body armour and arrows

[Matthew Amt]

Avete!<br>
Yeah, I knew it would happen. Calculating physics to the nth degree and comparing to bullets and anything else is all well and good, and may prove that a particular projectile has more power than someone else had calculated. But if an accurately reconstructed arrow is shot from an accurately reconstructed bow and repeatedly fails to pierce an accurately reconstructed piece of armor, the physics caluculations are irrelevant, yes?<br>
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Germanicus, you seem to be assuming that a claim that arrows can not pierce armor is a claim that an armored man cannot be killed by arrows. We have not said this. The point has been made repeatedly that even armored Romans had a LOT of bare flesh exposed and could certainly be wounded or killed by arrows (or anything else) even if their armor is never penetrated.<br>
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Bows and slings were common and very effective weapons on ancient battlefields because comparatively few warriors or soldiers had armor! Even in the Roman army, not all troops were armored (that's a different debate, though!), particularly back in the Republic. So you could wound and kill a LOT of troops without doing serious harm to the more heavily armored ones.<br>
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Even at Carrhae, MOST of the Romans SURVIVED. They were worn down by days of this, and captured en masse. You do NOT have to kill a large percentage of an army to defeat it.<br>
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The exact same principles apply in the Middle Ages, but again this is not the best place to debate it. If you want to argue, go to the Sword Forum International and check out the Antique Armor discussion board:<br>
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forums.swordforum.com/for...forumid=48<br>
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It has a number of LONG heated debates, anything you might want to bring up has been hashed over repeatedly. The thread entitled "Cutting Armor?" is one in particular, and has references to the Royal Armouries test:<br>
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forums.swordforum.com/sho...adid=27946<br>
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If you need a summary, though, the French knights at Crecy and other battles certainly took a beating, but there is very little evidence that many or any of them were hit by arrows that PENETRATED the metal of their armor. They were hit in the faces or feet or backs of legs, or killed in hand-to-hand combat with English knights--or by archers who had, for some reason, put down their bows to attack them with axes and mauls! No point in doing that if your arrows are gonna sail right through that silly armor, right?<br>
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I would never say that it is impossible for an arrow to go through armor. I'm just saying that it was darn rare.<br>
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Plutarch does not necessarily "tell a different tale" about Carrhae. Even if he is correct that some arrows were going through the mail (which I still think was uncommon at best), it could in fact be true that only one arrow in a hundred or more was hitting a man. We know the Parthians spent several days shooting at the Romans, and had camels carrying loads of arrows for the archers. If more of them had hit their targets, the battle would have been over much more quickly, with all the Romans dead.<br>
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"Effective" archery does NOT mean that every arrow, or even lot of them, have to kill or wound their targets! It simply causes to the enemy to do something other than what they had planned.<br>
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There are still far too many variables here. I don't know the physics of bows at all, so is it possible that the compound, laminated bow had a lot of penetrative power at close range, but that this fell off rapidly at longer ranges? I know the thing was powerful, and (for comparison) that crossbows typically have flatter trajectories than longbows. Also, be careful of things that slant your data--a shield is only ONE centimeter thick, not two!<br>
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Anyway, carry on, guys. If you come up with something solid, let me know!<br>
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Valete,<br>
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Matthew/Quintus <p></p><i></i>