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Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. It is Saturday.

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Speaker 1: We have another Vaald episode for you. This is going

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Speaker 1: to be part two of our series The Invention of

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Speaker 1: the Crossbow listen originally published eleven sixteen, twenty twenty three.

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Speaker 1: So let's go ahead and dive right in.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, the production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind.

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Speaker 3: My name is Robert Lamb and I am Joe McCormick,

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Speaker 3: and we're back with part two of our series on

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Speaker 3: the invention of the crossbow. In the previous episode, we

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Speaker 3: talked about some evidence of the crossbows invention in ancient China,

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Speaker 3: some differences between the crossbow design and regular bow design,

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Speaker 3: some differences in the physics of how they work, and

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Speaker 3: what different kinds of advantages they would have had in

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Speaker 3: history oracle usage. And today we're back to talk about

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Speaker 3: crossbows some more. Now, there is a subject I brought

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Speaker 3: up in the previous episode. I think I think it

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Speaker 3: at least teased it that I wanted to come back

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Speaker 3: to in detail, and that is the moral coding of crossbows,

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Speaker 3: specifically in storytelling, especially in movies, in modern movies. So

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Speaker 3: I was reading a very interesting paper about this that

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Speaker 3: was like a history slash film studies paper called x

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Speaker 3: marks the Plot crossbos in Medieval Film by Peter Berkolder,

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Speaker 3: published in the journal Studies in Popular Culture in twenty fifteen,

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Speaker 3: and it starts with what I think is a pretty

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Speaker 3: good example. So there's a scene many of you out

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Speaker 3: there will remember from the first Lord of the Rings movie.

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Speaker 3: It's from Fellowship of the Ring, which came out in

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Speaker 3: two thousand and one. It's when the heroes are at

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Speaker 3: riven Dell the fellowship is formed. For those unfamiliar with

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Speaker 3: the story, it's when the adventurers from various people's around

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Speaker 3: Middle Earth pledged to band together into a fellowship to

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Speaker 3: carry out a mission to destroy the story's mcguffin, a

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Speaker 3: wicked and powerful magic ring, to protect the people from

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Speaker 3: its demonic owner, Lord Sauron. So it's sort of the

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Speaker 3: ultimate good guy vibes a scene the good characters are

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Speaker 3: all pledging camaraderie, pledging to help each other in the

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Speaker 3: service of doing good. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: In fact, I reference this scene in the last episode.

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Speaker 3: You did Yes yeah, about how Legolis says it's my bow,

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Speaker 3: not my string. Yeah, it's not. Actually the string that stretches.

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Speaker 1: Though we will get back to that concept later on

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Speaker 1: in this episode when we get back into the technical

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Speaker 1: specifications of various crossbow designs, because sometimes it is the string.

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Speaker 3: Oh I can't wait. Okay, So, but you got the

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Speaker 3: characters in the scene. You got Frodo. That's the young

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Speaker 3: hobbit who commits to taking the Ring to Mordor to

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Speaker 3: destroy it. He's your classic courage against impossible odds character.

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Speaker 3: Frodo is not a warrior. He's just like a young,

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Speaker 3: almost helpless little guy at first. But he has courage

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Speaker 3: and he wants to do the right thing, so he's

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Speaker 3: going to go destroy the ring. But then the other

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Speaker 3: characters say they're going to help him. Gandalf the Wizard,

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Speaker 3: holding the magic staff in his hand, he says, Frodo,

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Speaker 3: you're not going to do it alone. I will help,

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Speaker 3: And then Erra Gorn, the man, the sort of king

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Speaker 3: of men in Middle Earth, says, you will have my sword.

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Speaker 3: I don't remember it. Does Sean Bean say the same

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Speaker 3: thing or something like that, but aer Gorne at least

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Speaker 3: says you'll have his sword. Legalis the Elf says you'll

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Speaker 3: have my bow. Gimli the dwarf says, and my axe,

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Speaker 3: and then Mary and Pippen, the perpetually second breakfasting Hobbits,

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Speaker 3: also offer the help of their intelligence. Yes, yes, but

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Speaker 3: in this scene, each of the principal heroes of the story,

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Speaker 3: they offer their commitment through the metaphor of the weapon

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Speaker 3: they carry, And this is basically in a medieval technological regime.

