speed shooting = horseback archery?

Time, you don't have time for aiming at 50 kmh on standing still target.

This is not a silly question, cause the term speed-shooting is a bit misleading.
I know Christian Schrade who is an excellent horesback-archer and he teaches every horesback-archery beginner to shoot his arrows very fast as much arrows as possible within a little time. When he is able to do that, than he can start to shoot from his horse.
Among all the ancient nomadic tribes and hordes you can found games and competitions of "speed-shooting".

Michael

Michael:

Such games are also known for foot archers. I am interested in "speed-shooting" specifically in horse archery. And related to warfare. The use of this technique on the battlefield by horse archers and training for it, hopefully with references.

Thanks

Adam

Think if you were at a battle field with your horse. The best man survives.
But accuracy, if you don't hit it does not matter if you miss many arrows at speed shooting.
How did they do? Be sure that they did what was best, you don't need any references for that.
For them this was life or dead, not a game to play with your archer friends.
I see a lot of horseback shooting on target. But how many of this riders can control their horses in chaos? And still shoot with speed and accuracy?

Redhorse, yes I agree with you, and thank you for your answer. But you misunderstood my question.

I need historically proven instances, when the practice of speed-shooting on a horse (or such trainig) was confirmed in war.

Adam

Yes but there has alway been those who has been faster then other.
Anybody can play golf but how many can beat Tiger Woods?
So find a confirmed warrior who has speed shoot is like asking if there was faster shooting soldiers WWII.
Many times we are to historical correct so we miss what was real. I see that all the time, we seek something that is front of our eyes if we just look.
When finding a old thing, don't look for how they used it. Try to use it and it will be like they did. Don't copy, look instead why tings are like they are.
Take a horse and a gang horse archer and start to fight, in minutes you have the answer.

Actually, a complicated question.

The 'need for speed' is obvious; but there have been different theories applied. Kassai method (followed by Schrade) is effective for display; but was not permitted in military engagements in China, according to Ming manuals. There was a general rule against holding more than one item in one hand, as it was regarded as generally dangerous. Therefore all military shooting was taught from the quiver and not with a bunch of arrows held in the bow hand.

Being based in military tradition, Korean horseback archery contest rules do not permit shooting with arrows grasped against the side of the bow. However, holding up to three arrows together in the draw-hand is permitted, on the basis that with a quiver, fumbling a couple of arrows is not as dangerous as risking dropping your bow.

Speed nocking was assisted by having bulbous nocks on arrows and very shallow nocks which did not pinch onto the string.

I agree, show shooting and war shooting is different tasks.
Keeping 8 arrows with hunting points in bow hand and shoot one every 3 stride is speed shooting but dangerous. Riding on track is safe but not in chaos shooting in different direction. And you would not want to stick a arrow in your horse neck by mistake. A fly can make your horse to turn its head and if you are aiming in front the horse can get the point in it's eye.
But back to fight, you don't follow rules if it can get you killed. You do what you think is best and what your training let you do. You don't stop to turn an arrow just because it has wrong side to the bow.
There is no pause button.

Stephen:

Were the bulbous/shallow nocks supposed to help in speed nocking, or generally in nocking in the awkward positions on a horse, when one may not have the time to look at the arrow nock? These types of nocks may have been helpful, as well as the types with two nock grooves at 90deg, to nock arrows faster withot looking, but it does not mean speed-shooting was actually practiced on a horse.

When I posted this question, I was certain there would be many references about deliberate fast shooting and training to achieve this skill.

Adam

Adam,
There are definitely reference to shooting quickly, but they are on foot. There is a particular one in Saracen Archery, the interpretation of which might require some adjustment.

The nocking techniques in the three major Middle Eastern archery manuals teach you to draw and shoot without looking at the bow, arrow or quiver. Needless to say that is a necessary first step in speed shooting on horseback.

The major types of shooting in the Middle East from horseback emphasised flexibility rather than speed. Though for qighaj at least you had to be fast. I will look up the references to see if there are distances between targets noted (I think there are). Certainly, in modern times in the Caucasus, similar games required shooting several times at the targets.

