English war bow

Originally posted by rider Do you know when it went out of use, or the last recorded use of longbows?

In England, that would have been in the mid to late 1590's, at a guess, as the Shire levies summoned for the Armada campaign in 1588 still contained many longbow men. I suspect there would have been a gradual decline as calivers and arquebuses became more commonplace. 

Originally posted by Challenger2 In England, that would have been in the mid to late 1590's, at a guess, as the Shire levies summoned for the Armada campaign in 1588 still contained many longbow men. I suspect there would have been a gradual decline as calivers and arquebuses became more commonplace.

As I recall it, bowmen were still in use militarily in the early 17th century in England. It was also during this period that it became a gentleman's sport in the country (and presumeably also declined as a military pursuit).


Edited by Endre Fodstad - 05-Jul-2007 at 16:37

I have to admit (and, working as a museums conservator, I've seen quite a few bows of a great deal of periods in addition to my living history interest in the subject) that I really don't spot any difference between stone age bows and later bows in finish, since, as I said, many of the Mary Rose bows are just staves.

The modern olympic bow is recurved and made from layered composite plastics, fiberglass, and carbon fiber (the flat bow construction profile lends well to layering modern composite materials). Wooden flatbows are excellent weapons, but tend to be limited in draw power unless you really start wasting wood to make the bow. They've tended to be used more as hunting bows than as war bows. Native american indians did actually use both types of bow - some tribes used d/circular-cross section "long"bows of 100lbs+.

Originally posted by Endre Fodstad Originally posted by Challenger2 In England, that would have been in the mid to late 1590's, at a guess, as the Shire levies summoned for the Armada campaign in 1588 still contained many longbow men. I suspect there would have been a gradual decline as calivers and arquebuses became more commonplace.  As I recall it, bowmen were still in use militarily in the early 17th century in England...

Not by the Trained Bands, which by then had moved on to Calivers and Muskets. It's possible the Shire levies still had them but they would have been phased out as firearms became cheaper and more readily available.