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Speaker 3: But the author of this paper notes that it's interesting

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Speaker 3: that it's sort of trying to like show the whole

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Speaker 3: span of recognizable medieval weapons, but none of these characters

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Speaker 3: offers up a crossbow to help, despite the fact that

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Speaker 3: berker Holder calls the crossbow quote one of the most

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Speaker 3: readily accessible personal weapons of the Middle Ages.

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Speaker 1: And I should say I still hold this to be true.

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Speaker 1: I think a crossbow is an excellent weapon for a dwarf.

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Speaker 1: I think everything lines up that dwarves should be using

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Speaker 1: crossbows by the dozen. You know, it's just a perfect

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Speaker 1: weapon for imagining them use some sort of arranged weapon

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Speaker 1: within an enclosed dwarven environment. It seems to fit there.

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Speaker 1: You know, their their build, their basic demeanor, their technological proficiency.

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Speaker 1: I think everything lines up. I think I think Gimli

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Speaker 1: should have had a crossbow.

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Speaker 3: Fair enough, though the acts makes sense to me, it

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Speaker 3: seems at home in his hands. But this paper argues

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Speaker 3: that the absence of a crossbow among the ranks of

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Speaker 3: the good guys in the movie is neither unique nor happenstance.

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Speaker 3: The point of this paper is that throughout modern film

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Speaker 3: there is a consistent principle that in settings with roughly

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Speaker 3: medieval European technology regimes, good guys do not carry crossbows.

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Speaker 3: The crossbow is the weapon of the wicked, the barbarous,

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Speaker 3: the treacherous, the cruel. And Secondly, in this paper, the

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Speaker 3: author argues that this implicit moral gloss on different types

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Speaker 3: of medieval weapons is not necessarily a modern invention. In

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Speaker 3: the case of the crossbow, there are elements of this

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Speaker 3: particular vilification of it going back to the medieval period itself.

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Speaker 3: So in the first half of the paper, the author

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Speaker 3: goes through this extensive list of movies with medieval technology

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Speaker 3: regimes that implicitly associate the crossbow with wickedness, and note

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Speaker 3: that these stories include both comparatively realistic period dramas or

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Speaker 3: historical films, as well as high fantasy and other stories

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Speaker 3: with fully fictional settings and magic that just rely on

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Speaker 3: the conventions of medieval technology. One thing he notes is

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Speaker 3: that crossbows are often used to establish setting for medieval films,

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Speaker 3: along with other visual cues like knights in armor, castles, catapults, etc.

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Speaker 3: And this is true even in settings where it would

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Speaker 3: be strictly anachronistic, for example, in stories about King Arthur,

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Speaker 3: which if you're trying to sort of situate those roughly historically,

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Speaker 3: that'd probably be something like fifth century Britain, where there's

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Speaker 3: really no evidence that crossbows were popular, even though they

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Speaker 3: had already been invented by this point. It doesn't seem

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Speaker 3: like century Britain had a lot of crossbows in it,

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Speaker 3: if any. But it's sort of like a shorthand. You

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Speaker 3: see knights in armor, you see crossbow, you think, Okay,

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Speaker 3: I know where I am. It gets you to the

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Speaker 3: correct mental setting very quickly. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, And I don't know if you gets into this

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Speaker 1: at all, but I think one of the other things

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Speaker 1: about the crossbow and films is that there is a

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Speaker 1: gun like quality to the crossbow, where the makes the

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Speaker 1: visual language of say, armored guards or armored goons, whatever

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Speaker 1: the case may be. With crossbows like read very similarly

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Speaker 1: to modern tyrannical enforcement agencies.

