Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: Irontom on September 04, 2010, 09:44:03 am
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Simple question, why did the American Flat Bow and ELB replace the Mollegabet style bows?
There seems to be a surge in the popularity of the Mollegabet style bows recently. It is a very interesting looking bow, and everyone says it shoots very well. I'm curious as to why this style didn't continue on into more modern times? What are the flaws that make the long bow/flat bow a better design by comparison?
Maybe I'm completely off the mark with my assumptions and the Molle is still in use somewhere? Just looking for more info...
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As far as I understand they have only found one Mollegabet style bow and it has been suggested that the bow was made for a child. So despite its current popularity the question should be was there ever many Mollegabet style bows to be replaced.
Craig.
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Rich (half eye) is THE authority on this subject. I expect he'll respond when he sees this later. In short, yes, they were used, and YES, they are very powerful and cast an arrow with authority. Any and all styles have been made for children, native peoples were not born with an innate ability to accurately shoot hunting weight bows.
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i think the only real reason that they changed is because time itself changed
all things good and bad change thru out time
if you realy want an "authority" on the subject,then your best bet is to talk to someone with an
educated background on such a subject.
just because Rich makes a lot of bows does not mean he is "THE AUTHORITY"on the subject
hell i make a lot of stone knives and arrow heads and self bows,but that does not mean i am an authority on any of it
so like i said if your ealy want an answer then talk to someone tat has aneducation and background on the subject
other wise its just speculation from one persons point of veiw and that cant realy hold any weight because its just an opinion on a subject
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Not to be argumentative, but just because he makes a lot of bows also does not disqualify him from knowing what hes talking about. He has a lot of knowledge on this style, and has done quite a bit of research on the subject, not to mention posted a lot of museum pictures and smithsonian referances. He has a few bows on display in a native american museum that they themselves consider an accurate depiction of their ancestral weapons.
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Not to be argumentative, but just because he makes a lot of bows also does not disqualify him from knowing what hes talking about. He has a lot of knowledge on this style, and has done quite a bit of research on the subject, not to mention posted a lot of museum pictures and smithsonian referances. He has a few bows on display in a native american museum that they themselves consider an accurate depiction of their ancestral weapons.
i never said he didnt know how to make them
or that his work wasnt decent enough
what i said was if you want an "authority on the subject" find some one whom is educated and has a background on the subject
i too can make holmies and mollies,does that make me an authority on the subject?no it just means i have the ability to make them
having the ability to make them does not make one and authority on shit
i have a couple of his bows,and the wife has one,and just cause he made them does not mean they are good bows
the first broke after 21 arrows,the second one cracked just puling it to draw,hers has more set in it than any bow i have ever tillerd out and she refuses to shoot it
also just becuase he post pics and references the smithsonian and other sources doesnt realy mean squat either,to me that just means he spends alot of time looking at crap on the internet
ive been to the smithsonian and have seen and taken pics of al the NA and primitive stuff.
does tha mean i am an authority on all of that now? no it does not,i do alot of research on line to,but i am not a authority on it.
now i have and education and 20+ yrs background in the automotive field,does that make me an authority,damn straight it does.
i have the eduactio and background to prove it.just becuase you probably change yor own oil and can put in spark plugs and brakes does not mean you are an authority on automotives
see what iam getting at here?
just because someone has the ability and can make a few does not mean one is an authority
is his opinion valued by some here,sure it is,but that still does not mean he is an authority on it as he was called by gothmog,no that stil does not make him an authority on the subject.
now i am not saying that he cant make bows,what i am saying is that id Irontom wants a true answer to his question on why this style of bow is no longer in use,then he needs to find someone whom has the education and background on such a subject,otherwise its just speculation
helli can speculate on the subject too,i could say that they decided t=to give up the design because they could tell in the future that compunds would be coming and whay waste your time with such poor design when you know that the wheelie thing is coming in just a matter of few centuries or so.
see speculation ;) and id doenst mean shit and cant hold water,why because its speculation
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if you have read the bowyers bible series, it goes into some detail as to what the authors have found to be most efficient in a bow, which is a design with wide inner and midlimbs, and narrow nonbending outer limbs to keep mass down. IMO the molle is very close to a design like they speak of. cant remember which volume it was offhand but it had the "mantra Bows" in it.
