No subject

to illegal stripping of bark to sell to obtain taxol for cancer 
treatment experimentation. You're lucky to have some. I hear it's 
quite scarce now and the Federals aren't allowing harvesting in 
National Forests - unless something I haven't heard of has changed.
                        ------------
I generally write informative posts for lots of people.
*Please do not repost this to the Rialto, newsgroups in general,
or to the SCA-Universitas list.* (I'm rather particular about
that and consider it a violation of my copyright to do so.)
Forwarding to other closed subscriber-based, SCA or reenactor
elist discussion groups I have no problem with. The above I do.
                        -------------
I'm not sure if I have information on a western european horn
armguard or not. I would be interested in finding your source
for this. (I may already have it, but I'd like to see it.)

I do have the original article on the leather Henry VIII bracer. 
I've scaled it up to right size and at some point I may redo 
the design to reflect our Windmasters Hill Baronial Archery Corps, 
or the Atlantian archery groups in general, by carving the 
design into a linoleum block and using a large wood vise or a can 
press to impress it into the leather. Archers here are very active.
 - I got a lot of practice carving linoleum blocks when I was
a teenage artist. I did dozens of the things - mostly animals.

Dalton, O. M.: A Late Medieval Bracer in the British Museum; 
in the _Antiquaries Journal July, 1922, (Vol. II, No. 3)_ 
reprint, pp. 208-10 with illustration. Archery. 

(There is a scaled drawing in it. Not full scale though. You 
get to use that pantograph you always knew you'd need one day.)

I do engraving and carving with burins and have the same size sets
in wood gouges and veiners. The only difference is that instead
of carving into positives, I would be making a negative and
frequently checking it with play-doh impressions. The master would, 
of course, have to be reversed. Linoleum blocks in various sizes
are obtainable, as are the Xacto tools to carve them, from
most hobby and art supply stores. they are usually backed with
a good grade hardwood and can be cut to size of your project.

The easiest way I know of to transfer designs is to make originals
on graphed paper, enlarge or reduce them to desired sizes,
and rubber cement them to the hard material to be worked. Then I
generally cut through the design with an xacto #11 blade,
pull up the paper and rub the remainder of the rubber cement off.
Generally this leaves enough residue in the lines that you can
see them. Otherwise I take a sharpie marker and ink the lines,
quickly rubbing, or sanding, off the excess. With Linoleum  
though you have to remember to cut at a bevel to the outside.
Since the leather has to be wet to impress I recommend sealing
your linoleum block wood with shellac to protect it.

I did get to photograph a couple of Scythian bone bracers from
a Russian Collection being sold last year with a lot of other
ancient jewellery items. Those were roughly 2 x 2" or slightly
larger. One had a duck on it and another a bird also I think. They
were near white on a dark background and did not come out with
the detail I would have liked. They were about 3/16" thick and
the animals were framed with a rounded border, and if I recall the 
backgrounds were stippled with small depressions. I intend at some
point to make a similar one, being as how I already carve in bone.

The bone used would most likely be a cow metacarpal, easily
obtained cleaned from pet supply houses, price range is $4-6.
Thickness varies up to about 3/8". (For you metricians it's 2.54
cm to the inch or .3937" to the millimeter. I'm sorry, I'm more
used to inches than millimeters. 4 x 4 nominal lumber mentioned
later is actually 3 1/2 x 3 1/2" here as well. The longer I live 
the smaller it gets. I remember working it when it was nearly 4 
actual inches.)

>Of course, as a dilletante, my bow's pull is significantly less than 
>the average 80# to 120# found on the Mary Rose. I was playing at an 
>Englishman circa 1620 yearning for the old days of "feathering their 
>bowels". Got me back into the "dream" part of our game. 