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Speaker 3: I think you might make that comparison. We'll see when

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Speaker 3: we look at a few of the examples.

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Speaker 1: Okay, let's see what do you got. Let's let's look

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Speaker 1: at some films.

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Speaker 3: I'm not going to list all the examples burke Holder

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Speaker 3: gets into in this paper, because I suspect most listeners

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Speaker 3: will in fact already recognize the crossbow as evil pattern themselves,

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Speaker 3: but it's just worth naming a few. One he gets

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Speaker 3: into that I've never seen is the nineteen ninety five

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Speaker 3: film First Night, which has Sean Connery as King Arthur,

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Speaker 3: So this is an Arthurian legend film. Sean Connery is

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Speaker 3: Arthur Richard Gear as Lancelot, and in this movie, he says,

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Speaker 3: the heroes, such as Lancelot are repeatedly shown demonstrating their

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Speaker 3: skill with the sword, and this is a recurring theme.

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Speaker 3: The sword is often represented as a kind of virtuous

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Speaker 3: and honest weapon. And meanwhile, in this film, the villain,

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Speaker 3: a character named Prince Malagant played by Ben Cross, commands

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Speaker 3: gangs of marauders who are all armed with crossbows, which

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Speaker 3: he says are treated almost like six shooters from a

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Speaker 3: Western film. And also he says. In this story, the

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Speaker 3: heroic King Arthur is killed by a barrage of crossbow bolts.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. I think this comparison to Cowboy flicks is pretty solid.

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Speaker 1: Reminds me of the scene in the western The Cowboys

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Speaker 1: in which Bruce Dern's character is a scoundrel is beat

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Speaker 1: up by John Wayne's character with fisticuffs, and then afterwards

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Speaker 1: he shoots John Wayne's character in the back. Clearly, if

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Speaker 1: this had been a medieval setting, he would have used

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Speaker 1: a crossbow.

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Speaker 3: Right, John Wayne would have the sword and the bad

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Speaker 3: guy would have the crossbow. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I saw First Night, but I've forgotten

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Speaker 1: all of it. This is no ex caliber, but I

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Speaker 1: have to stress that Ben cross was always great.

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Speaker 3: Uh huh. Next movie. I also haven't seen this one.

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Speaker 3: Another Arthurian legend film. This is the two thousand and

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Speaker 3: four film King Arthur, which not only shows Arthur's Saxon

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Speaker 3: enemies using crossbows. Apparently, at one point of this movie,

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Speaker 3: one of the heroes picks up a crossbow from the ground,

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Speaker 3: only to like look at it and toss it away

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Speaker 3: in disgust.

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Speaker 1: I did not see this one. This was a strange

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Speaker 1: decade for films, but Ivan Clive Owen as author, that's

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Speaker 1: got to be good.

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Speaker 3: To come back to Lord of the Rings. We've established

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Speaker 3: that the heroes don't use crossbows, but Burke Older mentions

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Speaker 3: that the only time we actually see crossbows used in

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Speaker 3: the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the film the Peter

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Speaker 3: Jackson films, is by the Forces of Evil. He says,

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Speaker 3: crossbows are used by the urik Hi during their attack

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Speaker 3: on Helm's Deep.

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Speaker 1: Those are elite orcs though you know, so, yeah, give

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Speaker 1: it to him. He's in the elite weaponr here.

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Speaker 3: Another interesting thing he points out is how in some movies,

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Speaker 3: the use or discarding of a c crossbow can signal

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Speaker 3: a change in the same character's moral or factional valance.

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Speaker 3: So maybe a character uses a crossbow when acting as

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Speaker 3: a villain or when we're supposed to wonder if they're

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Speaker 3: a villain, and then they stop using the crossbow when

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Speaker 3: they become good or are revealed as good. An example

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Speaker 3: cited here is Lord Arthur in the movie Army of Darkness,

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Speaker 3: where he apparently uses I didn't remember this detail, but

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Speaker 3: he apparently uses a crossbow when you assume he is

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Speaker 3: an enemy of Ash, But then when he becomes an

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Speaker 3: ally of ash, the crossbow goes away and instead we

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Speaker 3: see crossbows used by the dead, heites, the you know,

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Speaker 3: the bad the monsters of the movie.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I forgot this scene as well. There's so

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Speaker 1: many other scenes that definitely stick in your mind that

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Speaker 1: this is a nice, nice, subtle example of what you're

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Speaker 1: talking about here.