In defence of Kassai's method, there is a terracotta of a Parthian horsearcher showing him holding arrows in the bow hand. I agree this is dangerous, but it might have only lasted until the invention of waist quivers worn on the drawing hand side.

I have only seen arrows being held in the drawing hand on a painted plate from Kashan in Iran. The archers were kneeling in a fortress. I will recheck the image.

It is important to remember that there are two types of shooting in battle. You either shot at a mass of men or at individuals. It is unlikely that in a one on one engagement you would be trying for speed. You would be attempting to shoot accurately and finish off your opponent. When a group of horse archers attacked a crowd of enemy cavalry or infantry, they would have shot as many arrows as they could to break up the enemy lines and panic their horses.

The Sassanians were famous for the rate at which they could shoot arrows and even in mediaeval times the crusader reports comment on the rapidity at which arrows were showered on them.

There is a film from Tibet in the 1930s showing armoured cavalry shooting at two targets in succession, first with a matchlock gun and then with their bows. In order to do this, they had to take the bow from the bow case and draw the arrow from the quiver, nock it and shoot. All this was done at a gallop.

Regarding nocks, if you look at some Tatar arrows in the Askeri Museum, Istanbul and also in Polish collections, the nock is wide mouthed in comparison with Turkish and Indo-Persian arrows. In Khorasani's book on Iranian arms and armour, there are similar nocks on some of the arrows.

However, practical experience suggests that repeated practice is better than special nocks. Cross nocks are weaker than ordinary nocks and would have been a problem if they broke, especially if you caught the string over one cusp instead of two. There is a surviving Chinese arrow with multiple nocks but the nock area is too wide to pass the bow.

Thanks Bede for the good answer.

To summarize the discussion as I understand it:

The methods of shooting, arrow holding, looking/not looking at arrows and nock design do not confirm that archers were required to shoot fast. It could have been desirable, but not necessarily practiced.

There are references to skill (as you mentioned Sassanians etc.) of horse archers.

My understanding of the use of bow on a horse was this: it was used, as on foot, to shower the enemy from a distance, if this method had any use in a particular situation and this may apply to attacks on a fortified enemy as well. The other was galloping along the enemy flank to kill and maim as many opponents as possible plus horses - this method seemed to be favoured by the Ottomans (and probably other Turkish riders) - but again the accuracy was more important than speed (there are references to accuracy, not the rate of shoting). There were, of course, other non-tactical uses, such as one-to-one combat etc.

I believe now the modern horse archery has developed the methods of speed shooting as a game only (an a very good one in my opinion).

?

Adam

"I believe now the modern horse archery has developed the methods of speed shooting as a game only (an a very good one in my opinion)."

It's the only trill left :)

Adam,
There are accounts of the Mongols in Syria dismounting and putting their horses in the rear. They then proceeded to shower their enemies with arrows. This says nothing about speed of shooting, but it does show horse archers were flexible in their tactics.

You have raised a point which I discussed with several people at a Horse Archery Festival some years ago. It occurred to me that no one has come up with contemporary material from horse archer nations on battle tactics as opposed to combat tactics. The most detail account of horse archery in Saracen Archery only realy describes one on one fighting and sport archery. This is true of earlier literature from Egypt as well.

The Byzantines made some comments and late Roman authors describe other peoples tactics, but not in real detail. Modern military writers treat charging and turning as trivial problems, but it is much harder to attack on a line then turn off as a mass of horsemen than it is to charge home. All practice and sports in horse archery develop shooting skills, not the riding skills which would be critical. Taybugha advised students to see a lance master to learn the finer points of military riding.

It is possible that nomadic horse archers used their knowledge of horse behaviour to exploit the herd instincts of their mounts to control their mass behaviour. However, working out how to deliver the best approach to shoot effectively and the best departure to prevent confusion if the enemy charge unexpectedly. For instance, the Parthian shot is not much use if the majority of the people behind you are your own soldiers.

There is a lot of material on Native American speed shooting. For instance a game was played where shooters would keep numbers of arrows in the air at one time. I believe that five was a respectable number but not the record. possibly look to Hamilton. All the arrows were held in the bowhand and flicked into position.