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Again, I'm not trying to argue, even though it seems your feeling fiesty this morn ;D. I'm not commenting on his bows, though I find them more than adequate. I'm also not stating that he is the be all, end all authority on the subject. I'm mearly stating that on THIS sight, he knows more about them than most, if not all the rest of us. Doing research privately, whether on a computer, in books, museums, or speaking with other knowledgeable people is no different than knowledge paid for and gained in a school. I don't doubt you know your way around a car, but I see no difference in the knowledge you gained in school and experience you earned plying your trade and the knowledge gained privately and experience gained learning that and practically applying it by others. I guess till we have someone on this board that has an ivy league doctorate on the subject we will have to take the word of the best educated in the field that we have. This is fun this morning, I enjoyed the debate. Had a LONG night at work, nice to blow off some steam ;D. I need another cup of joe.
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gothmog,glad you are taking this as a debate ;D
i too see it as that and nothingmore.
however when i hear some call someone else an "authority" on any subject
there a re a few things i expect from an authority on any subject
those things are: education and and experienced background on said subject
now one can be self educated as you suggested,however a self education still comes up short as compared to
an education one gets from scholars on any subject(s).
my next door neighbor likes to think he is a mechanic
he chages alot of oil,brakes,spark plugs etc for people he knows
they even call him a mechanic as he himself does.
but can he do what i can do with m education,nope not even close.
he comes to me for help all the time when hes doing someting that he truly is over his head on.
hell i just got back from 2 days fo FORD training,and i go back on 2 weeks for 2 more days.
see now thats one of the differences between being a "mechanic" and an "automotive diagnostic technician"
i am the later of the two.
now i agree Rich probably knows more than most (on this site) on these style of bows.
does this make him an authority,no it stil does not make him one
it makes him knowledgable on the subject yes.there fore his opinion is valued by folks on them styles.
but in my opinion he is like me next door neighbor,has a little more knowledge than the average bowyer does on those designs
however it still does not make an authority of him on said subject. ;)
now i have to agree with you one more point in your last post also.
i too need another cup of beans :D
and i still stick by my first post on this topic
the change from these styles to the flatbow styles were simply because time itself had changed
and we all know that all things change with time
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This isn't really a matter of someone knowing the bow style. It is a matter of guessing why it lost popularity. We cant even agree on how popular it was to start with so we might be in trouble here. There are guys who can build good shooting bows of this style. But if you want to know how they compare in performance to another style, you need someone like Steve Gardner (badger) who isn't afraid to take a scientific approach and measure the measureable points. There are very few people who have the experience, knowledge or desire to get reliable results and tell you if the performance is better much less tell you why it is better.
There are a lot of guys who know something about ancient cultures. But a professional who has studied the culture and handled the artifacts, collected the food, dug op the points, and been inside a camp during excavation would definitely be the best source for info. If I wanted a little info, I would certainly talk to anyone I could find, but if I wanted reliable detail I would contact someone like the Charles Greyson museum in Missouri.
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My computer crased in the middle of a response. Have to re-type it. One thing is certain, I am definately NOT an authority on computer techy matters.
Anywho, I too am pleased that you are taking this lightheartedly. I do not intend to offend anyone. I do agree that on the automotive subject, your knowledge and experience are superior to that of your neighbor, making you the authority on your block. I do not, however, believe that is due to you being educated in a particular environment. I beleve it is due to you being more thoroughly trained and educated, and possessing a more extensive history in the subject. Applying this to bows, no one argues that the Traditional Bowyers Bibles are authoritative on the subject. In those volumes however, the authors themselves clearly state that most of their knowledge is self gained through trial and error, not collegiately. They state that there was a clear lack of printed material or education to be had on the subject, so they set out to discover it themselves. Now, nearly two decades later, these tomes and their authors are considered among the foremost authorities on the subject. Food for thought...