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Speaker 3: One more, this is not an example the author here

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Speaker 3: brings up, But I was just thinking about the most

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Speaker 3: prominent appearance of the crossbow in HBO's Game of Thrones adaptation,

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Speaker 3: which as a show is notable, especially in early seasons,

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Speaker 3: for moral ambiguity and you know what might be called

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Speaker 3: grim dark realism. There's kind of a in many ways.

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Speaker 3: It resists the kind of classic hero villain tropes and

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Speaker 3: the clear delineation between those two. And yet even in

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Speaker 3: Game of Thrones, this crossbow pattern holds true. It is

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Speaker 3: Its most salient use is as a weapon of torture,

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Speaker 3: used by King Joffrey, one of the nastiest and most

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Speaker 3: sadistic characters on the show. The other main example I

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Speaker 3: could think of was it is later used by a

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Speaker 3: more sympathetic character, but in an act of patricide when

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Speaker 3: that character is at his lowest point. So it's still

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Speaker 3: it's a pretty like negatively coded weapon in Game of Thrones.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, In both of these are cases where the

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Speaker 1: Lanisters are using them, and Lanisters are always at least

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Speaker 1: in a little bit in the gray area, if not

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Speaker 1: outright villains.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. Now, the author does try to acknowledge some counter examples,

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Speaker 3: and I think it's interesting to look at movies that

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Speaker 3: violate the pattern. One he mentions, Oh boy, I think

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Speaker 3: you're going to be excited about this. Rob is Rutger

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Speaker 3: howerd and Lady Hawk from nineteen eighty five.

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Speaker 1: Lady Hawk a movie that is never as good as

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Speaker 1: I remember it being whenever we watch it. Yeah, but

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Speaker 1: I still love it, like you gotta love Lady Hawk.

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Speaker 1: It's just kind of it's it's it's just pure romance,

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Speaker 1: it's beauty.

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Speaker 3: I had the same experience. I remember, it's been years

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Speaker 3: since I watched it, but I remember wanting to like

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Speaker 3: it before I watched it, watching it and thinking wasn't

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Speaker 3: actually that great, but then still kind of loving it

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Speaker 3: for some reason.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, But anyways, so Rutger Hower in this movie, he

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Speaker 3: plays a renegade knight who uses a crossbow. He is

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Speaker 3: sort of the hero of the story, but the author

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Speaker 3: notes that he is portrayed as a kind of rebel

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Speaker 3: or renegade character, so so, you know, maybe it's more

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Speaker 3: fitting that he uses the crossbow because he's more he's

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Speaker 3: more outside the balance of the normal medieval night type hero.

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Speaker 3: And also here the author notes that he, you know,

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Speaker 3: uses the crossbow early in the movie, but then he

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Speaker 3: goes on to explain the prodigies of his family's house sword,

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Speaker 3: and then he uses that more in the later parts

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Speaker 3: of the film.

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Speaker 1: M So again, perhaps an example of casting aside the

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Speaker 1: villainous crossbow and picking up the noble sword.

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Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, one more example. I had to mention another

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Speaker 3: movie for I haven't seen a lot of these are

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Speaker 3: like medieval movies from the two thousands that never got

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Speaker 3: in front of my eyes. But apparently the good guys

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Speaker 3: used crossbows in the medieval sci fi time travel movie

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Speaker 3: Timeline from two thousand and three, based on the novel

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Speaker 3: by Michael Crichton. Again, I haven't seen it, but the

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Speaker 3: author here notes that the movie flopped, and I laughed

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Speaker 3: out loud when I read that, because I was like, wait,

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Speaker 3: is he saying that it flopped because it depicted crossbows

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Speaker 3: coming to the rescue. Unclear.

