How good was Robin Hood?

Part 1

Most of the articles I write are, to be honest, for my own amusement! It’s not that I don’t think about my faithful readership, although to be honest I have never met him/her, it’s just that I tend to try and find things out which have occurred to me as a re-enactor and which I then think others might find interesting and even useful. I am an archer, I love shooting the bow and I love watching it being shot well. I have witnessed some lamentable archery displays and some brilliant ones over the years. Watching half a dozen ‘archers’ shooting at three large round shields placed upright twenty yards away and missing with every arrow, did not impress, nor did another ‘medieval’ group rather more accurate but shooting on the standard FITA 122cm multi coloured target. The ‘prince’s mark’, which is the origin of the multi-coloured roundel target now universally employed by archers, was formally approved by Prince George (George IV) in the late eighteenth century.

As a medieval re-enactor a number of questions arise when considering contemporary archery. Firstly what degree of accuracy might we expect to achieve with the longbow, secondly what targets might be considered authentic, what alternative targets are available and finally how might competitions and demonstrations be organised? I will be dealing with the first two questions in this article and the remainder in the next. I am assuming that in practice most re-enactors will usually be shooting at targets from twenty to forty yards away using bows of between thirty or forty pounds draw weight. Those shooting heavier bows at that distance either know precisely what they are doing or are wasting their time with a bow which is unnecessarily heavy.

The answers to the first two questions I asked are clearly connected, after all what the medieval archer would shoot at is what they could hit. I think we can ignore the old stories of archers able to shoot squirrels out of a tree at a hundred yards or being expected to hit a single man at two hundred every time. The real evidence we have to work from is threefold, contemporary

written and pictorial sources and current achievements by competent longbow archers.

The butts to be found in English villages are meant to have been, according to Anne Braun author of Historic Targets some 140 yards apart although the minimum shooting distance required by statute was 220 yards. In 1583 in a competition in London the butts were set at 148 yards. At these distances it is only possible to conduct high angle ‘clout’ shooting where the target is placed on the ground and arrows are scored on the basis of their closeness to it. The eighteen or thirty inch traditional target is, not surprisingly, rarely hit at the distance of 180 yards for men and 120 for ladies. There is rarely a chance for re-enactors to attempt this long distance shooting in front of the public.

Solid earth butts, perhaps six feet high and semi-circular in form would prove a reliable backstop at any range and their existence in English villages is proclaimed by the innumerable Butts lanes and Roads that still exist. What about the targets to be found on them? The wand or straight branch of hazel or willow stripped of bark, is certainly referred to by the Tudor archer and author Ascham and in numerous early accounts of Robin Hood. The wand would make an excellent target but not at 140 yards surely? The current 122cm Fita target face has a 12cm diameter 10 ring, which the best modern archers using carbon fibre arrows travelling at some 60metres per second might expect to hit regularly at 70m. To expect a longbow archer to split a two inch wide wand at 140 yards seems unreasonable. The present day and delightfully named Mole Valley Bowmen shoot at a 6 foot high by 4 inches wide wand, at 100 yards for men, 80 for ladies and 60 yards or closer for juniors, using both modern recurve bows and longbows. In practice shooting at a one inch wide hazel rod at 25 yards seems a good challenge.

1. Dated to around 1340 this illustration from the Luttrell Psalter contains a wealth of information about target practice in this crucial period.

The well known Luttrell Psalter illustration of archers at practice shows them shooting at a garland or wreath, perhaps as much as a foot in diameter. The distance is unknown but the trajectory of the arrows is very flat, suggesting a short range to be measured in a few tens of yards. This garland or wreath is perhaps the easiest target to make and has the appearance of authenticity as well as being referred to in numerous accounts of archery contests.

2. The Fair at Hoboken like so many other illustrations show archery practice to have been an every day activity which at least in part explains the ‘relaxed’ attitude of the population.

