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Archery is now a very widespread sport and hobby all over the world, but once, long ago, it was even more popular. Every army had archers and men hunted with bows for food. Every country or every region invented its own peculiar design of bow and therefore, even nowadays, there are many different types of archery bows. Modern technology has meant that new types of archery bows are still being developed.

Some bows were invented by people who rode horses a lot. These bows were shorter, other bows were intended for long range shooting and these bows were longer. I will list some of the main types of archery bows below with a short explanation of each

The traditional Welsh or English longbow was made from a single length of yew (or other wood) at least the size of the bowman, but up to about six feet six inches (two metres). It was ‘D’ shaped in profile with the flat, bark side, facing away from the string. The curved inner side followed the natural growth rings of the branch. The timber itself was seasoned for two years.

The draw weight of a longbow was between 160-180 pounds, which is hard to accomplish by modern man. In the days of the longbow, in the Middle Ages, men and boys were obliged by law to carry out target practice with longbows at the village butts every Sunday. The target range for a man was to be no less than 220 yards by order of king Henry VIII.

The longbow was used to devastating effect as long range (400 yards) artillery by the British army at Crecy in 1346 and Agincourt in 1415, raining deadly three ounce, three foot long arrows down on the enemy. As the armies drew closer the longbow could be used accurately to aim at individual targets. Not long after these great victories, which can be attributed to the archers and their longbows, bows were superseded as military weapons by guns.

Flat bows, just as the longbow, can be over six feet long, are not recurved and can be made out of a single piece of wood. However, they are rectangular in outline, not ‘D’ shaped.

Short bows are comparable to longbows or flat bows in every aspect bar size and because they are shorter, they do not have the power or the distance of the other bows. Sort bows are easy to carry and easier to use in cramped conditions like woods or a forest, so they were used by and large for hunting small animals.

Recurve bows are more effective that any other bow inch for inch of length. The tips of a recurve point forward when the bow is unstrung and look odd to the inexperienced. The recurve was very common from the Mediterranean to the Far East from about 2000 BC until 1700 AD. These days, the recurve is the only type of bow allowed to be used in the Olympic Games.

Compound bows use very stiff materials in their assembly so have pulleys or cams to help bend or draw the bow. This mechanical assistance to drawing the bow to the best length means less physical force on behalf of the archer, which means that the archer con focus on the target more.

Crossbows have the limbs mounted crossways on a piece of timber and the draw string is held by mechanical means until it is let loose with a trigger. The arrow, or bolt, is a great deal shorter. They are practically half-way houses to guns.

Owen Jones, the author of this article writes on various subjects, but is currently concerned with archery recurve bows. If you would like to know more or for special deals, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

Bow hunting or bowhunting is one of those sports that you either love or you hate – a little like fox hunting in the United Kingdom. Town people abhor it and anybody involved with it and country people see it essential to cull wild animals that could otherwise become a nuisance.

In spite of its macho image, which was encouraged by the film the Deer Hunter, there are growing quantities of women who go bowhunting. The big distinction between hunting with a rifle and hunting with a bow is distance. A hunting rifle with telescopic sights can provide enough punch at 600 yards to kill a deer with a single shot almost wherever it is hit in the chest.

On the other hand, a hunter using a bow with a fifty pound draw weight will have to be within about forty yards to be able to deliver the same sort of lethal punch, if the shot is accurate to the heart.

This means that if you severely injure an animal from 600 yards, it will probably be dead by the time you get there, clambering over fallen trees and rocks, but if you seriously wound a deer from forty yards you witness its pain.

This has a sobering effect on most bow hunters. The overwhelming majority of bow hunters do not want to see this and they do not want the animal to suffer either, so they wait for the perfect shot. If it is not there, they do not shoot.

A hunting bow needs to have a draw weight of at least fifty pounds to hunt large game and that used to mean quite a sturdy recurve or longbow, but the compound bow was invented in 1966.

A compound bow makes use of pulleys to assist with the draw, which allows less beefy people to achieve a draw weight of fifty pounds, which has opened up bowhunting to women and adolescents.

Large wild animals are dangerous and some will attack without warning if they feel in danger. This creates a danger zone around wild animals. Every sort of animal has a danger zone, for a lion, that could be pretty large and for a stag less so. This danger zone is an locale outside of which you are fairly safe.

If you are hunting with a rifle, you can remain outside that danger zone easily, but with a bow and arrow, well, you often have to go inside it. This enlarged risk provides a superior rush for bow hunters – a bigger thrill. Especially if they are hunting bears or mountain lions.

In contrast to the Deer Hunter, most bow hunters go on prearranged trips these days. The hunting trip is organized through a specialized firm which will provide guided trips into areas known to have large numbers of the animals you want to pursue.

These expert guides know how to bait areas to lure your prey; they can advise on safety aspects and they carry a big gun in case a hunter is too stupid to take their advice. Regrettably, the gun is to use on the animal, not the idiot.

Owen Jones, the author of this article writes on various topics, but is currently concerned with compound hunting bows. If you would like to know more or for special offers, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

People have been involved with archery for a minimum of four thousand years, but very nearly certainly for a lot longer than that. Sections of composite recurve bows have been found dating back to the second millennium BC, but the parts that were found were the non-wooden, composite parts, usually of horn.

