling after reading several accounts of Agincourt, is that the French defeat was largely self-inflicted. Had they been properly led and organized the outcome would have been very different, I think. The French knights and men at arms not only made it to the English line, but pushed it back some distance at one point, and descriptions of the melee make it clear that they made it across the field in considerable strength. There are also accounts that many French died from being trampled into the mud by their own rear ranks. This makes it obvious to me that archery alone was not decisive, at least against the assaults on foot. The fact that the archers joined in the melee with hand to hand weapons seems to confirm this. So just how much credit should we give to the bow, when the final issue was clearly decided by hand to hand combat? Some folks like to make it sound like a turkey shoot, which it clearly was not.

[William Knight]

[Benjamin H. Abbott]

I wouldn't dismiss speed archery in warfare, at least not as a general principle. Countless Middle Eastern sources speak highly of shower shooting. Thanks to David Nicolle, the almost superhuman alacrity of Muslim archers is becoming enshrined in academic texts. Matthew Strickland references Nicolle's estimate that Muslim archers could loose five arrows in two-and-half seconds. I have trouble believing that; I think Lajos Kassai give us a better standard. Either way, period manuals and modern tests show arrows can be shot quite fast, and battlefield accounts suggest they at least sometimes were. Would six volleys per minute amount to a hail?

[Tom King]

If the hundred years war is anything to go by, the war bow can definately penetrate plate armor. At agincourt, thousands of french knights were either horribly maimed or outright killed in the first french charge. The crossbow can also penetrate plate and has more power, but less range. The archer dominates the battfield!

[Artis Aboltins]

[Lafayette C Curtis]

[Benjamin H. Abbott]

[Lafayette C Curtis]

[Kevin S.]

Have a question. Poundage and momentum aside, can the arrow head with the same/equal metallurgical quality as the armour allow the projectile to penetrate? Or does the metallurgy of the arrow head have to be better than that of the armour?

By metallurgical quality, I meant things like Vicker Hardness Rating, etc.

[Dan Howard]

Hardness matters a lot less than thickness of the target, weight of the arrow, draw weight of the bow, shape of the arrowhead, etc.

[Justin King]