Please don't get into the String theory as you are putting yourself in the firing line to be shot down big time. Please sit back and LISTEN to those who know a lot more than you about the MR bows than you do.
Steve
Ooh, that sounds scary. I don’t know why anyone would want to “shoot down big time” a post offered to inform interested people but as I’ve said, I welcome correction. I prefer historically based evidence, such as I have posted, rather than garbled incoherent attacks. The above refers to Tudor bow strings, not theoretical physics and the post was as follows.
I think we are all aware that the bowstrings were made ‘of very fine hemp’ or silk and had a loop as mentioned by Ascham, Smythe [Certaine Discourses] and ‘Lartdarcherie’ [ pub.Paris 1515, trans. Col Walrond ], Lartdarcherie, which contradicts Ascham only as to whether to nock an arrow before or after taking a stand, states that the string should be tightly twisted of three strands of fiber or thread. [We know from the Mary Rose arrows that the strings had to be only about 1/8” thick.] The loop [ for longbow horn tipped sidenocks.],, should be made as small as possible and stretched with a stone weight. Ascham’s comment about the bending, the timber hitch at the end , “if [the string] be long, the bending must needs be in the small of the string, which being sore twisted, must needs snap in sunder”, clearly tells us that the string is made thicker at the bending, a stress point. The loop being another stress point, and with Ascham’s comment “ if either of the nocks be naught” referring to the string, not the bow, we can safely infer that the loop would be likewise reinforced. Smythe, a strong Elizabethan proponent of military archery, tells us that the strings were also treated “ with a kind of water glue to resist wet and moisture” and in 1547 every archer was to “have three bow strings in a waterproof case”.. We no longer know what that glue was.
So much for the stringer. Smythe tells us that the string is whipped [served] by the archers with fine thread, as we do now, and a list of gear for Elizabeth’s “trayned bands” says, :”every string whipped in the nock”, another point of wear.
I would not be able to offer a much more detailed description ot a Tudor period bow string if a time traveller dropped an original one in my lap. For those interested in making one, I suggest Dr, Elmer’s ‘Target Archery”, which describes the real Flemish string as made by a Belgian stringer from the early 20th century who died with his craft, but whose strings suggested how they were made. They did however have a looser twist than noted above. Making such a string of linen ,silk, or hemp, is an all day job for me.
Cheers,
Erik