I lately read a report of Army surgeons on arrow wounds who said that those injured with arrows were likely to have multiple wounds.

There are references to English archers in the King's service who were required to sustain a certain rate of fire, I believe 20 arrows per minute. Certain references call for an accuracy.

One of the Islamic texts admonishes students that the first one to make an accurate shot may win a duel.

My article on Rock art shows a selfbow archer of Samarkand felling an opponent with a composite.

One can only assume that accuracy and speed preceded both horsemanship and archery as tenents of armed conflict. -j-

Adam: I don't think there's much difference between quick and effective nocking for speed and for shooting in sticky situations. The points stressed in the Chinese manuals were (1) that you must be able to nock without looking, and (2) safety of the archer was of prime importance.

For a pracitcal insights into archery/cavalry/infantry interraction and tactics, Machiavelli's 'Art of War' is interesting:
http://www.constitution.org/mac/artofwar_.htm

S

Thanks for the responses. Still, no concrete evidence of horse archers trained/required to shoot fast. Accuracy is the most important, then the skill in nocking and drawing, speed = maybe. No distinction made between foot and horse archery.

To nock without looking had to be the most important requirement in warfare, since a soldier, on horse or on foot, must be aware what the enemy is doing at all times. The speed was secondary and did not seem to be enforced (English were foot archers). Multiple wounds had to be from the shower of arrows, not one-to-one combat.

Adam

If a horse archer gets off his horse, what is he then? -j-

Adam, I guessed that you've checked all of this stuff out:
http://www.atarn.org/chinese/horseback/ ... rchery.htm

yep, these are interesting texts..
gotta "take it easy" :-) - I cite from Qingxi Zhuyong:

The speed of the horse and the repeated release of the arrows must be rapid. Nevertheless, if the archer is quick but not at ease, than that is still an error. That is why one talks of 'taking things easy'.
The essence is: stability within movement and ease within speed.
[..]
Regardless of whether you are too far away or whether your bow has got snagged in something, you must not loose off a wild shot. This is called 'holding on for a second chance.' 'Holding on for a second chance' is horseback archers' slang and students should pay attention to it.
[..]
Shooting at a level target ball is not the same as shooting on foot. On foot, you aim carefully at the target; on horseback, it's all done in the blink of an eye. As you pass the mark, once your bow-hand is past the target ball and the arrow is pointing at the base of the target, you can't be either too soon or even less too late. If you're too early, you'll strike short. The hand must follow the mind automatically. It is not something you can describe in words.

This is very good, thank you.

Cheng Ziyi, however, says "draw the bow slowly". This is 1628, and he clearly talks about the battle use of bow.

The other two gentlemen write about examinations rather than the battle use. And the same Qingxi Zhuyong also says not to rush while drawing the bow. Nevertheless is it the first, somewhat inconsistent, but the first reference.

Adam

Rush is not the same thing as speed.
I can do things with my horses at speed, other rush for the same thing.
I could never rush playing tennis with Bj?rn Borg and speed him out. Hi could take it slow and still speed me out.

Maurice's Taktika, discussing the training of cavalrymen, specifically states that shooting swiftly is essential, and that even accurate shooting is worthless if it is not also rapid.

Similarly, Mamluk archers faced during the Crusades appalled the westerners with how quickly they shot (but I don't have a handy reference, sorry).

You are probably thinking of William of Tyre during the second Crusade. It is quoted on page 142 of Saracen Archery.

Russ Mitchell wrote:

Maurice's Taktika, discussing the training of cavalrymen, specifically states that shooting swiftly is essential, and that even accurate shooting is worthless if it is not also rapid.