The painting, Fair at Hoboken by Pieter Breughel (1559) contains an excellent shooting scene. Set amidst a bustling village in the midst of merry-making, a small group of archers continue their sport, with spectators sitting next to the butts, a testimony to their confidence in the archers if not their common

sense. The butts appear about seventeen yards apart and the rondel target is perhaps some six inches in diameter. A very similar scene from a manuscript illustration of a palace garden, on this occasion depicting crossbow shooting, shows the butts set at about twenty yards with the target about a hands length in breadth. The rondel target face appears in numerous late medieval and renaissance illustrations. They appear to be made of white material probably linen or canvas of some sort, with a black centre.

4.A scene form the Schilling Chronicle shows a well organised range with portable and covered shooting point, well constructed target and back stop and even a cabin for the unfortunate marker.

The Tir au Bersault was an archery practice established in France in the late middle ages and still shot today. The etymology of the word itself is curious but came to mean an archery practice. It was designed to encourage the Francs Archers to match the achievements of their English counterparts. The grounds, practice and target were very well defined. The range was fifty yards and the target was 48cms in diameter, possibly meant to represent the chest of a man. The bull was 14.5cm in diameter with an inner bull of 4.2cm.

European illustrations seem to depict crossbow rather than longbow competitions, although they often seem to have competed together. Crossbow and later firearm clubs maintained a tradition in Italy, Germany and

the Low Countries that lasted not only for centuries but in the case of Italy to the present day. Anne Braun’s monograph on Historical Targets deals with this subject exhaustively from the European perspective.

Crossbowmen, by virtue of their weapon assume superiority in matters of accuracy, if only because of the consistency that the crossbow provides them over the hand bow. It is not surprising that they claim a remarkable degree of accuracy. It is mentioned by one author that Genoese crossbowmen would practise their skill by shooting at a coin affixed to the mast of a nearby ship. This I think is unlikely, as I doubt whether the master of any vessel would take kindly to his masts being nailed by arbalastiers for fun! The present Italian Crossbow Federation drawing upon a tradition of crossbow competitions stretching back centuries, has chosen two distances for competition shooting of forty and twenty yards, which matches the scale of medieval Italian squares where such competitions still take place. The former distance is for heavy crossbows resting on a stand and the later for lighter crossbows shot off hand. The target in both cases is twenty inches in diameter with a scoring centre of five inches. Their use of highly decorative targets is certainly one that is worth considering when planning your archery for next season.

5. Shooting at highly decorated falcon using heavy crossbows is still an important tradition in a handful of Italian cities.

The most demanding medieval targets for the longbow I have seen referred to, date from 1468. The target was itself 121-181mm or 5-7inches and was set at about 120paces from the mark, further example is given of a 12inch diameter target at roughly the same distance. This would mean a target of 1½ to 3 inches in diameter at 20 yards. To achieve a hit at the longer range would have

demanded either infinite skill or considerable luck or a happy combination of both.

Shooting at the Popinjay has a long tradition, in Britain the Kilwinning archers record the first shoot of this type in 1483. In Europe it was and remains a popular sport. The popinjay is the representation of a bird, the name is derived from the word papingo or parrot. The target is suspended from a pole, tower or steeple of some ninety feet in height and archers standing at the base aim to dislodge the bird or birds. For re-enactment purposes it is obviously impractical to conduct this sort of shoot, however a horizontal version where the target or targets are set ‘in flight’ by being suspended in the air by cord is both practicable and enjoyable and a real test of skill. The bird can be constructed from straw, scraps of colourful material and of course feathers for verisimilitude.

6. Wooden popinjay targets preserved by the Kilwinning archers

So what might a medieval archer have shot at and at what distance? At thirty yards the wand and the garland would have been as testing for him as for ourselves. The popinjay would also have been a common target, at least on the continent. At greater distances a roundel painted white with a black centre would have suited as a target out to about fifty yards, with the roundel about the size of a man’s chest and the bull perhaps five or six inches in diameter. At the greatest distance the clout, a round target some eighteen inches in diameter would seem to be appropriate.

