Sight aids on certain bow types

blakey

Active member
Their brains knew what to do, even though they were not aware that their brains had already learnt how.
Hi Geoff, I am very jealous of people like that. I find nowadays quite the opposite, my brain is letting me down consistently. :)
 
Yes, I can understand that. I suppose "how much lead" is difficult to put into numbers because the measurement is more "seen" than compared to any standard.Or, would the lead be compared to the size of the bird being targeted?
Several factors come into the equation. The pigeon can be accelerating or decelerating and can be travelling at a diagonal or even circular flight path but equally if it is coming towards you the lead will decrease and vice versa. I guess in your head the calculation is made by instinct. Some people use "maintained lead" until the lead and the perceived size of the bird match up. I tend to do very well at the instinctive targets which suddenly present themselves, where you don't have enough time to knowingly calculate aim point. If there is a flock flying over at say 45 yards(maximum range) it is hard to lead the correct amount because for me my conscious mind takes over and this normally means not enough lead so a miss behind.
I guess it's like filtering in to traffic on a roundabout, you just accelerate in to the gap without really thinking about it.
 

WillS

New member
Just as a small note, there are absolutely no marks on a single bow found from throughout history. That includes the early Viking war bows such as the Balinderry Bow and Hedeby bow, the hunting bow of the Meare Heath and right up to the elite peak-performance warbows of the Mary Rose, encompassing the Nydam bows, Holmgaard and Mollegabet bows and Otzis bow. Not a single one of them show any signs of marking on either limb.

As somebody said earlier in the thread, there is also no evidence within period artwork from European culture of bands or marks being used on bows for war or hunting, despite the incredible accuracy and detail included in many pieces of art. They depict horn nocks, string serving, fletching inserts, tapered shafts, accurate typology of arrow heads and yet no markings or bands on bow limbs. Seems fair to assume that they're a very modern introduction.

There are archers today who have never used a rubber band or ground markers to be able to hit what they're aiming at, so there's no reason that archers in history would have needed them or thought of using them.

Pockets are very useful for keeping stuff in and we couldn't imagine life without them today, but they weren't around in medieval times either. You can't argue a point about historical context based purely on common sense in a modern mindset.
 

geoffretired

Supporter
Supporter
Norfolkngood, I watched a tv programme about the fast processing part of the brain. Apparently it works very quickly and is at its best when we are not able to put our ideas into words. So, if there is no time to " think" which is usually done in words, the brain makes better decisions.

There is one problem, though, sometimes we give that part of our brain the wrong situations to make decisions about.
 
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