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Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

peterleeson.com

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Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#171

Post by mcv »

afterburner wrote: post #34
mhd wrote: post #28

The intro still assumes that the battles won by the English in the Hundred Years War were due the longbow (alone), which AFAIK is quite debatable (at least outside of England, where Agincourt is a bit of a national myth, even more than e.g. the Black Legend). And never mind instability, the French also weren't as geographically isolated as the English and thus it was easier to hire mercenaries. Genoese crossbowman be…

France won the Hundred Years War.

Doesn't exactly help the case for the longbow.

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#172

Post by mcv »

mhd wrote: post #28

The intro still assumes that the battles won by the English in the Hundred Years War were due the longbow (alone), which AFAIK is quite debatable (at least outside of England, where Agincourt is a bit of a national myth, even more than e.g. the Black Legend). And never mind instability, the French also weren't as geographically isolated as the English and thus it was easier to hire mercenaries. Genoese crossbowman be…

Exactly. The longbow alone doesn't win anything. It has to be used in the right situation, preferably on defensive terrain, on a hill, with dismounted knights protecting the longbowmen.

Dismounted knights was a no-go for the French nobility, who loved their glorious cavalry charge. If you're going to charge, the longbow is a lot less useful. And in battles where the French charge succeeded (because the English lacked a good defensive position, for example), the French were a lot more likely to win.

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#173

Post by mcv »

kiwi93 wrote: post #85

surprised there's no discussion of the importance of chivalric values in the French military. French knights were so married to the idea of valor that employing yeoman infantry was seen as dishonorable. Obviously this is directly related to the political context of state security but it's worth considering the cultural factor as well

Absolutely. The French nobility loved the heavy cavalry charge. The English knights had to fight on foot to protect the longbowmen. It's a totally different culture and attitude. You can't just pick one element out of a different system and expect to copy the successes of that system.

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#174

Post by Someone »

vram22 wrote: post #133
junto wrote: post #10

Kevin Hicks is a great resource on the longbow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvKJcxa8x_g He is also very knowledgeable about all things from this period of history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUYd6pNy6QU There is also some more detail regarding the make up of the "English" army bowmen here: http://www.bowyers.com/bowyery_longbowOrigins.php Sidenote: - Bowyer: Makes the bow - Fletcher: Makes the arrow - String…

Ah, that thing of some names being derived from areas of work / professions. Taylor, Fletcher, Smith, Carpenter, ... It's there in other countries than European ones too. Wonder if there is a list of such names anywhere. Would be interesting to read.

http://surnames.behindthename.com/names/source/occupation

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#175

Post by [deleted] »

Someone wrote: post #174
vram22 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, that thing of some names being derived from areas of work / professions. Taylor, Fletcher, Smith, Carpenter, ... It's there in other countries than European ones too. Wonder if there is a list of such names anywhere. Would be interesting to read.

http://surnames.behindthename.com/names/source/occupation

[deleted]

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#176

Post by vram22 »

Someone wrote: post #174
vram22 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, that thing of some names being derived from areas of work / professions. Taylor, Fletcher, Smith, Carpenter, ... It's there in other countries than European ones too. Wonder if there is a list of such names anywhere. Would be interesting to read.

http://surnames.behindthename.com/names/source/occupation

Oh cool, thanks much. Some good weekend reading now, and more so if one follows links or topics in a bit of depth :-)

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#177

Post by ucaetano »

mcv wrote: post #169
ucaetano wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agincourt wasn't fought in a huge, flat battlefield. Neither was Tours, Hastings, Crecy, Poitiers, Patay, etc. European wars were fought in a very diverse range of battlefields, and most commanders, specially the outnumbered ones, would try as much as possible to use the battlefield in their advantage.

And that was at least as much the key to the English victories as the longbow was: good defensive terrain that was unsuitable for the French cavalry charge. When the French did have room to charge, England lost. The longbow was only a single factor in a much bigger system.

Indeed, in Agincourt, the mud was probably a much more decisive factor than the longbow.

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#178

Post by eru »

vinceguidry wrote: post #160
noir-york wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> finally, crossbows really are the better weapon - once you start factory-making them, your army can be raised and trained faster But the army you raise is less effective; quantity vs quality. A country which did not want or could not afford to train longbow men may have had a deeper flaw: its model. Perhaps the real reason England could beat France had been a long time in the making: a strong economy, and political…

> I wonder if the advantages of a democracy - political stability and a (usually) advanced economy - also translate into the modern battlefield. There are many, many, many examples throughout history of this happening. In WWII, the British kept the European theatre alive until the Americans finally showed up. I learned in a Quora thread that opposing soldiers thought the British incredibly disciplined and reliable, w…

> Strongly democratic nations enjoy virtual invulnerability in battle, particularly when defending.

Tell that to all the smaller countries overrun by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. (Or the native north-American tribes.)

(Lots of them did put up a great defence, though.)

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#179

Post by eru »

bweitzman wrote: post #110
junto wrote: post #10

Kevin Hicks is a great resource on the longbow: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvKJcxa8x_g He is also very knowledgeable about all things from this period of history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUYd6pNy6QU There is also some more detail regarding the make up of the "English" army bowmen here: http://www.bowyers.com/bowyery_longbowOrigins.php Sidenote: - Bowyer: Makes the bow - Fletcher: Makes the arrow - String…

Sounds like somebody figured out the single responsibility principle

See http://www.adamsmith.org/adam-smith-quotes/

Re: Why didn't France adopt the longbow like England did?

#180

Post by hussong »

rogeryu wrote: post #84

Last summer I did a workshop with the longbow. It's real fun, and has many links to meditation, finding your center etc. I had seen it before, never liked it, but it was great. In the end I shot at a 1.5 meter target about 100 meters away. You could barely see it, as it was lying flat on a hill. At first I could not believe that I had the power to get that far, but it worked out. I missed it by about 12 meters, which…

You might like the book "Zen in the Art of Archery" by Eugen Herrigel, first published in 1948 / 1953 (German / English).
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