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Speaker 1: There's probably no real connection here, but it is worth

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Speaker 1: notable that Lady Hawk and Timeline were both directed by

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Speaker 1: Richard Donners, so I don't know, maybe he just really

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Speaker 1: liked crossbos or had some sort of like there's so many,

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Speaker 1: so many factors that go into I guess making these

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Speaker 1: kind of decisions for film. You know, could have been

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Speaker 1: something where it's like, well, the crossbows are easier to

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Speaker 1: block and use. I don't know.

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Speaker 3: So it's not absolutely universal. You can think of a

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Speaker 3: few counter examples, but I do think by and large

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Speaker 3: this is very true throughout the language of modern films

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Speaker 3: with historical and fantasy medieval settings. I would have to

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Speaker 3: agree it is remarkably consistent how the crossbow, in contrast

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Speaker 3: to other medieval weapons like the sword and the traditional bow,

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Speaker 3: is used to convey the negative traits of the person

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Speaker 3: who wields it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I think this is this is absolutely true when

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Speaker 1: you look at the all the examples here, and I'm

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Speaker 1: certainly not going to set around and come up with

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Speaker 1: a bunch of counter examples, but I think one counter

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Speaker 1: example is worth mentioning because it has folkloric origins and

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Speaker 1: then also resonates through media, and that's Swiss folk hero

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Speaker 1: William Tell. This was a fourteenth century mountaineer, assassin and

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Speaker 1: crossbow marksman, again of Swiss folklore and legend. The legends

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Speaker 1: range from shooting an apple off of a person's head.

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Speaker 1: If you're aware of nothing else concerning this character, you

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Speaker 1: probably know about that little episode just because it's been

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Speaker 1: portrayed in cartoons and so forth. But other things he

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Speaker 1: gets into, like he slays a chimera, so he does

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Speaker 1: all sorts of stuff. But his more realistic exploits position

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Speaker 1: him as an assassin of evildoers and tyrants with a crossbow,

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Speaker 1: a weapon that, as we've discussed before, democratizes ranged lethal violence,

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Speaker 1: you know, and certainly factors into for instance, in the Chinese.

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Speaker 1: One of the Chinese examples we mentioned the last episode

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Speaker 1: a way that people outside of an actual military group

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Speaker 1: could potentially do harm or fight back against their overlords.

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Speaker 1: So I think it's you know, it's worth considering this

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Speaker 1: as a notable folkloric exception to the rule. And of

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Speaker 1: course there are also numerous depictions of this in film

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Speaker 1: and television, including the late nineteen eighties TV series crossbow,

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Speaker 1: which I remember seeing some in syndicate later on. And

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Speaker 1: I also distinctly remember seeing a vhsawbit. You know, maybe

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Speaker 1: it was just like a few episodes cobbled into a movie.

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Speaker 1: I'm not sure, but I remember seeing that on the

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Speaker 1: video shelf as a kid. And then there are other

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Speaker 1: older adaptations from the fifties. There is a nineteen ninety

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Speaker 1: eight TV series that looks really bad. There's a nineteen

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Speaker 1: thirty four movie The Legend of William Tell, so certainly

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Speaker 1: a figure with staying power within Swiss Swiss culture, but

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Speaker 1: also seems to resonate beyond it into other media. Two

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Speaker 1: more examples do come to mind because I imagine people

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Speaker 1: write in there's The Walking Dead's Darryl Dixon always using

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Speaker 1: that crossbow to shoot zombies. I'm not sure. I guess

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Speaker 1: he's kind of positioned as an antihero in some respects,

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Speaker 1: like he is kind of like a neutral character who's

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Speaker 1: you know, obviously he's not gonna side with the zombies,

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Speaker 1: but you know, he has his own kind of like

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Speaker 1: rogue outsider energy. And then let's not forget what hold up?

