Weapon/Armor Effectiveness

[Dan Howard]

Whoops, not much use for my 40 pounder! :mrgreen: As far as I've seen 'tests' with the warbow (Medieval, and LOTS of pounds, up to 180), it can penetrate both mail and plate armour with ease. The tests I've seen myself (and quite likely most tests) were on close range, firing on straight pieces of mail or plate.

So yes, a bow can pretty surely penetrate a segmentata, squamata, or hamata, and quite likely also a shield or helmet.

A bow can pretty surely NOT penetrate any kind of plate armour under all but exceptional circumstances. The only test that tried to use decent reconstructions for both warbows AND plate armour was the Defense Academy Warbow Trials that were published in the Royal Armouries journal, Arms and Armour. Even at point blank range a 150 lb warbow had trouble getting through 2mm of poor quality munitions plate. The deepest penetration was only 16mm.

See "A report of the findings of the Defence Academy warbow trials Part 1 Summer 2005." By Paul Bourke and David Whetham. pp.53-82. Here is a discussion of the test when it was first published.
http://www.swordforum.com/forums/showthr...ublication

If this is used in conjunction with the data in Williams' book then one must conclude that plate armour could stop all but the rarest of arrows.

In addition, Blythe attempted to use decent reconstructions of Persian and Scythian bows and Greek bronze plate and came to the same conclusion:

"A Greek hoplite could quite happily rely upon his bronze helmet to keep out both Persian and Scythian arrows, and on his breastplate and greaves, if he wore them. On the other hand, his armour was far from complete, and the eyes, right arm, and the neck were particularly vulnerable. His shield would provide adequate protection against arrows from the Scythian bow…, but not, at short range, against those from the Persian infantry bow."

See P. H. Blythe, The Effectiveness of Greek Armour Against Arrows in the Persian War (490-479 B. C.), PhD, University of Reading (1977).

Blythe's work would also be relevant to the other thread about helmets.
http://www.ancient-warfare.org/rat.html?...833#298951