This sounds a bit kinky. Then again this is the Authenticity list.
I hope you're talking about the enemy here, otherwise you might 
wish to remove that e-l there pardner, or run for Parliament. ;) 
I used to be able to shoot an average 20 hours per week. Some of 
the Mary Rose skeletons showed signs of stress from pulling the 
heavy bows for years. Imagine the callouses on their fingers. 
I know I have some scoliosis. They must have had a lot.

I've seen some of the Mary Rose bows close up, what impressed me a 
lot were some of them were pretty much round in cross section, and
a few of them were deep D shaped. As I recall they only found one
horn nock surviving. I do have Thomas Hardy's book. I read this
month that a new expanded version is coming out. I already 
replaced it once. I think I'll wait to see it before I buy it again. 
It was expanded once before after the Mary Rose material came to 
light. The Mary Rose sunk in 1545 I believe. What the new material 
in The Longbow, a Social and Military History is about I don't know.
I frequently have picked up bargain copies at Barnes and Noble
for gifts to friends at later times.

I am fortunate to have an original large copy of _The Grey Goose 
Wing_ by E.G. Heath, and over half of the Archer Antiquaries 
Journals beginning with issue two, at which point they had less 
than 75 members. Any of these are hard to find nowadays. 

There are also a number of other books, mostly reprinted about 
eighteen years ago that contain earlier seminal archery works.
A reprint of Toxophilus by Roger Ascham for example was in them. 
I've noticed that books from that set of thirty individually 
may sell from $15 to $100, depending on the dealer. So it's 
worth checking very closely, and biding your time. These were 
put out by the Derrydale Press at about $30 a piece, which was 
much too much for me at the time. You had to subscribe to the 
whole set then to get them. Since then I have bought the best 
dozen or so that did not duplicate too much other older archery 
books I have. A few of these volumes contain more than one 
smaller archery book. There are some genuine classics in the set.
Generally they are sold individually on the used book market. 
The seven volumes devoted to the early Sylvan Archer club news 
I found to be mostly useless, and did not buy them. They 
frequently sit intact, by themselves, on used bookstore shelves 
for years. The principal use for these is that many people copy 
the out-of-copyright illustations and use them in their ads and 
newsletters. Robin Hood in numerous poses for example. 
Most of the rest of the Derrydale set is worth having.
I see today there is a whole set of 29 at $1300.
I still say skip the Sylvan Archers. Save your money.

Since Bibliofind has now been absorbed by Amazon - who really 
reams you for used books in my search experience - I recommend
Bookfinder.com. In fact I use it as my homepage.
Search Legends of the Longbow (title of set) or search 
Derrydale Press to find the books. Derrydale is a 
small publisher and the books should pop right up.
........
Sir John Smythe wrote 'Certain Discourses, written by Sir John
Smythe, Knight: Concerning the formes and effects of divers
sorts of weapons.' 1590  An argument comparing the arquebus to
the bows then going out of fashion.
This is paired with:
'A Breefe Discourse, Concerning the force and effect of all 
Manuall Weapons of Fire, by Humphrey Barwick.' 1594.
These are paired together in the little hardback book:
_Bow versus Gun_; with an Introduction by E.G. Heath (of the
English Archer Antiquaries), 1973 EP Publishing Ltd., East
Ardsley, Wakefield, Yorkshire, England. From original copies
held in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. The pages are direct
copies of the manuscripts with later marginal notes added in 
supposedly by John Smith, the one associated with Pocahontas. 
He marked out all his page numbers as well. The book has a 
xv page lead in and introduction, then John Smythe's work 
which looks like about 70 pages or so and another thirtythree 
or so for Barwick.

Since this seems to be relevant to your time period I thought I
might mention them.
.............
There is also a good history in _Arrows Versus Steel - The History
of the Bow_;  by Vic Hurley, 1975, New York, Mason/Charter Publishers
Inc., 384 Fifth Ave., New York, NY 10018, 238 pages, unillustrated,
covers from ancient times to the Plains Indians of the American
West, and puts in some chapters on the crossbow as well.

