Draw strength of Chinese, Mongol and Manchu bows

recently there was an exhibition of mongolian culture in Bonn, Germany.
They had 2 bows, too, and stated an estimated draw weight of 60-70 lbs.
The better preserved bow was very think, made of black horn and when unstrung bent into a real C-shape.
But what surprised me most was the length of the arrows: at least 1 meter (only the fletching was more than 20cm long, the iron tip 10cm ), and a diameter on the nocking point of 1-2cm.

comments, anyone ?
;) Uli

Dear Uli,

When were those bows made? In what period? Whicn pound do you use - 0,4 kgs, 0,45 kgs or 0,6 kgs (so called cutty or Chinese pound)?

What is the app. weight of those arrows?

Best regards,

Alexey.

All the historical weights in Chinese texts are a complete mess. I think that the weights given in the bow industry were not the same as those used for normal measuring of weights.

Manchu bows had huge, heavy arrows. I doubt if they would have been very effective at under 60#.

S

But what is regarding distances listed in "Zhengnan shefa"?

I think "bu" here is 1,5 or 1,6 meters as the usual pass of a man varies from 0,7 till 1 meter and so it could not be used in measurement of distance during military exams.

Dear Stephen, could you tell me the name of the Ming manual whish prescribed to shot from 30 "bu" for mounted archers?

Best wishes,

Alexey.

Sdrawstwui Alexey,
Sorry I cannot answer all your questions, but they told us that 60lbs = 30kg.
;-) Uli

Uli wrote:

Sdrawstwui Alexey,
Sorry I cannot answer all your questions, but they told us that 60lbs = 30kg.
;-) Uli

Thank you a lot. So, I see there are non-standard measures used for that bow. But in "Meng-da bei lu" (appr. 1221) it is stated that Mongolian bows were of 1 shi (29,96 kgs). It correlates with your data very well!

Thank you again,

Alexey.

Hey Alexey,

I found a photo of the bow + arrow + clothes set I was talking of.
There is no description of draw/weights but interestingly it says arrow length = 105 cm (!)

;-) Uli

and, some interesting pictures (iranian and european, 13-14. century)

Question: As you can see, they show the mongol bows without string bridges (!) like the hungarian and cotan ones - ideas, anybody ?

Uli; The clothes and archery gear are from the late 1800s, were the most modern for that era; Qing Chinese style, ie Manchurian. The artwork represents a much earlier period, maybe from around the time of the Mongol invasion. -j-

The painting appears to be a section out of a Shahnama, perhaps the Demotte. It may have been painted in Tabriz in the mid 1300s. It is doubtful that the artists were very aware of string bridges (artistic styles were often conservative), though the earliest representation of one is in another Ilkhanid miniature in the World History of Rashid ed-Din from 1310-30. However, the overall shape of the bows was similar to the picture you have.

At this time the last third of the ear was recurved at a slight angle. The more Turkish style of ear started to appear in the 1400s. String bridges were never universal. The Krim Tatars, Persians and Bashkirs used them in the west, the Koreans, Ming and Qing used them in the east.

Mongols used them in the Qing armies, but the Omnogrov bow did not have them. It was in a different style from modern Mongol bows, but did look like the early Chinggisid bows.

The kit in the first photo looks like 19th Century Tibetan.

Mongol bows of the time of the Mongol Empire did not have string bridges. It is only the modern ones, modelled on Qing bows, that do.

On the photo captioned "Mongol army (Iranian drawing, 14th century)" I am quite curious about the way the bow holsters point forward and touch the foreleg of the horses. What do you think of that, Bede?

S.

thanks for your comments guys !

Stephen,
The painting of this period emphasises the shortness of the stirrup leathers and the artists had problems with proportions. This was added to by the habit of experimenting with the angles that the horsemen were portrayed from.

The normal position for the bow case in Iran and Central Asia at this time was facing backwards. I think it might have something to do with the use of hand weapons and the desire not to have the upper bow tip crowd the other weapons. The Ming and Qing as you know favoured the bow case to face forward. There were probably practical reasons for this too.

Forward-pointing bow-holsters are completely unfamiliar to me. I find it hard to imagine using one that way around.

i see a drawing in library, it depict the chines ming dynasty emperor hunting, the bow has long ear(syhia?), no more differ to the picture uli posted, the drawing called 明英宗射猎图（也许是宣宗记不太清了）

stephen, i am sure you can find more bow in drwing BOOK(古代中国画图集），if no copyright restrictive i am sure i can post more picture if i can use a dc

Jiao, please scan a small part of the picture which shows the bow, and also add the name of the source of the picture, then it's ok. 只有您把有关图片显出那张弓的那小部分扫描一下，并加上图片来源的说明，就可以了。

Hi everyone,

What an amazing site with loads of information!! I'm so glad I found this website. Thanks!

I happened to have some pictures of chinese bows from a Song dynasty painting (中興四將圖), they look a bit different from the other Chinese bows on this website.

Second bow from the same painting:

That is indeed a painting from the Song Dynasty; but the gentleman is a Khitan of the Liao Kingdom. The bow is a descendant of the Khotan bow. The design dominated bowmaking in China (and far to the West) from about 100AD to the end of the Yuan Dynasty (1360s), when a more Turkish bow design became popular.

S.