A little archery "snag"

[Dan D'Silva]

When shooting off the hand, how do you keep the fletchings of your arrows from striking the bow hand between thumb and forefinger and causing skinning or bleeding? A glove will take care of it, but is there any way to stay in-period when reenacting as an ancient archer? Ancient gloves, bandages, better shooting technique? Or do you just grin and bear it?

Many thanks for any advice that can be provided!

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

I believe there is a recommended way of mounting the arrow on the bow....how are you doing it?
IIRC,it is to have the V of 2 fletches against the bow, the third fletch on the hand side so to speak, if I am making any sense?
There are people more up on archery than myself tho', I am just getting my bow.....first one is needing repair.... :oops:

[P Sertorius Scaevola]

I doubt if that's what he means. Upon release there's that nasty moment when the fletchings pass the hand that holds the bow and to 'office hands' that can get most annoying I'm sure. I've shot for quite a number of years but never experienced this to the point of actually getting cut. Must be a matter of building up callises, simply the hardening of the skin at the 'nodge'. So keep practicing and remember that in ancient Japan it was customary to shoot over a thousand arrows per day practicing

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Well, one of the more experienced archers did say you need to mount the arrow correctly, or this will happen....
I am only passing on what I heard. I must have been a natural, as I never noticed any problem either. :lol:

[Marcus Mummius]

The way the feathers are prepared and attached to the arrow matters too.

If you nock the arrow at the exact right position on the string you should have no cutting. If the feathers cut your hand it probably means that you have nocked the arrow slightly too high or low on the bowstring (I can't remember if it's too high or low).

Building up callouses will help too.

I must admit that I often tie a piece of leather to my bowhand when shooting because I often do not pay attention to the exact position where I notch the arrow.

Vale,

[Johnny Shumate]

I've been shooting and making my own bows (English longbows, sinew backed recurves) for years....
How often do you shoot? If you practice on a somewhat daily basis, you'll develop a callous
on your hand where the arrow passes. If you layoff for several weeks, the callous will go
away and your skin will be a little thin and easy to nick.... It happens to me if I don't shoot for
several weeks..! Keep shooting, your hand will toughen up...!
Johnny

[Virilis]

I usually raise the arrow on the string about one centimeter higher to avoid it hitting my bow-arm. Despite this I use a quard on my bow-arm too. If you use heavier bows (starting from 80#) I won`t recommend shooting without a protection at any time. I have developed all kinds of calluses during shooting ( I shoot 80-110 # bows usually) but if the arrow breaks, the bindings of the feathers gets loose etc. you will get hurt in a very nasty way :wink: ...

[Dan D'Silva]

I use modern arrows for practice, with soft plastic vanes that seem to just be glued on. I support the arrow on my left thumb, to the right of the bow.

Yesterday was the only session I've gotten in so far since receiving them, but I plan on at least two or three times a week if the weather allows. (Back in school, our bows had arrow rests, so this wasn't an issue.)

I can say I didn't manage to maintain a definite nocking point until after getting cut, at which point I marked it with a Sharpie.

The bow itself is just 32 pounds. And I won't deny having office hands!

Thanks again.

[dave budd]

I've seen (and had) a few very nasty injuries related to fletchings, including lifted feathers having to be surgically removed from somebody's hand! :x

adjust your nocking point: get the nocking point in the right place for correct arrow flight and the arrow should not be touching your hand by the time the fletching get there (too low and the back end drops onto you, too high and it can flick back onto your hand or teh shaft will abrade it). having correctly sponed shafts will help a little with this aswell as it helps with the overall tuning of your set up.

trim the front of your fletching to a fine feather edge where it touches the shaft (so it is a smooth ramp rather than a blunt front to the fletch). put a drop of glue over the front of it too to secure and make sure nothing will lift. A few wraps of fine thread just infront and over the tip of the feather will also help hold it inplace and guid it past obsitcals like your hand

Good technique goes a long way as well. If you snatch your bow, then you are more likely to encounter the fletching (and throw your arrow off target). A smooth release helps to keep the arrow going in the right direction, so the fishtailing and pardox of the arrow straighten faster as it passes your hand and heads to the target.

all else failing, I've wrapped a padded plaster over the spot that a feather is rubbing, so you could wrap a bandage around your hand ina strategic postistion

[Malleus]

Shave down the front of the fletching, then wrap it with thread for about 1/4 to 1/2 an inch. Injected feathers HURT! I know the Japanese traditional archers do it that way. Plastic fletches require a glove on the bowhand.

[Robert]

How sure are we the Roman bows didn't have an arrowrest? I am sure they must have come across the featherproblem same as us. An arrowrest does not have to be "carved into the bow", it can be easily made from a bent bit of metal, a piece of bone or wood and lashed onto the bow.

[AuxArcher]

I fletch my arrows by gluing the vanes to the shaft, and then binding at both ends with either linen or silk thread or with sinew, and have never had the issue of cutting my hand due to the feathers. Only when I first started out using cheap store bought arrows did I nick my left hand (the one holding the bow, I'm right handed.

Robert, I cant say for certain, but I doubt that any ancient bow had an arrow rest, either cut into the handle or added on.

[Robert]

We "know" there were no arrowrests carved into the bows, as none have been found and it would serously weaken the bowdesigns we know about. But then again, an arrowrest lashed on would be very easily lost as the bow was deteriorated in the ground. As far as I am aware, few if any handle wrappings have survived. I am not sure about the bows found in the Eastern provinces, there could be a good few semi-intact bows found in period graves there ..

The goosefeather fletching in the style of the Duro finds (parabolic fletch, glued on fletch) tends not me give me any problems, I have whipped the ends of the fletching with linen string, but the nocking is indeed of great importance, as the bending of the arrow is away from the hand then and the fletching just zips by on release.

[Maximio]

As others have said, callouses will form if you practice regularly and hence solve the problem. One way of helping this is to get some pure alcohol from a chemists (either in a bottle or impregnated wipes), and swab the hand in the affected area several times a day. This will toughen the skin but may leave you smelling like an alcoholic. Make sure you have an understanding boss at work.

[Maximio]

In terms of a "Roman" solution to the problem one should bear in mind that the specialist archers would most likely have used the "Mongolian draw" method. I.e. using a thumb release and the arrow passing over the knuckle of the thumb gripping the bow not the index finger. This both rules out any idea of an arrow rest and would suggest the exposure of a slightly more sensitive area of skin to the repeated wear and tear of the fletching.

If you have a look at the brief discussion from a few years back, I mentioned the evidence for protective hand guards to prevent the damage to the skin caused by the fletchings.

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Perhaps something for the wonder boys of Armementaria to look at producing.