During the writing of these articles I found the following sources particularly helpful.

European Medieval and Renaissance Archery Contests And Targets by John R Edgerton (AKA Sir Jon Fitz-Rauf SCA). http://www.zateev.net/ontarget/download/Sir%20Jon%20article.pdf

Medieval and Renaissance material culture- archers and archeryhttp://www.larsdatter.com/archers.htm

How good was Robin Hood?

Part 2Modern longbow archery is in many respects clearly different from its medieval forebears but it is not unreasonable to assume that it can inform our perception of what degree of accuracy could be achieved by our illustrious predecessors. Bert Smith, a very experienced and successful longbow archer in his own right, has published a list of Proficiency Tables suggesting achievable scores. In a postal Portsmouth round, with a 60cm target face set at 20 yards, he considers that the best archer might achieve an outdoor score of 440 (average for men and women) out of 540, shooting 60 arrows. This would equate to roughly two thirds of the arrows hitting the red with the rest in the gold. The Eccles round, shot against a 60cm target face at sixty yards, is a good test of skill and a competent beginner might expect to hit it with half his arrows.

Robert Hardy recounts an archery competition amongst the Kamba tribesmen. These are a people with an ancient tradition of archery and who were used to shooting with bows little different from those used by re-enactors, of low draw weight and designed for accuracy. They were shooting on this occasion at a target some fifty paces (forty yards?) away and five inches in diameter. None hit but many came close, until the hero of the story came to the mark and with infinite skill placed his arrow plum in the middle. In the previous article I have suggested the sort of accuracy that might be expected from medieval

predecessors. What these modern examples seem to point to is that medieval and modern archers were not that different in terms of their levels of accuracy.

Considering all the evidence both from the past and present, it would seem that consistently hitting a six inch diameter target at 20 yards and a target double that size at forty would be pretty good shooting with a longbow both now and in the past.

7. A garland shot with a thirty pound draw weight bow at twenty yards. A hessian covered foam target takes the place of the traditional earthen butts.

What would make a good sized target for a modern longbow archer to achieve?

Distance Target diameter-for scoring

Bulls-eye

20 Yards 9 inches 3 inches40 Yards 18 inches 6 inches

The garland and the wand would seem to be authentic and appropriate targets. For variation an apple, not necessarily placed upon the head of a small child, or a cockle shell also make good targets which also appear to have been used in the past.

The numbers of arrows required by law for practice was only two and in most competitions only a few arrows seem to have been shot at any one time, two per archer in the Luttrell Psalter and Hoboken illustrations for example. This is perhaps to ensure consistency of performance, if making a set of matched arrows was a particular problem. The numbers of arrows and archers should not be so great as to endanger those arrows already on the target. The removal of arrows and then their redistribution to their owners also slows the proceedings down.

8. A one inch hazel wand shot at 25 yards with a forty pound bow.

Scoring of the ‘medieval’ target may be done by dividing the target into rings of differing values or marked on a simple hit or miss basis. One practice I have used is to reduce the diameter of the target at each end. The archers start with six arrows apiece and they can continue the shoot only with arrows that have landed inside the target area. In medieval Ferrara a similar system was used where archers shot three arrows each at a series of rings decreasing in size from about eight inches. If a competitor missed his shot he withdrew and successful competitors continued onto the smaller targets until a winner was achieved.

Of course it is not always possible or necessary to use sharp arrows, blunts can be used to good effect. In the Luttrell Psalter the archers are using blunts and there is at least one illustration of a crossbow practice where they are also using blunts. Blunts have several advantages over sharps for display purposes. Firstly, of course, they significantly reduce the dangers that shooting sharps present and secondly they can be used against a number of targets that are unsuitable for sharps, either because of the damage to the arrows, the targets or from ricochets.