Actually, the views of Maurice are very revealing:

"The East Romans discovered that fire prepares the way for shock more through suppression than attrition and that the effectiveness of suppressive fire depends less on accuracy than on sheer volume and high trajectory. For when the enemy has to worry about avoiding the missiles raining down on him, his attention is diverted from what is happening directly ahead, and he becomes vulnerable to the shock of a charge. Therefore, in the instructions for drilling the tagma, the horse archers line up behind the lancers, reversing the earlier practice, so that they must use high-angle fire in order to reach the enemy and avoid hitting their own men. The directions for training the individual horse archer are equally revealing: "He should be trained to shoot rapidly . . . . Speed is important in shaking the arrow loose and discharging it with force. . . . This is essential. . . . In fact, even when the arrow is well aimed, firing slowly is useless." This emphasis on speed, and hence volume, of fire, even at the cost of accuracy, was also without precedent in Byzantine military practice."

Charles C. Petersen
(Article from Military Review, August 1992. Scanned by Air War College.)

I find that interesting, same technic as the English are so proud of with their ELB.
But this is the speed and accurancy of the hole army, not a single horse archer.
When was this done, East Romans?

Thank you. Can you post more about this reference? Who is Maurice? dates? Where to find it?

Quote:

"He should be trained to shoot rapidly . . . . Speed is important in shaking the arrow loose and discharging it with force. . . . This is essential. . . . In fact, even when the arrow is well aimed, firing slowly is useless." This emphasis on speed, and hence volume, of fire, even at the cost of accuracy, was also without precedent in Byzantine military practice.
....

It seems to me the first sentence (in quotation marks) is from the source. It tells to shoot fast, but if it means repeated fire is not clear. I understand the source advises to draw fast, as in flight shooting, for a fast arrow and greater distance. This is especially important for bows made of natural materials.

The second sentence seems like an interpretation of the first and may be wrong. He equalizes speed of draw with voloume of fire, just another interpretation.

Adam

The Emperor Maurice died in 602 as the result of decapitation.

He is credited with writing the Strategikon. The Emperor Leo is credited with the Tactica.

I found the reference below to the book in translation, but I have not seen that version.

Maurice Maurice's Strategicon (1984)University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, translated George T. Dennis.

Bede has given you the correct bibliographic reference. That is the only translation and it's out of print.

I have the following interpretation of the confused instructions on shooting at speed in the battlefield: we need to distinguish between what an archer normally does and what he can potentially do.

An archer on a horse or on the ground who can't nock and shoot at the greatest speed is unarmed for as long as he takes to complete the maneuver. So as a good defensive practice, we need to train archers to complete the shooting cycle as fast as possible.

However, given the choice, every shot should be 'at ease'. Speed should not be confused with haste.

I have found several copies through www.abebooks.com and another translation into English as follows:
Roman Art of War in Late Antiquity: The Strategikon of the Emperor Maurice:a Translation with Introduction and Commentary
Philip R Rance

Yes, I understand the need to learn nocking and shooting skillfuly. If I recall this correctly, Taybugha (Saracen Archery) writes about nocking an arrow while urging the horse forward, but not about nocking the next arrow fast. Given all the information from so many manuals, one could at least expect to find it somewhere. This is a surprise for me.

It seems, the accuracy and good cast were the most important. Also the mastery in riding a horse. The rest: maybe.

Thanks Bede for the reference.

Adam

Adam,
It may be a mistake to argue a point from the absence of evidence in this case. The writers of these old books, Taybugha included, were not writing modern "How to..." instruction manuals. They assumed that their readers would be in the same milieu as themselves and would have access to teachers.

Even in Saracen Archery, which is the most practical of the texts in my view, many things are left out. There is evidence that in qighaj shooting that up to three targets were used in a similar way to the horizontal shooting seen in China and Japan. However, despite the practical aspects of archery described, very few details of the tactical approach in battle are presented. I get the impression that archery manuals taught you how to shoot and you learnt tactics in the army that built on the exisiting skills of the individuals.

Bede:

My point is the lack of evidence, not that speed-shooting was never practiced. In books, where you can find detailed instructions how to string a bow in the field and under attack, you can expect at least a mention about shooting fast, if this was indeed so important. Perhaps they learned to do it, but maybe it was not needed at all. Maybe one well aimed shot was good enough, multiplied by many, it becomes a deadly shower.

