English longbow The English longbow , also called the Welsh longbow , is a powerful type of medieval longbow ( a tall bow for archery ) about 6 ft ( 1 . 8 m ) long used by the English and Welsh for hunting and as a weapon in medieval warfare . English use of longbows was effective against the French during the Hundred Years ' War , particularly at the start of the war in the battles of Sluys ( 1340 ) , Crécy ( 1346 ) , and Poitiers ( 1356 ) , and perhaps most famously at the Battle of Agincourt ( 1415 ) . They were less successful after this , with longbowmen having their lines broken at the Battle of Verneuil ( 1424 ) , and being completely routed at the Battle of Patay ( 1429 ) when they were charged before they had set up their defensive position . The term " English " or " Welsh " longbow is a modern usage to distinguish these bows from other longbows , though in fact identical bows were used across northern and western Europe . The earliest longbow known from England , found at Ashcott Heath , Somerset , is dated to 2665 BC , but no longbows survive from the period when the longbow was dominant ( c . 1250 – 1450 AD ) , probably because bows became weaker , broke and were replaced , rather than being handed down through generations . More than 130 bows survive from the Renaissance period , however . More than 3 , 500 arrows and 137 whole longbows were recovered from the " Mary Rose " , a ship of Henry VIII ' s navy that sank at Portsmouth in 1545 . Description . Length . A longbow must be long enough to allow its user to draw the string to a point on the face or body , and the length therefore varies with the user . In continental Europe it was generally seen as any bow longer than 1 . 2 m ( 3 . 9 ft ) . The Society of Antiquaries says it is of 5 or 6 feet ( 1 . 5 or 1 . 8 metres ) in length . Richard Bartelot , of the Royal Artillery Institution , said that the bow was of yew , 6 feet ( 1 . 8 m ) long , with a 3 - foot ( 910 mm ) arrow . Gaston Phoebus , in 1388 , wrote that a longbow should be " of yew or boxwood , seventy inches [ 1 . 8 m ] between the points of attachment for the cord " . Historian Jim Bradbury said they were an average of about 5 feet and 8 inches . All but the last estimate were made before the excavation of the " Mary Rose " , where bows were found ranging in length from 1 . 87 to 2 . 11 m ( 6 ft 2 in to 6 ft 11 in ) with an average length of 1 . 98 m ( 6 ft 6 in ) . Draw weights . Estimates for the draw of these bows varies considerably . Before the recovery of the " Mary Rose " , Count M . Mildmay Stayner , Recorder of the British Long Bow Society , estimated the bows of the Medieval period drew , maximum , and Mr . W . F . Paterson , Chairman of the Society of Archer - Antiquaries , believed the weapon had a supreme draw weight of only . Other sources suggest significantly higher draw weights . The original draw forces of examples from the " Mary Rose " are estimated by Hardy at at a draw length ; the full range of draw weights was between . The draw length was used because that is the length allowed by the arrows commonly found on the " Mary Rose " . A modern longbow ' s draw is typically or less , and by modern convention measured at . Historically , hunting bows usually had draw weights of , which is enough for all but the very largest game and which most reasonably fit adults can manage with practice . Today , there are few modern longbowmen capable of using bows accurately . A record of how boys and men trained to use the bows with high draw weights survives from the reign of Henry VII . What Latimer meant when he describes laying his body into the bow was described thus : Construction and materials . The bowstave . The preferred material to make the longbow was yew , although ash , elm and other woods were also used . Giraldus Cambrensis , Gerald of Wales , speaking of the bows used by the Welsh men of Gwent , says : " They are made neither of horn , ash nor yew , but of elm ; ugly unfinished - looking weapons , but astonishingly stiff , large and strong , and equally capable of use for long or short shooting . " The traditional construction of a longbow consists of drying the yew wood for 1 to 2 years , then slowly working the wood into shape , with the entire process taking up to four years . ( This can be done far more quickly by working the wood down when wet , as a thinner piece of wood will dry much faster . ) The bow stave is shaped into a D - section . The outer " back " of sapwood , approximately flat , follows the natural growth rings ; modern bowyer s often thin the sapwood , while in the " Mary Rose " bows the back of the bow was the natural surface of the wood , only the bark being removed . The inner side ( " belly " ) of the bow stave consists of rounded heartwood . The heartwood resists compression and the outer sapwood performs better in tension . This combination in a single piece of wood ( a self bow ) forms a natural " laminate " , somewhat similar in effect to the construction of a composite bow . Longbows will last a long time if protected with a water - resistant coating , traditionally of " wax , resin and fine tallow " . The trade of yew wood to England for longbows was such that it depleted the stocks of yew over a huge area . The first documented import of yew bowstaves to England was in 1294 . In 1350 there was a serious shortage , and Henry IV of England ordered his royal bowyer to enter private land and cut yew and other woods . In 1470 compulsory practice was