> I lost a few good arrows since, so I'll have to resupply 
> before doing it again, but I hope to be out there this year. 
> St. George!  Mike T.

I used to always look for extra arrows behind the targets when I
taught. Picked up a whole boxful that way. I once co-captained 
the NCSU archers. Prior to, and at that time, I also shot with
three different clubs. Those things don't seem to exist now
as much as they once did outside the SCA. Which is a real shame.
We used to shoot indoor and outdoor target and roving and field
archery courses as well.

What surprises me a lot is I've never really seen SCA archery
written up in the current magazines that are out there. I think
there are a lot of potential new members out there not aware of
us. Someone should write up and photograph an article for them.
I'm thinking the clout shoot, and interkingdom archery events
at Pennsic. The SCA is probably collectively their largest
client group.
 
I first read of the SCA in a 1969 archery article stating there
was a group in Virginia. The one in Raleigh I found out about
in 1981, five years or so after it initially formed. There were
about thirty-forty members in the whole Barony then in three
cities, which is much different than the 500 in six cantons now.

Later on in life I built State three dozen heavy duty archery 
targets of 3 different designs when I worked there as the
head cabinet maker. I'm now disabled/retired from there. FMS.

The last sets involved stackable, replaceable cardboard 4 feet 
wide, 4 feet high, and about 16 inches deep, slotted on the 
ends to fit between all-thread shafts in the middle of either 
end. The bases were about two feet high including the casters 
underneath and as wide and deep as the cardboard. Literally a 
6' high movable wall of 12 - 48 feet long. Behind this they 
strung a net in the indoor range.

Outside the other set was in an open shed with a storage room
on the end. They put a wooden slat wall on the embankment above 
it to protect cars and pedestrians, and the dummies who built 
the wall of course left enough room for arrows to pass through 
between the slats. Many an arrow from beginners went up there too.
(Some people really shouldn't be carpenters. It's hazardous to the
rest of us. I've met a couple dozen of these guys.)

I cut enough target cardboard to fill a full size transfer truck, 
stacked to the roof. Excess was stored under the bleachers.
Three years later it all had to be cut again - by someone 
else thankfully. I had made a special jig to hold the pre-cut 
sheets (ordered from a box company) vertically for a large dado 
set of blades to cut the slots in on the large tablesaw, that we 
had kept for the purpose. 

Two of the three sets were on locking casters, and the last two 
were of 4 x 4's (not my designs). I did make them reversible, 
and the bases were protected with sections of new conveyor belting
sheared to size (came from Dillon Supply). We used a jig to drill 
the hanger bolt holes in all the bases both sides and all the 
conveyor belt tops as well. Meaning I made them interchangable. 
Held on with nylon centered steel locknuts and washers.
 
Many classes a day tended to shoot the older wood targets to 
smithereens eventually. Even when the fronts of them were
covered with industrial rubber belting. So we overbuilt the 
new ones to last. 

When the cardboard got shot through they would simply take it
out and replace and restack the pile, then put on a top board
and bolt it down with large wingnuts. The threaded rod was
run through the 4 x 4" bases' top plywood and end stretcher
and secured above and below with a nut and washer. Since an 
off shot would have to penetrate 7 1/2" of tightly bound 
cardboard to hit the threaded rod the arrows tended to last 
much longer as well.

NCSU has both indoor and outdoor ranges. I made a lot of their
other equipment as well. Eventually the treated 4 x 4's they had
supplied to us for the second set warped as of course wet wood is
prone to do, and the last set for indoors was therefore made of 
kiln dried juniper, which was what was available in that size 
untreated at the time. The curious thing about this set was it 
was timber framed and cross-braced to the max. Who designed that 
thing I have no idea. The warped treated set then moved to the 
outside range building. I was told that was a helluva day for
them.

Magnus Malleus, OL, GDH, Atlantia / © R.M. Howe, Raleigh, NC. 2001