Lars Andersen: A new level of archery

The ultimate archery trick. Proving that Hollywood archery is not historical.

It is not possible to tell the whole story about archery in a 5 minute video.

so this video is definitely not the whole truth!

Historic archery is a lot of different methods and much is forgotten

but archery can be much more than we usually think!

THE BACK QUIVER

Hollywood of course did not invent the back quiver, but they spread the myth it was proper archery!

Many asked why I do not use a back quiver and that is why I am showing my own experience, how bad it is in motion.

There are many different historical variatoner of back quiver and they have of course been used, but presumably belt quiver was more common and some archers did not use quiver.

HISTORIC ARCHERS HAD THE ARROWS RIGHT AROUND THE BOW

Af course not all not all. Someone had the arrow left around the bow, but many historical archers had the arrow right around, also archers in Europe

TARGET PLATES

Past archers obvious used fixed targets, but not the modern round divided two dimensional.

THE THREE LEVELS OF ARROW HANDLING

It is obvious much more complicated, We can not know what the first archers did, some of the earliest pictures show arrows in the bow hand, but the arrow is much older than the bow so the quiver may be used and it is impossible entirely exclude that the first archer held his shafts in the draw hand.

In some parts of history is progress gone in the 3 levels, but other times the opposite has happened. Some archers are gone from arrows in the draw hand to the advanced rapid fire quiver that was developed just before war archery disappeared.

TRICK ARCHERY IS HISTORICAL ARCHERY

Training tricks was an integral part of several historical traditions

HISTORIC ARCHERS SHOT FAST

There are a lot of historical descriptions of archers that shoot fast

and that archers were rejected because you were not fast enough.

DO I HIT EVERYHING?

I use a LOT of time practicing, and every time I set out to learn a new skill, a new trick or how to handle a new type of bow or arrow, it takes a long time, with plenty of misses. When I got the idea of grabbing an arrow in flight and firing before I landed, it took me months to learn. For a long time, arrows flew everywhere!

But there's no trick in the video that I haven't done many times (except for splitting the arrow in flight – after I'd done that once I finished the video). The one with hitting the blade I've only done three times, though. All that running hurt my knees. ;-)

ON MY BOWS AND POWER

I'm 50 years old, and have been doing archery for only ten years. I'll never be able to shoot really fast with 100 lbs+ war bows. I tried, but it just produced injuries. Had I started at age 10, it would have been a different story. ;-)

Bows were not always shoot against plate armour (as at Crecy in 1346 and Agincourt in 1415). This was very much the exception. Many opponents had little or no armour at all, and Stone Age findings show that many animals were taken down by multiple shots. Also, in 1923 Saxton T Pope examined a number of historical museum bows from around the world. His conclusion was that most only had a tensile strength of 45-50 pounds.

The fast shooting methods I use are described in war manuals and are intended to be performed with war bows

THE CHAINMAIL TEST

Around 04:22 I penetrate chainmail. The arrows had bodkin tips, and the chainmail is riveted. However, while the gambeson is thick, it's not as thick as some I've seen elsewhere. But one reason the arrows penetrate is that I sharpen not only the tip itself, but also the edges of the bodkin tip.

HIT AN INCOMING ARROW!

You don't have time to aim or think, but can only do it if your reactions are completely instinctive. First of all, you need to be convinced that you WILL hit it, so you can “feel” the incoming arrow and fire at it instead of just flinching away.

I was also in doubt whether it was smart to show this, because I don't want anyone to get hurt trying to copy the trick. I trained for years with soft boffer arrows and spent a LONG time before I tried it even the first time. And the arrow shoot at me was not shoot with a very powerful bow, though it was definitely dangerous enough!

I didn't think it was possible to split an arrow!

It was a light bamboo arrow with a metal tip, and the arrow I shot back was a heavier aluminum arrow. That the arrow split was just pure luck, and I'm not certain I could repeat it without first training for a long time.

FINAL WORDS

Thank you for watching my videos and for reading.

I will remove rude and dumb comments.

I will also remove dumb “archery experts” comments.

- Lars Andersen, January 2015