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This isn't really a matter of someone knowing the bow style. It is a matter of guessing why it lost popularity. We cant even agree on how popular it was to start with so we might be in trouble here. There are guys who can build good shooting bows of this style. But if you want to know how they compare in performance to another style, you need someone like Steve Gardner (badger) who isn't afraid to take a scientific approach and measure the measureable points. There are very few people who have the experience, knowledge or desire to get reliable results and tell you if the performance is better much less tell you why it is better.
There are a lot of guys who know something about ancient cultures. But a professional who has studied the culture and handled the artifacts, collected the food, dug op the points, and been inside a camp during excavation would definitely be the best source for info. If I wanted a little info, I would certainly talk to anyone I could find, but if I wanted reliable detail I would contact someone like the Charles Greyson museum in Missouri.
I agree with your comment as well, and apologise to the original poster. We kind of got off track of the original query entertaining ourselves. However, there was a post recently, I'll try to dig it up, where the aforementioned PA specialist stated that an aquaintance had done the scientific testing on the mollegabet style and found it to be among the most efficient styles known to us...
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Here's the quote:
http://www.primitivearcher.com/smf/index.php/topic,21105.msg289302.html#msg289302
not very in depth, but something that can be further explored
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Hi Irontom,
As an authority on nothing, and an expert on even less ;D, I cal tell you what I've seen in my own limited experience. I'm guessing it might be a production efficiency issue. I've made two or three Mollegabet style bows, and maybe eight or nine longbow-ish, flatbow-ish, and pyramid style bows, and although the Mollegabets are one of my personal favorites, they take me at least twice as long to make as a flat bow or ELB would, and have more things to attend to, like two extra fades, and getting those levers light enough but still stiff enough. So, if it was just me (with no power tools) in the Northwoods, hunting for me and mine, I'd probably take the time to work out a fine tuned bow of whatever type, but if I was the Kings Bowyer, and saw that 30,000 pesky French knights were coming to call, and not for tea, I'd have to go with something I could turn out in high volume, and quickly. Does that square with history? Dunno.
I don't at all say that making longbows is any less an art and skill than any other type, and I also have to add that I'm not a slow bow maker, nor a fast bow maker. I'm a half fast bow maker. ;)
Just my 2 cents, that and five bucks'll get you a small orange mocha frappacino.
Frode
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Justin, i agree fully.this is, in differant words,what i said in my first post ;)
one can know how to build them,but that doenst mean that they would know the answer to the original question
which was why they lost their popularity in use
like i said,only someone with the education and a background in this area would be able to give a closer to definitive answer as to why
the rest of us would be purely speculating
i still say the design changed because time changed
and all things change in time
Frode:good point on production effieciency
glad were all still having fun with this topic :D
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I also fully agree with this point. To be devil's advocate though(again >:D), unless said scholar was actually there at the time and place that the design was abandoned, it would be nothing more than an educated guess, not fact.
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Just caught this thread.....Jesus Fellas,
I aint never said I was an expert on anything....I've posted bows and told ya what I found out about them, and where I found it, nothing more. When I got called out on my sources I even posted the museum catalog numbers, but damn if this aint gettin out a hand. By the way the bow WAS made into the middleages (pic attached) by at least the Russ decendants. If you take a good look ya can see where the design is the same but it is a whole lot more crudely built. Maybe they run out of need, people who made 'em, or what ever reason but who cares how come? They existed, they ran their course and went away ....just like everything else does.
I like 'em cause they shoot good, dont believe I ever said they was any better than anyother kind, so why dont everybody holster their pistols before somebody gets shot in the foot? For everybody that wants to get technical....the bow's located in a Russian museum and listed as a "Middle age Russian hunting bow", and no I didn't make it up.
rich
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Build them all to the best of your ability and be your own authority. The authority's used to say the world was flat. There are lots of authority's on many subjects, I'm sure you can find one to agree with and probably a few to disagree with.
P.s. try decaf boys
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;D Easy Rich. Nobody's gettin shot, just a friendly debate held tongue in cheek for entertainment purposes only. :D
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Got to go, this has been fun, but there are things that need doin....