renewed , and hazel , ash , and laburnum were specifically allowed for practice bows . Supplies still proved insufficient , until by the Statute of Westminster in 1472 , every ship coming to an English port had to bring four bowstaves for every tun . Richard III of England increased this to ten for every tun . This stimulated a vast network of extraction and supply , which formed part of royal monopolies in southern Germany and Austria . In 1483 , the price of bowstaves rose from two to eight pounds per hundred , and in 1510 the Venetians obtained sixteen pounds per hundred . In 1507 the Holy Roman Emperor asked the Duke of Bavaria to stop cutting yew , but the trade was profitable , and in 1532 the royal monopoly was granted for the usual quantity " if there are that many " . In 1562 , the Bavarian government sent a long plea to the Holy Roman Emperor asking him to stop the cutting of yew , and outlining the damage done to the forests by its selective extraction , which broke the canopy and allowed wind to destroy neighbouring trees . In 1568 , despite a request from Saxony , no royal monopoly was granted because there was no yew to cut , and the next year Bavaria and Austria similarly failed to produce enough yew to justify a royal monopoly . Forestry records in this area in the 17th century do not mention yew , and it seems that no mature trees were to be had . The English tried to obtain supplies from the Baltic , but at this period bows were being replaced by guns in any case . The string . Bow string s were , and still are , made of hemp , flax or silk , and attached to the wood via horn " nocks " that fit onto the end of the bow . Modern synthetic materials ( often Dacron ) are now commonly used for strings . The arrow . A wide variety of arrow s were shot from the English longbow . Variations in length , fletching s and heads are all recorded . Perhaps the greatest diversity lies in hunting arrows , with varieties like broad - arrow , wolf - arrow , dog - arrow , Welsh arrow and Scottish arrow being recorded . War arrows were ordered in the thousands for medieval armies and navies , supplied in sheaves normally of 24 arrows . For example , between 1341 and 1359 the English crown is known to have obtained 51 , 350 sheaves ( 1 , 232 , 400 arrows ) . Only one significant group of arrows , from the Mary Rose , has survived . Over 3500 arrows were found , mainly made of poplar but also of ash , beech and hazel . Analysis of the intact specimens shows their length to vary from , with an average length of . Because of the preservation conditions of the Mary Rose no arrowheads survived . However , many heads have survived in other places , which has allowed typologies of arrow heads to be produced , the most modern being the Jessop typology . The most common arrowheads in military use were the short bodkin ( Jessop M10 ) and a small barbed arrow ( Jessop M4 ) . Use and performance . Training . Longbows were very difficult to master because the force required to deliver an arrow through the improving armour of medieval Europe was very high by modern standards . Although the draw weight of a typical English longbow is disputed , it was at least and possibly more than , with some estimates as high as . Considerable practice was required to produce the swift and effective combat shooting required . Skeletons of longbow archers are recognisably adapted , with enlarged left arms and often bone spur s on left wrists , left shoulders and right fingers . It was the difficulty in using the longbow which led various monarchs of England to issue instructions encouraging their ownership and practice , including the Assize of Arms of 1252 and King Edward III ' s declaration of 1363 : " Whereas the people of our realm , rich and poor alike , were accustomed formerly in their games to practise archery – whence by God ' s help , it is well known that high honour and profit came to our realm , and no small advantage to ourselves in our warlike enterprises . . . that every man in the same country , if he be able - bodied , shall , upon holidays , make use , in his games , of bows and arrows . . . and so learn and practise archery . " If the people practised archery , it would be that much easier for the King to recruit the proficient longbowmen he needed for his wars . Along with the greater ability of gunfire to penetrate plate armour , it was the long training needed by longbowmen which eventually led to their being replaced by musketmen . On the battlefield English archers stored their arrows stabbed upright into the ground at their feet , reducing the time it took to notch , draw and loose , as drawing from a quiver or arrow bag is slower . An unintended effect of this practice was that an arrowhead that had been stuck into the dirty ground , would be more likely to cause infection . Range . The range of the medieval weapon is not accurately known , with much depending on both the power of the bow and the type of arrow . It has been suggested that a flight arrow of a professional archer of Edward III ' s time would reach but the longest mark shot at on the London practice ground of Finsbury Fields in the 16th century was . In 1542 , Henry VIII set a minimum practice range for adults using flight arrows of ; ranges below this had to be shot with heavy arrows . Modern experiments broadly concur with these historical ranges . A 667 N ( 150 lbf ) " Mary Rose " replica longbow was able to shoot a arrow and a a distance of . In 2012 , Joe Gibbs