Somehow I do not see combat as the fast-draw-from-the-hip western movie style encounter, as some seem to imply. I see a mass of archers, galloping along the enemy flank, each aiming as well as they can, and executing the "Parthian shot", if pursued, and coming back to finish the job.

Adam

Adam; What if your target is faster and more accurate? How can you prevail by taking your time?

I enjoy reading Musashi, Japan's greatest sword fighter (and archer). He claimed that he who attacks first holds a small advantage. And to attact one second before you are expected is also a surprise attack.

You are correct: I mixed up my sources.

Adam, I think it's quite fair to posit regional and tactical variation. To an extent, it's really situation-dependent. If I'm a Cuman fighting crusading contingents at 1205 Adrianople, good chance that when the signal comes, I'm going to dump as many arrows as I can into the formation of horsemen who are chasing me, because every time I damage one of their horses, I help to disorder their formations.. and just like the Byzantine reference posted, I'm going to hit them up close and personal as soon as the shower's over. If I'm skirmishing, otoh (which would be one of the things that horse archers found themselves doing much more often than taking part in set-piece battles), then it's probably well worth it to take an extra moment to really try to hit my target.

fwiw, I suspect that "shaking it loose" refers directly to getting the arrows out of the quiver.

Well, my imagination is limited - if I do not see the evidence, I try hard to explain the lack of it, bearing in mind these people were no less clever than us. If they did not see the need to write about speed-shooting, then there was no need for it. This may lead us to more interesting conclusions.

Adam

Is it right to look for any consitency in battlefield practice? It is generally accepted that the best military tactic is not to have any one consistent military tactic.

Adam, one of THE basic axioms for scholarly research is "absence of evidence does not constitute evidence of absence." Otherwise, ymmv.

Is it possible that an unhurried, but smoothly reflexive ability to perform the act repeatedly may lead to speed?

Perhaps the lack of specific mention of speed results from an assumption like the above.

I think I can see Adam's point. With what has been presented so far, how can anyone say definitively that people trained for speed shooting? So far what we have been doing is mainly deduction.

• Ammianus Marcellinus wrote of the high rate of Sassanian shooting in relation to Late Roman shooting more slowly with stiffer bows (see Coulston).
  
  The Emperor Maurice wrote of putting the archers behind the heavy cavalry so that they could shoot over the heads of the front lines and disrupt the enemy horse with large numbers of arrows that were not aimed at individual targets.
  
  William of Tyre wrote of Saracen horse archers shooting extremely fast.
  
  Taybugha wrote of the expected rate of shooting of a military archer being the equivalent of 3 arrows in 1.5 seconds.
  
  Several of the defined horse archery target ranges in later literature specified shooting from a galloping horse at targets at fixed intervals. From the intervals between the targets and the average speed of galloping horses with riders you can calculate the rate of shooting.

It is correct to conclude that from the absence of evidence that we cannot prove the absence of the practice. Equally we cannot prove the existence of a practice only its possibility.

sorrow. so more word i can not translate them

i am perplex what advantage the horsebackarcher than foot archer, one vs one , 10000 vs 10000?

Strategic advantages, not tactical advantages. Foot archers are usually deployed as a defense against horse archers, not the reverse. But horse archers have strategic mobility that foot archers cannot match. Even the English, who shot on foot, mounted their archers whenever possible.

As to speed... I have to really work to get a consistent 3 shots in 8 seconds. (And even that puts my rate of fire twice as high as friends of mine who shoot longbow.) If 3 shots in 1.5 seconds doesn't constitute speed-shooting, then what does, or how is speed-shooting being defined?

I submit the 3 shots in 1.5sec is either trick shooting on foot or in error. It is not physically possible to discharge arrows at this rate on a horse, if at all.

In a section about training on a horse, Taybugha clearly wrote that only one arrow is shot within a min. 60 yard track.

Anyway, thanks for the refs. It definitely proves the proficiency of archers.

Adam

I mentioned earlier that I had problems with that 1.5 second figure in another post. The arguments revolve around the meanings of long and short ulki and I think the translators make a logical, but unlikely, conclusion.