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Speaker 3: Yes, sorry, I don't mean to derail, but I've never

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Speaker 3: seen that much Walking Dead. Do some people side with zombies?

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Speaker 1: Well, I think in later seasons that I have not seen,

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Speaker 1: there are certainly individuals who become more like the zombies

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Speaker 1: through their cruelty and their and their wretchedness. And there

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Speaker 1: are some that find ways to use zombies and become

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Speaker 1: more zombie like in their use of them. So in

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Speaker 1: a sense, there are those who side with zombies. But yeah,

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Speaker 1: Walking deads mostly about like humans being horrible and zombies

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Speaker 1: just being zombie. Zombies are kind of neutral, like you

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Speaker 1: can't hate the zombie for being a zombie, but there

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Speaker 1: are plenty of reasons to hate most of the human

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Speaker 1: characters in my experience.

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Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I think that's a classic zombie movie thing,

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Speaker 3: where usually the villain is other living humans and the

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Speaker 3: zombies are more like the setting. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: But Darryl Dixon a favorite character of many on the

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Speaker 1: TV show, I don't think he's in the comics at all.

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Speaker 1: But the other one that came to mind, and this

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Speaker 1: is what movie I've not seen, But I again, just

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Speaker 1: remember seeing that the VHS box art all the time.

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Speaker 1: Patrick Swayzey's Next of Kin from nineteen eighty nine. I

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Speaker 1: think he uses a bow in it as well, but

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Speaker 1: there are also scenes where's he's using a crossbow. There's

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Speaker 1: some sort of an action sequence in a cemetery where

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Speaker 1: he's running around with that crossbow.

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Speaker 3: I've never seen this one either.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, well it has it has Bill Paxton in it,

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Speaker 1: and it also has a nissance.

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Speaker 3: Wow. Okay, yeah, it's.

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Speaker 1: Not supposed to be very good.

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Speaker 3: It exists. Well, so, uh, to come back to the

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Speaker 3: points made in Burkeholder's paper, we sort of already raised this,

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Speaker 3: but it's interesting to contrast the villainous associations in film

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Speaker 3: of the crossbow with the sword, which is almost always

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Speaker 3: used to convey admirable traits and moral virtue. And of

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Speaker 3: course this seems like if you really think about it,

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Speaker 3: it's it's kind of a silly way to split things up.

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Speaker 3: Like they're both weapons, and so they could both be

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Speaker 3: used for evil, like just as easily a sword or

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Speaker 3: a traditional bow could be used for murder or something

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Speaker 3: else evil, and a crossbow could be used by whatever.

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Speaker 3: We see the good characters using swords for in this movie,

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Speaker 3: I don't know, self defense or defensive others or something.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, I mean a sword carries a great deal

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Speaker 1: of symbolic power, But at the end of the day,

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Speaker 1: it is a murder weapon and a symbol of terror.

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Speaker 1: No one is out there hunting a deer with a

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Speaker 1: long sword.

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Speaker 3: That's well, I was gonna say that's true, but I

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Speaker 3: don't know. Maybe some people hunt deer with swords. It

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Speaker 3: seems unlikely.

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Speaker 1: It's unlike it would be a highly ineffective weapon to

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Speaker 1: use that way for hunting. Yeah, it was clearly not

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Speaker 1: designed as such, but the long sword was designed with

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Speaker 1: clear intention, the long sword, the dagger that dirt. Most

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Speaker 1: of these these implements, they are made to kill and

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Speaker 1: mutilate human beings.

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Speaker 3: So one wonders, like, where do these associations come from?