Over the past few years my group has focused on the use of blunts for demonstration and this has certainly allowed us to shoot more frequently in spaces unsuitable for the use of sharps. Archery in this context is less about authenticity and more about demonstrating the style and capabilities of the bow and the individual skills of the archers.

The targets that we have used include canvas bag targets filled with wool, suitably painted with a medieval heraldic design as well as a ‘hanged man’ target filled with scrap material and with his heart picked out in red as the aiming mark. Both make rewarding targets as the sound of impact cheers the archers and impresses the audience.

One of the most successful series of targets that we have made are simple knock-down designs which we originally copied from ones used by the Hoplites. They have been made in two sizes and are painted with geometric or heraldic designs. Individual targets can be assigned or they can be grouped together and shot down by controlled volleys. The public enjoy the excitement of competition and the challenge presented by such targets at twenty yards. What they lack in authenticity they make up for in drama. They demonstrate the skill of the individual and the power of a group of archers.

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On occasion we have used man-sized wooden figures, which when grouped together at thirty or forty yards make an excellent target for volleys. The sight and sound of twelve or fifteen arrows all striking the faces of three such targets simultaneously gives some idea of the capability of the medieval archer. Of course something similar can be achieved when shooting against suitably protected men-at-arms but they tend to be a rarity. Cladding targets in surplus plate is certainly a possibility but the arrows tend to suffer too much for this to be a regular activity. Man-sized targets of Turks were used in the reign of Henry VIII and there is a reference to the Yeoman archers of his royal guard shooting at and through one inch thick seasoned oak planks

10. The best sort of knock down targets!

Novelty targets there are aplenty. A glove, a leather purse, a cap, fruit and vegetables can all make demanding and amusing targets. An old helmet fitted on a pole can make a good target and a real test for the archer aiming for the face and throat, the preferred target at short range. The stuffed toys sold as pets’ playthings are very resilient and often provide a good challenge as long as

9. Knock down targets can add colour and drama to a display and are great fun to shoot at.

authenticity and the context permit. There are also high density foam three dimensional targets of animals available which I know some groups use.

I will conclude with a few salient points which have been gleaned over many years and after much expenditure of sweat and tears.

Safety is paramount. Consider the competence of the archers, the capabilities of the bows and arrows, overshoot distances and the angles of shooting, resilience of the targets and access to the field. It is worth quoting the words of one sixteenth century traveller. “ And howsoever the butt at which they shoot be large, with much earth cast up behind it, yet my self at Heidelberg saw diverse people wounded with shafts and bullets sometimes missing the Butt, and then hitting them”.

The size of the target should reflect the skills of the archers. Consistently missing the target does little for the morale of the archers or impress the audience.

Small targets encourage better archery than big ones. This does not contradict the previous statement. You must know the current capabilities of your archers and then challenge them.

Make the targets part of the display, explain their different roles in training and preparing the archer. For example the wand focuses the archer on getting the line right and would be useful practice for shooting through a castle’s arrow slit.

Ring the changes during the display, change the targets, the distances the groups of archers. If you divide your archers into three groups then with judicious timing you can maintain a continuous hail of arrows while at the same time controlling the numbers of arrows shot.

Shoot fewer arrows than you bring and always bring more than you need. It is better to shoot three arrows well than a dozen arrows badly. Give the archers time to recover from the previous arrow. Five arrows a minute is a reasonable pace.

Encourage competition, which will involve the archers and the public. As my group is equally divided between the sexes I have no problem in pitting men against women. Reactive targets make scoring easy.

Good luck and best wishes to all those who shoot in the bow.

During the writing of these articles I found the following sources particularly helpful.

European Medieval and Renaissance Archery Contests And Targets by John R Edgerton (AKA Sir Jon Fitz-Rauf SCA). http://www.zateev.net/ontarget/download/Sir%20Jon%20article.pdf

Medieval and Re naissance material culture- archers and archeryhttp://www.larsdatter.com/archers.htm

Even the humble longbow is capable of providing a few surprises. At twenty yards at the prince’s mark!