Personally, I have problems imagining horse archers riding parallel to the front of their enemies. Despite their firepower, they are exposing their flank to a prepared formation. A sudden forward movement by their target formation would cause them to rapidly change direction by 90 degrees. This presupposes that there is no one on their right, they all turn at the same time and the enemy is not too close. I feel that too much of our predictions about horse archery tactics are based on watching Hollywood Indians in movies riding around wagon trains drawn into circles.

If horse archers did not always attack in long head-to-tail lines, then the ones farthest from the enemy must have aimed indirectly or not aimed at all. Perhaps they only concentrated on angle and direction.

I find this a little amusing as a professional horse trainer.
Just mount a horse and you will know.

Adam Karpowicz wrote:

I submit the 3 shots in 1.5sec is either trick shooting on foot or in error. It is not physically possible to discharge arrows at this rate on a horse, if at all.

The only clue I can offer you here is an 18th C European print of a Turkish horseback archer that we have on display in the Museum. He's shooting his bow with two arrows nocked on at the same time!

Bede:

If the enemy, however prepared, does not have archers, this tactic is perfect. I beleve I read it in de la Brocquiere (mid 1400s). The horsemen could do what they pleased, until finished. And it is (I imagine) easier to shoot to the left.

Adam

Adam,
As the Seljuks found out at Dorylaeum, non-missile heavy cavalry can be extremely dangerous if you cannot get out of the way. DeLa Brocquiere has some interesting tactical ideas, but he was writing to convince the Duke of Burgundy to start another Crusade.

Redhorse,
As far as I know, there aren't too many people alive today that have experience in large formations of cavalry in battle. Francis Dwyer (no relation) wrote a book in the nineteenth century when cavalry were a regular part of armies in which he made observations on the behaviour of horses in battle. The herd instinct was very useful for keeping formation, but everyone agreed that changing direction at the gallop was difficult, both for the horses and the men once their adrenalin was up.

My limited mounted archery experience some time ago suggested that there was not anywhere near the difficulty in shooting from horseback as there was of keeping track of where your own side was. The interesting fact that the Romans trained their cavalry in odd circular maneuvers indicates that they were aware of the difficulties. When Europeans took up using guns from horseback, they also developed some complex arrangements and gave up the gallop altogether until they were finished firing their pistols.

What I am trying to point out is that warfare on horseback is much more complicated that just getting on a horse and riding at an enemy.

Interesting point about herd instinct. A Ming writer pointed out that horses are social animals and in the battlefield, the enemy's horses may have come from your own horse's original herd. So if you can't control your horse well, it is just as likely to deliver you to your enemy as to keep you with your own comrades.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J75hWF4MiI&NR
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sc9fYQC7 ... ed&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIt28Alt ... ed&search=
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3DuOj18 ... ed&search=
This is not dressage, dressage is what people do today.
Whit out control you would not live long on a battle field.
Why go slowly?
Because, if you can't do it in walk you can't do that in canter.
This has nothing to do with speed.

Thanks Redhorse for the video, especially the bullfighting. It does not seem these gentlemen have any trouble to control horses. I think it was you, Bede, who drew attention a while back to the film "Horsemen" and the buskashi game in it. The mastery of the horse, flexibility and the complete lack of fear is inspiring. This is why the manuals talk first about learnig how to ride a horse well, then archey. The horsemanship of these people was legendary. Closer home, stories by my father, who, as a teenager in the 1920s falsified his birthdate to join cavalry, match these too.

I agree De la Broquiere is biased, but not in his description of tactics. Bear in mind the enemy did not necessarily had horses, a situation actually rather common on the western front anyway. Even then heavy cavalry had little chance to engage the archers and with well done "Parthian shot" it was over (not everytime of course!). If the horsemen did not have space to do the manouvers, they would loose.

Adam

In old days they had not to write manuals about things everybody already know.
In old horse manuals they never talk about how to handle the horse or other basic things. Everybody could that.
So I guess it same with archery, what was basic knowledge they did not see any purpose to write about.
And who could write in those days? Not the horse trainer and maybe not the archer. The noble could but what did they know?
I think warhorse disappear with the Barock era. They had horses just to show of on Sundays in the garden.