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gothmog, once again i agree ;)
i got coral thats cooking that i need to attend to
not to mention its a hell of a day to get out on the scooter ;D
n2huntn: why decaf,that doesnt keep me going?
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What I read TBB vol ? was that after the copper/bronze age when men could split larger logs into
staves with metal wedges and follow one growth ring, the Holmies disappeared. The D-bows that came
after that were easier to build and tiller.
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an interesting read about the subject.http://paleoplanet69529.yuku.com/topic/27645
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Rich, don't missunderstand, I think you are an expert bowyer and you have made some awesome bows of this style. What I am saying is we are speculating on cultural evolution and it isn't enough to build awesome bows to know the culture. We must understand the whole culture before we can understand the evolution of bows. If we aren't going from a archaeological perspective then we need to go from performance. To judge performance we would have to build hundreds of bows of each kind and compare them. Steve is the only person I know who has done that kind of testing.
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Mr. Tim Baker, considered by some to be an authority. Quoted in Tbb as having built every conceivable type of bow from every conceivable material. Is he still around?
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actually i emailed tim awhile back about some questions on grain violation. he is still around , dont know if he still haunts the boards or not.
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Mr. Tim Baker, considered by some to be an authority. Quoted in Tbb as having built every conceivable type of bow from every conceivable material. Is he still around?
yes maybe as an authority on bowmaking
however i would not consider him an authority on cultural archeology
and thats what the topic was about,why was the design of a holmie/mollie bow dropped or changed and no longer used
not whether or not it was an efficiant bow design.
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I think that is exactly the fundamental difference we were debating earlier.
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Ah, Rich. The only person I know on these boards that can be the direct cause of a heated debate in a thread without even posting in it. And all he is really guilty of is making lots of good bows. Such a trouble maker... >:D ::)
Stay thirsty my friends. ;D Keep making bows, Rich.
In case speculation is still worth mentioning, I'd like to propose the idea that maybe the flatbow design is much easier to the bowyer than the moll design, which to a person that does not know how to make them, would be intimidating.
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Half eye,
Interesting picture, do you know anything about the bow? Have you actually seen it? Nothing else in the picture looks old is the bow an actual artifact or a reproduction? I have to say that I have travelled and worked in areas of what was the Soviet Union, now independent countries, not Russia, and found that some museums had reproductions of artifacts on display, some of which were not native to the area. Things could have improved in the last few years but then again!!!!!!
So sorry to be a doubting Thomas but the bow looks to be in too fine a condition to be what is claimed.
Can anyone from Russia or who has visited the country confirm the picture is of an actual artifact or provide links to contemporary drawings of bows of this shape.
Craig.
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Thanks for all the info guys. I didn't mean to start any wars, I had no clue how passionate of a subject this was for some people.
Whoever said the bit about production being harder makes sense, and is along the lines of what I was looking for. A lot of the posts lately have been talking up the good points of the style but I wanted to know what the trade off was. I was only thinking of actual performance of the bow and had assumed there was a hidden flaw in the design that showed itself later in the bows lifespan. Along the lines of being hard to mass produce, the amount of material required likely could have played a part in it as well.
The thought just occurred to me, the situations the bows are used in likely had something to do with it too. The right tool for the right job and all that.
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Irontom, I think you just said it.. Time, material, And use determine the design, as well as the tools and expierience. As for actual facts, It is all spectualtion , unless you have personally spoke to the builder or shot the bow and have expierence and have a good knowledge of archery. I don't think some bow or bowyer 7,000 years old is here for us to share with orbow to shoot. Although , there are parts of or a whole bow out there, I am sure no one has or would try to shoot one. So all we have is spectulation on the design and performance from the bows we build or some one has replicated..And I am sorry there is a big difference from the historian and the actual builder and or the builder of today. Buy the way , I measure authority from the passion of the person, not knowledge. We can always say this or that, but when do you believe or when do you not believe, That is up to the person who is spoken too...That being said , because someone speaks of knowledge, That doesn't mean they are of authority.By the way Tim Baker is still out there, He has instucted me to contact P'A' , When I asked him for more info on holmey's. This is only my opinion of an old man seeking truth. Denny