shot a livery arrow with 170 lbf yew bow . Armour penetration . Modern testing . In an early modern test by Saxton Pope , a direct hit from a steel bodkin point penetrated Damascus mail armour . A 2006 test was made by Matheus Bane using a draw ( at 28 " ) bow , shooting at 10 yards ; according to Bane ' s calculations , this would be approximately equivalent to a bow at 250 yards . Measured against a replica of the thinnest contemporary " Jack coat " armour , a 905 grain needle bodkin and a 935 grain curved broadhead penetrated over . ( " Jack coat " armour could be up to twice as thick as the coat tested ; in Bane ' s opinion such a thick coat would have stopped bodkin arrows but not the cutting force of broadhead arrows . ) Against " high quality riveted maille " , the needle bodkin and curved broadhead penetrated 2 . 8 " . Against a coat of plates , the needle bodkin achieved 0 . 3 " penetration . The curved broadhead did not penetrate but caused 0 . 3 " of deformation of the metal . Results against plate armour of " minimum thickness " ( 1 . 2mm ) were similar to the coat of plates , in that the needle bodkin penetrated to a shallow depth , the other arrows not at all . In Bane ' s view , the plate armour would have kept out all the arrows if thicker or worn with more padding . Other modern tests described by Bane include those by Williams ( which concluded that longbows could " not " penetrate mail , but in Bane ' s view did not use a realistic arrow tip ) , Robert Hardy ' s tests ( which achieved broadly similar results to Bane ) , and a " Primitive Archer " test which demonstrated that a longbow could penetrate a plate armour breastplate . However , the " Primitive Archer " test used a longbow at very short range , generating 160 joules ( vs . 73 for Bane and 80 for Williams ) , so probably not representative of battles of the time . In 2011 , Mike Loades conducted an experiment in which short bodkin arrows were shot at a range of by a bows of . The target was covered in a riveted mail over a fabric armour of deerskin over 24 linen layers . While most arrows went through the mail layer , none fully penetrated the textile armour . The experimenters , however , concluded that a long bodkin arrow would have penetrated through this armour combination . Even so , Loades cautions that this experiment did not reflect normal combat ranges and used powerful bows , so may not be typical of battlefield performance . Other research has also concluded that later medieval armour , such as that of the Italian city state mercenary companies , was effective at stopping contemporary arrows . Contemporary accounts . Gerald of Wales commented on the power of the Welsh longbow in the 12th century : Archery was described by contemporaries as ineffective against plate armour in the Battle of Neville ' s Cross ( 1346 ) , the siege of Bergerac ( 1345 ) , and the Battle of Poitiers ( 1356 ) ; such armour became available to European knights of fairly modest means by the late 14th century , though never to all soldiers in any army . Strickland and Hardy suggest that " even at a range of 240 yards heavy war arrows shot from bows of poundages in the mid - to upper range possessed by the Mary Rose bows would have been capable of killing or severely wounding men equipped with armour of wrought iron . Higher - quality armour of steel would have given considerably greater protection , which accords well with the experience of Oxford ' s men against the elite French vanguard at Poitiers in 1356 , and des Ursin ' s statement that the French knights of the first ranks at Agincourt , which included some of the most important ( and thus best - equipped ) nobles , remained comparatively unhurt by the English arrows . " Summary . Modern tests and contemporary accounts agree therefore that well - made plate armour could protect against longbows . However this did not necessarily make the longbow ineffective ; thousands of longbowmen were deployed in the English victory at Agincourt against plate armoured French knights in 1415 . Clifford Rogers has argued that while longbows might not have been able to penetrate steel breastplates at Agincourt they could still penetrate the thinner armour on the limbs . Most of the French knights advanced on foot but , exhausted by walking across wet muddy terrain in heavy armour enduring a " terrifying hail of arrow shot " , they were overwhelmed in the melee . Less heavily armoured soldiers were more vulnerable than knights . For example , enemy crossbowmen were forced to retreat at Crecy when deployed without their protecting pavises . Horses were generally less well protected than the knights themselves ; shooting the French knights ' horses from the side ( where they were less well armoured ) is described by contemporary accounts of the Battle of Poitiers , and at Agincourt John Keegan has argued that the main effect of the longbow would have been in injuring the horses of the mounted French knights . Shooting rate . A typical military longbow archer would be provided with between 60 and 72 arrows at the time of battle . Most archers would not loose arrows at maximum rate , as it would exhaust even the most experienced man . " With the heaviest bows [ a modern warbow archer ] does not like to try for more than six a minute . " Not only do the arms and shoulder muscles tire from the exertion , but the fingers holding the bowstring become strained ; therefore , actual rates of shooting in combat would vary considerably . Ranged volleys at the beginning of the battle would differ markedly from the closer , aimed shots as the battle progressed and the enemy neared . Arrows were not unlimited , so archers and their commanders took every effort to ration their use to the situation at hand . Nonetheless , resupply during battle was available . Young boys were often employed to run additional arrows to longbow archers while in their positions on the battlefield . " The longbow was the machine gun of the Middle Ages : accurate , deadly , possessed of a long range and rapid rate of fire , the flight of its missiles was likened to a storm . " This rate was much higher than that of its Western European projectile rival on the battlefield , the crossbow . It was also much higher than the standard early firearms , although the lower training requirements and greater penetration of firearms eventually led to the longbow falling into disuse . Treating arrow wounds . The only way to remove an arrow cleanly was to tie a piece of cloth soaked in water to the end of it and push it through the victim ' s wound and out the other side — this was extremely painful . There were specialised tools used in the medieval period to extract arrows from places where bone prevented the arrow being pushed through . Prince Hal , later Henry V , was wounded in the face by an arrow at the Battle of Shrewsbury ( 1403 ) . The royal physician John Bradmore had such a tool made , which consisted of a pair of smooth tongs . Once carefully inserted into the socket of the arrowhead , the tongs screwed apart till they gripped its walls and allowed the head to be extracted from the wound . Prior to the extraction , the hole made by the arrow shaft had been widened by inserting larger and larger dowels of elder pith wrapped in linen down the entry wound . The dowels were soaked in honey , now known to have antiseptic properties . The wound was then dressed with a poultice of barley and honey mixed in turpentine . After 20 days the wound was free of infection . History . Etymology . The first recorded use of the term ' longbow ' , as distinct from simply ' bow ' , occurs in a Paston Letter of the 15th century . Origins . The origins of the English longbow are disputed . While it is hard to assess the significance of military archery in pre - Norman Conquest Anglo - Saxon warfare , it is clear that archery played a prominent role under the Normans , as the story of the Battle of Hastings shows . Their Anglo - Norman descendants also made use of military archery , as exemplified by their victory at the Battle of the Standard in 1138 . During the Anglo - Norman invasions of Wales , Welsh bowmen took a heavy toll of the invaders and Welsh archers would feature in English armies from this point on . However , historians dispute whether this archery used a different kind of bow to the later English Longbow . Traditionally it has been argued that prior to the beginning of the 14th century , the weapon was a self bow between four and five feet in length , known since the 19th century as the shortbow . This weapon , drawn to the chest rather than the ear , was much weaker . However , in 1985 , Jim Bradbury reclassified this weapon as the " ordinary wooden bow " , reserving the term shortbow for short composite bow s and arguing that longbows were a developed form of this ordinary bow . Strickland and Hardy in 2005 took this argument further , suggesting that the shortbow was a myth and all early English bows were a form of longbow . In 2011 , Clifford Rogers forcefully restated the traditional case based upon a variety of evidence , including a large scale iconographic survey . In 2012 , Richard Wadge added to the debate with an extensive survey of record , iconographic and archaeological evidence , concluding that longbows co - existed with shorter self - wood bows in England in the period between the Norman conquest and the reign of Edward III , but that powerful longbows shooting heavy arrows were a rarity until the later 13th century . Whether or not there was a technological revolution at the end of the 13th century therefore remains in dispute . What is agreed , however , is that the English longbow as an effective weapon system evolved in the late 13th and early 14th centuries . Fourteenth and fifteenth century . The longbow decided many medieval battles fought by the English , the most significant of which were the Battle of Crécy ( 1346 ) and the Battle of Agincourt ( 1415 ) , during the Hundred Years ' War and followed earlier successes , notably at the Battle of Halidon Hill ( 1333 ) during the Scottish wars . The longbow was also used against the English by their Welsh neighbours . The Welsh used the longbow mostly in a different manner than the English . In many early period English campaigns , the Welsh used the longbow in ambushes , often at point blank range that allowed their missiles to penetrate armour and generally do a lot of damage . Although longbows were much faster and more accurate than the black - powder weapons which replaced them , longbowmen always took a long time to train because of the years of practice necessary before a war longbow could be used effectively ( examples of longbows from the " Mary Rose " typically had draws greater than ) . In an era in which warfare was usually seasonal , and non - noble soldiers spent part of the year working at farms , the year - round training required for the effective use of the longbow was a challenge . A standing army was an