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Speaker 3: How come it is in these modern stories, especially on film,

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Speaker 3: that the sword is seen as good and the crossbow

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Speaker 3: is seen as bad. And a question raised in this

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Speaker 3: paper is was the crossbow scene as fundamentally more evil

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Speaker 3: than other weapons at the time when its use was common,

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Speaker 3: especially in war in say medieval Europe. And the answer

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Speaker 3: is complicated, but to some extent, and in some cases, yes,

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Speaker 3: there are medieval writings that indicate something uniquely bad about

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Speaker 3: the crossbow. But I want to stress this was clearly

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Speaker 3: not everyone's opinion, and it certainly didn't stop people, especially

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Speaker 3: armies and militias, from using it. One extremely famous example

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Speaker 3: of a medieval work vilifying the crossbow in particular over

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Speaker 3: other weapons, and you'll see this example cited very often,

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Speaker 3: is from the Alexiad, a biography of the eleventh to

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Speaker 3: twelfth century Byzantine emperor Alexios, the first Komnena, written by

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Speaker 3: his daughter, the Byzantine Princess and a Komnena.

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Speaker 1: Listeners of the show might remember our episode on Greek Fire.

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Speaker 1: We cite this source as well in that ap and

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Speaker 1: I believe we had Annie Reese come on and read

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Speaker 1: it in the cold open.

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Speaker 3: Oh yeah, well, thanks again to Annie for that. We

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Speaker 3: didn't get her on hand today, so I'm going to

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Speaker 3: have to read from it myself for this time. But yes,

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Speaker 3: so there is so. Anna Kamneno was writing this work

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Speaker 3: while she was in exile in a monastery in the

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Speaker 3: later years of her life, and a passage of this

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Speaker 3: work that has attracted a lot of attention is Anna's

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Speaker 3: eyewitness account of the arrival of crusaders in Constantinople in

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Speaker 3: the years ten ninety six and ten ninety seven. The

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Speaker 3: account is very vivid and it contains some confusing claims.

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Speaker 3: So I'm going to read what she says about the crossbow,

401
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Speaker 3: and the translation that I'm using here is the one

402
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Speaker 3: block sited in a book that I mentioned in the

403
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Speaker 3: last episode, but I'll mention it again here The medieval

404
00:21:50,680 --> 00:21:54,920
Speaker 3: crossbow by Stuart Ellis Gorman from Pen and Sword Military

405
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Speaker 3: Press in twenty twenty two. So this is what Anna

406
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Speaker 3: Komnena writes. Us bow is a weapon of the barbarians,

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Speaker 3: absolutely unknown to the Greeks, and by barbarians. There she's

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Speaker 3: referring to Western European crusaders, probably especially the Franks. She

409
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Speaker 3: goes on. In order to stretch it, one does not

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Speaker 3: pull the string with the right hand while pushing the

411
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Speaker 3: bow with the left away from the body. This instrument

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Speaker 3: of war, which fires weapons to enormous distances, has to

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Speaker 3: be stretched by lying almost on one's back. Each foot

414
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Speaker 3: is pressed forcibly against the half circles of the bow,

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Speaker 3: and the two hands tug at the bow, pulling with

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Speaker 3: all one's strength towards the body. At the midpoint of

417
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Speaker 3: the string is a groove shaped like a cylinder, cut

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Speaker 3: in half and fitted to the string itself. It is

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Speaker 3: about the length of a fair sized arrow, extending from

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Speaker 3: the string to the center of the bow. Along this groove,

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Speaker 3: arrows of all kinds are fired. They are short, but

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Speaker 3: extremely thick, with a heavy iron tip. In the firing,

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Speaker 3: the string exerts tremendous violence and force, so that the missiles,

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Speaker 3: wherever they strike, do not rebound. In fact, they transfix

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Speaker 3: a shield, but through a heavy iron breastplate, and resume

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Speaker 3: their flight on the far side. So irresistible and violent

427
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Speaker 3: is the discharge. An arrow of this type has been

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Speaker 3: known to make its way right through a bronze statue,

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Speaker 3: and when fired at the wall of the very great town,

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Speaker 3: its point either protruded from the inner side, or buried

431
00:23:21,400 --> 00:23:24,679
Speaker 3: itself in the wall and disappeared altogether. Such is the

432
00:23:24,720 --> 00:23:29,560
Speaker 3: crossbow a truly diabolical machine. Now Ellis Gorman makes a