I have the feeling that manuals were written in the old days by those who faced a new enemy with new tactics - and as a logical consequence, they tried to copy these new tactics to successfully defend themselves.
But I may be completely wrong.
Szabi

Redhorse made a good point: who wrote the manuals?

It is a fact that only where military concerns were the business of the educated did you have manuals written. There is some indication that people wrote manuals when they thought that the basics were being forgotten by their contemporaries. Taybugha and the writer from Saladin's armoury wrote long before Roger Ascham in England. All had to be literate and archers to write what they did. Prior to Ascham, English archers did not have a literate advocate.

Adam,
Regarding the Afghan horsemen in the movie, The Horsemen, I was commenting on the individual horsemanship of the Afghan riders and the differences between them and the western stunt men. In a way, the manner the mass of horsemen behaved in the buz kashi game is somewhat like an undisciplined group of cavalry would.

The tactical considerations of fighting on horseback are the subject to much argument. When Caprilli introduced the forward seat (riding position) into Western European cavalry, there were all kinds of comments at the time about how it wouldn't work, the riders would fall off, and the horses would be able to jump effectively. However, everyone adopted it when it was clear that it was successful.

An enemy inexperienced fighting against horse archers was at a disadvantage. However, that surprise effect did not last long. Also horse archers facing shock cavalry could be surprised if they did not realise what the primary tactic of the shock cavalry was.

Riding directly at a charging enemy affected your arrows by adding your velocity to the arrow's velocity plus your enemy's velocity. Mark Stretton's experiments suggests that a knight charging a stationary archer had the disadvantage of his velocity being added to that of the archer's arrow. This measurably increased penetration. Logically the weakest shot was the Parthian shot at a stationery enemy, reducing the arrow's velocity by the velocity of his horse. If the enemy was charging the retreating archer, the status quo was established again.

Redhorse,
Your videos are really good and show classic southern European equestrianism. However, this is all individual horsemanship and of a type that was unfamiliar to most Eurasian horse archers, except when they met people doing this in battle. There are some comments from a literate society with both eastern and western traditions, Hungary, about what they thought of western schooling.

What we are talking about really here is a difference comparable to that between fencing and infantry tactics. The first concerns what one person does with a sword against another person, the second is about what groups of people do against other groups of people.

I am not arguing about the modern understating of how to ride a horse or shoot a bow or even do both together. This discussion moved into the area about what we know about what people really did with their weapons when acting in a mass. We have historical descriptions of battles, we have weapons and horsemanship manuals and we have a few tactical works. They usually do not come from the same time periods or the same geographical areas. So we speculate.

Adam's desire to find a few references of rapid shooting from horseback exposed how little we really know.

Go the other way, look what they do in bullfight. And think that in older times they did that on battle field.
Long time ago they for sure could use their horses efficient. What we have left is just a little.
And that will be lost soon. Thanks to the animal protection groups. Today the animal protection groups kill a man so they can release his rabbit (theoretical).
That discipline a horse need to be a safe warhorse can be impossible to train in future. And the horses will be so weak of wrong breeding/treating so you can't use them.

I do not know where in Asia the undisciplined hordes of horsemen ruled the battlefields, I am not a historian. The excellent discipline of Ottoman horsemen was well known however, drums were used as way to command. It is also rather obvious, as Redhorse is trying to show, the individual skills translate into tactical advantages. Never mind western riding schools, just look how well trained was the horse in the bullfighting video. I can well imagine the bull to represent a heavy cavalryman! I absoutely agree that this kind of (to us) reckless riding will soon be gone and no-one (well equipped in those helmets and insured) will ever know what was possible.

As to the advantage of forward shooting: the mere 30fps (this is according to Stretton) of a a charging rider maybe significant for the relatively low velocity of the heavy longbow arrow, but not much for the light arrow of the Turks. I can not see the tacticians obsessing about such slight advantages in a forward attack, if shooting to the side of a horse was so much more natural.

I think we are getting into areas tangent to the original question. I think we should look at either facts, or directly at the old texts, and quit speculating (it can be fun though).

Adam