expensive proposition to a medieval ruler . Mainland European armies seldom trained a significant longbow corps . Due to their specialized training , English longbowmen were sought as mercenaries in other European countries , most notably in the Italian city - states and in Spain . The White Company , comprising men - at - arms and longbowmen and commanded by Sir John Hawkwood , is the best known English Free Company of the 14th century . The powerful Hungarian king , Louis the Great , is an example of someone who used longbowmen in his Italian campaigns . Sixteenth century and after . Longbows remained in use until around the 16th century , when advances in firearms made gunpowder weapons a significant factor in warfare and such units as arquebus iers and grenadiers began appearing . Before the English Civil War , a pamphlet by William Neade entitled " The Double - Armed Man " advocated that soldiers be trained in both the longbow and pike ; this advice was followed only by a few town militias . The last recorded use of bows in an English battle seems to have been a skirmish at Bridgnorth , in October 1642 , during the Civil War , when an impromptu town militia proved effective against un - armoured musketeers . Longbowmen remained a feature of the Royalist Army , but were not used by the Roundheads . Longbow s have been in continuous production and use for sport and for hunting to the present day , but since 1642 they have been a minority interest , and very few have had the high draw weights of the medieval weapons . Other differences include the use of a stiffened non - bending centre section , rather than a continuous bend . Serious military interest in the longbow faded after the seventeenth century but occasionally schemes to resurrect its military use were proposed . Benjamin Franklin was a proponent in the 1770s ; the Honourable Artillery Company had an archer company between 1784 and 1794 ; and a man named Richard Mason wrote a book proposing the arming of militia with pike and longbow in 1798 . Donald Featherstone also records a Lt . Col . Richard Lee of 44th Foot advocated the military use of the longbow in 1792 . There is a record of the use of the longbow in action as late as WWII , when Jack Churchill is credited with a longbow kill in France in 1940 . The weapon was certainly considered for use by Commandos during the war but it is not known whether it was used in action . Tactics . Battle formations . The idea that there was a standard formation for English longbow armies was argued by Alfred Byrne in his influential work on the battles of the Hundred Years ' War , " The Crecy War " . This view was challenged by Jim Bradbury in his book " The Medieval Archer " and more modern works are more ready to accept a variety of formations . In summary , however , the usual English deployment in the 14th and 15th centuries was as follows : In the 16th century , these formations evolved in line with new technologies and techniques from the continent . Formations with a central core of pikes and bills were flanked by companies of " shot " made up of a mixture of archers and arquebusiers , sometimes with a skirmish screen of archers and arquebusiers in front . Surviving bows and arrows . More than 3 , 500 arrows and 137 whole longbows were recovered from the " Mary Rose " , a ship of Henry VIII ' s navy that capsized and sank at Portsmouth in 1545 . It is an important source for the history of the longbow , as the bows , archery implements and the skeletons of archers have been preserved . The bows range in length from with an average length of . The majority of the arrows were made of poplar , others were made of beech , ash and hazel . Draw lengths of the arrows varied between with the majority having a draw length of . The head would add 5 – 15 cm depending on type , though some 2 – 4 . 5 cm must be allowed for the insertion of the shaft into the socket . The longbows on the " Mary Rose " were in excellent finished condition . There were enough bows to test some to destruction which resulted in draw forces of 450 N ( 100 lbf ) on average . However , analysis of the wood indicated that they had degraded significantly in the seawater and mud , which had weakened their draw forces . Replicas were made and when tested had draw forces of from 445 N to 823 N ( 100 to 185 lbf ) . In 1980 , before the finds from the " Mary Rose " , Robert E . Kaiser published a paper stating that there were five known surviving longbows : Social importance . The importance of the longbow in English culture can be seen in the legends of Robin Hood , which increasingly depicted him as a master archer , and also in the " Song of the Bow " , a poem from " The White Company " by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle . During the reign of Henry III the Assize of Arms of 1252 required that all " citizens , burgesses , free tenants , villeins and others from 15 to 60 years of age " should be armed . The poorest of them were expected to have a halberd and a knife , and a bow if they owned land worth more than £2 . This made it easier for the King to raise an army , but also meant that the bow was a weapon commonly used by rebels during the Peasants ' Revolt . From the time that the yeoman class of England became proficient with the longbow , the nobility in England had to be careful not to push them into open rebellion . It is conjectured that yew trees were commonly planted in English churchyards to have readily available longbow wood .