The wooden sections ordinarily rotted away thousands of years previously, but a wooden longbow from the same period was found in Somerset. Most probably, people had been using all wooden, single piece bows long before they started constructing complex composite recurve bows.

The skill of archery has always enthralled mankind and, in spite of the fact that guns have made archery obsolete, it still fascinates people today, although nowadays archery is practically exclusively used for sporting purposes. It is a thriving sport and hobby and is the national sport of the Kingdom of Bhutan.

If you are interested in taking up archery, you will first have to decide which type of bow you prefer. Among other types, there are the longbow, recurve bow, reflex and decurve bows, deflex bow, pyramid bow and crossbow.

To a certain extent, the arrows are not intercompatible either. For instance, a longbow can cast a three foot, heavy-gauge arrow, whereas a crossbow shoots a six inch bolt. The bows also had distinctive uses although there was a certain degree of common ground.

For example, longbows were the heavy, rapid-firing artillery of their day, being able to lob a heavy, armour-piercing arrow hundreds of yards; whereas a short recurve bow was perfect for attack from horseback. Crossbows took less ability to operate but were slower than a bow.

There are diverse kinds of arrow too. Historically, arrows were made of wood with a sharp metal tip, but these days arrows can be made of aluminium or carbon fibre. The arrowheads are different for different applications as well. A simple brass tip is sufficient for everyday shooting whereas a ferocious, slashing broadhead is used for killing.

The majority of people who take archery seriously use carbon fibre arrows these days which is the typical arrow shaft in use at the Olympic games. The flights are usually of bird feathers and are used to stabilize the arrow in flight to minimize wobble. Plastic flights are also to be had as they are less prone to damage.

The Welsh (and English) longbow was perhaps the most powerful hand bow widely used. These longbows were typically six feet or more in length and made of one section of seasoned yew (or other woods). The draw weight of a Welsh longbow at the time of Henry VIII was between 160 -180 lbf and that would shoot a heavy three ounce arrow up to about 280 yards.

An account of the damage that one of these arrows could inflict was given by Gerald of Wales in the 12th century:

“… in the war against the Welsh, one of the men of arms was struck by an arrow shot at him by a Welshman. It went right through his thigh, high up, where it was protected inside and outside the leg by his iron cuirasses, and then through the skirt of his leather tunic; next it penetrated that part of the saddle which is called the alva or seat; and finally it lodged in his horse, driving so deep that it killed the animal”.

It took years of practice to draw and shoot one of these longbows bows perfectly.

Owen Jones, the author of this article writes on various subjects, but is currently concerned with archery recurve bows. If you would like to know more or for special offers, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.

Archers have played a key part in warfare and hunting for thousands of years. Primitive bows were made of a single piece of wood, but composite recurve bows were being manufactured from Greece to China as far back as the second millennium BC.

Recurve bows, those with the ends facing the ‘wrong way’ when unstrung, are more powerful inch for inch in length than one piece wooden bows, which made them more suitable to confined conditions such as on horseback, in a chariot or in wooded areas.

Pieces of composite recurve bows, usually made from horn, have been found in many parts of the world. Early arrows were made from naturally straight twigs or pine needles with napped flint tips affixed. Wooden bows did not preserve so well and exemplars are scarce.

It seems that archery was being developed in the early Mesolithic or late Paleolithic Age. Archery was especially well developed in some Islamic countries and in Asia, where Zen Buddhist monks used archery as part of their meditation techniques.

In the first days of archery, there were miscellaneous sentiments about archers. In those days, people battled hand to hand with swords and spears and some of the traditionalists reckoned that archers were cowards because they fought from a distance out of direct danger. This point is made very clear in ‘The Iliad’, Homer’s account to the siege of Troy.

There are or were many types of bows made to suit different fighting or hunting conditions. Some varieties of bow are the; long bow, short bow, recurve bow, composite recurve bow, reflex bow, decurve bow, deflex bow and crossbow among others.

The longbow was extremely hard to learn to use and the archer needed considerable upper-body strength. The bow was often six feet long with a weighty three foot long arrow. The draw weight for maximum power was around a hundred pounds and the use of the bow on a battlefield was as long-range artillery.

The heavy arrows and fierce armour-piercing arrow head would rain down on the enemy from a hundred yards or more and penetrate shields and armour as if were not being worn. Shot horizontally, the three-foot arrow could pass through several people.

In fact, the longbow was so essential to the triumph of Great Britain that a law was passed making it compulsory for men over a particular age to practice with their longbows every Sunday on the village green in order to develop the required expertise and upper-body strength in case war came.

The arrows are made to go with the different kinds of bows and the different bows and their specific arrows are suited to different kinds of hunting – whether you are hunting men or animals.

There are essentially two styles of shooting: instinctive shooting, which is very demanding as the archer does not take his eyes off the target, but does not sight down the arrow; and sight shooting where the archer makes use of sights to align the arrow with its target. The majority of people find sight shooting simpler.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article writes on various subjects, but is currently concerned with archery recurve bows. If you would like to know more or for special offers, please go to our website at Kids Archery Set.