Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT
WCDT Strips 3641 to 3645 (25th - 30th December 2017)
TheEvilDog:
The real reason why crossbows were banned was because they were superior to the bows and longbows at the time, in England in particular.
Under English law, levies and retainers were required to spend several hours on a Sunday practising the use of the longbow, with many already serving as hunters for their lords or themselves. In fact, it was this reliance on the longbow that let the English win the Battle of Agincourt (what historians consider to be the peak of the longbow) and suffer a rout at the Battle of Patay. Every longbowman in English armies relied on their bows to provide for their families, thus necessitating a level of skill. Bows and longbows, while having a simple design, required a specialised method in their construction, so a well crafted bow might pass down from father to son. Not to mention the fact that a longbow took a great deal of strength to draw the string (current estimates put the draw of modern bows at about a third of the potential of English longbows), to the point where archaeologists can tell if someone used a bow by looking at the skeleton.
Conversely, the crossbow was a simple enough design to be mass produced; didn't require any great deal of training in their use, to the point where a crossbowman could be quite proficient within a week, compared to years with the bow. For a small outlay, you could quickly arm a large force of people with a weapon to could penetrate the armour of knights. Which the Vatican didn't like and declared them un-Christian and works of the devil. Which didn't stop most of Europe arming themselves with them very quickly.
Cornelius:
There are some advantages to the longbow, though, such as speed of firing, and the fact that it is easily r setting. Some sure that that is the major point that won Agincourt, as the rain had made the French crossbows useless, while the longbowmen had kept their bowstrings dry.
It seems that even then, there was no authority that could keep the evolution of arms at bay.
TheEvilDog:
The speed advantage came from being able to draw the bowstring, which if you wanted it to be effective required a good deal of upper body strength. To the point where the skeleton deformed slightly, particularly in the arms and shoulders. To be really effective with a longbow, you needed to be in (for the period) peak health.
Volume wasn't the best advantage, especially as armour evolved through the medieval period to the early Renaissance.
Meanwhile:
- Crossbows were easy to use, anyone could use them with only a little training.
- The quarrel fired along a flatter arc rather the arrow, allowing a lighter quarrel to travel faster.
- Easier to supply. Quarrels require less materials to make than an arrow, in less time too. Meaning you could make more for the same amount. And arrows need a spine that was flexible enough to allow it to move when it was released from the bowstring.
- Crossbows made siege warfare more dangerous. Where a bowman had to remain in the open to draw their shot and release, leaving them open to be fired upon, crossbowmen could remain behind a shield or pavise or battlement, reload, aim and fire. And in a siege, accuracy was valued over speed.
- Obviously, the crossbow's main advantage was the penetrative power. When an arrow was released, the potential energy stored was partially dissipated through the wave movement of its arc. A quarrel was less flexible but able to withstand far more force than the arrow, and was less likely to lose potential energy through its arc.
Bear in mind that the Battle of Agincourt was fought during the Hundred Years War, which the English eventually lost, the Battle of Patay being one the final nails in the coffin, due to the knights charging the English Longbowmen before they had even gotten into place.
I'm sorry if I seem to be harping on about this, its just that I'm from a historic town that has a strong connection to the longbow (we supplied most of the yew wood for their creation for several hundred years) and I'm something of a history buff.
Bollthorn:
--- Quote from: Cornelius on 29 Dec 2017, 13:06 ---I do doubt the connection between priests and maces, as expressed. The crozier has always been the shepherd's staff, quite distinct from the formal maces some dignitaries carry in processions. In fact, priests were decidedly non-combatants, and were only allowed non lethal weapons for self defence, when present as chaplain or confessor on the battlefield. Shedding blood disqualified one for priesthood, much like how a church where blood has been shed must be reconsecrated.
--- End quote ---
Well before the 12th century law was passed, priests were just as capable at fighting as any soldier of the time. When they excavated Lindisfarne, they found two sets of graves from the 793 AD Viking raid, one inside the priory for the monks who fell, and one outside the priory for the Vikings who were killed. And all the skeletons they dug up all had similar gashes, breaks and holes from swords, axes and spears.
Morituri:
I just wanted to say I think it's interesting that Melon seems to live in her own peculiar version of the universe.
And, looking at the weapons they had in the 12th century, and what kind of range they fired to and what kind of damage they did, if I'd been looking for a combat edge by developing a version that separated the powering-up from the aiming/launching procedure, I'd have been looking at the sling.
That rock-flinging device with the long flexy handles, which apparently took freakin' FOREVER to learn properly to aim and use, had a range very similar to the shortbow and landed these massive bonebreaking blows that crushed most kinds of protective gear and took people straight out of the fight. If somebody had done for that what the crossbow did for archery, we'd - oh, wait.
Guns.
Never mind.
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