433
00:23:29,560 --> 00:23:33,920
Speaker 3: few observations about this passage. First of all, even though

434
00:23:34,000 --> 00:23:37,199
Speaker 3: it is clearly exaggerating in some cases about like the

435
00:23:37,240 --> 00:23:39,720
Speaker 3: power of a handheld crossbow bolt, saying that it will

436
00:23:39,720 --> 00:23:42,760
Speaker 3: go through a city wall, or like through straight through

437
00:23:42,760 --> 00:23:45,359
Speaker 3: a bronze statue and come out the other side, it

438
00:23:45,400 --> 00:23:48,159
Speaker 3: does give a clear description of how the crossbow works.

439
00:23:48,520 --> 00:23:51,160
Speaker 3: And I thought it was interesting where she describes people

440
00:23:51,200 --> 00:23:53,639
Speaker 3: having to lie on their backs on the ground in

441
00:23:53,720 --> 00:23:56,280
Speaker 3: order to disband it or to pull back the mechanism

442
00:23:56,320 --> 00:23:59,480
Speaker 3: to lock with the trigger, like you were talking about

443
00:23:59,720 --> 00:24:02,560
Speaker 3: in the last episode, possibly with the ancient Chinese example.

444
00:24:02,600 --> 00:24:06,840
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, yeah, about there being like different different

445
00:24:06,840 --> 00:24:09,080
Speaker 1: ways of loading some of these different crossbows, and one

446
00:24:09,080 --> 00:24:11,000
Speaker 1: of them was like laying down and having to use

447
00:24:11,040 --> 00:24:13,840
Speaker 1: your feet to pull it back in a position.

448
00:24:14,200 --> 00:24:18,199
Speaker 3: Ellis Gorman says it's confusing why she says the crossbow

449
00:24:18,320 --> 00:24:21,919
Speaker 3: was unknown in Byzantium, because other evidence indicates it was

450
00:24:21,920 --> 00:24:25,159
Speaker 3: probably known at least somewhat, if not widely, used in

451
00:24:25,240 --> 00:24:29,119
Speaker 3: Imperial Rome, and the Byzantine Empire was descended from the

452
00:24:29,160 --> 00:24:32,600
Speaker 3: eastern half of the Roman Empire. But it's possible that

453
00:24:32,640 --> 00:24:35,360
Speaker 3: the technology had fallen out of favor in Byzantium, had

454
00:24:35,359 --> 00:24:38,399
Speaker 3: been and had been forgotten by many. But the point

455
00:24:38,440 --> 00:24:41,560
Speaker 3: of the passage, more than to create a continuous history

456
00:24:41,560 --> 00:24:45,199
Speaker 3: of military technology, was to praise her father and to

457
00:24:45,359 --> 00:24:49,479
Speaker 3: condemn the barbarity of the Western European crusaders, So her

458
00:24:49,520 --> 00:24:53,080
Speaker 3: comments about the crossbow seemed kind of aimed at that purpose.

459
00:24:53,560 --> 00:24:56,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, she has a clear agenda here, because otherwise, if

460
00:24:56,040 --> 00:24:59,880
Speaker 1: you take her literally, it's like she's saying crossbow absolutely diabolical,

461
00:25:00,280 --> 00:25:03,480
Speaker 1: our secret fire weapon, totally above board.

462
00:25:05,440 --> 00:25:08,000
Speaker 3: Yeah, so it's possible. It's just like here it is

463
00:25:08,080 --> 00:25:12,080
Speaker 3: described as particularly a worse weapon than others because it

464
00:25:12,160 --> 00:25:15,159
Speaker 3: is the weapon used by people she saw as wicked

465
00:25:15,200 --> 00:25:19,840
Speaker 3: and barbaric. So coming back to Burkeholder's paper, he discusses

466
00:25:20,000 --> 00:25:22,800
Speaker 3: at some length this passage by anakom Nina, but he

467
00:25:22,840 --> 00:25:26,639
Speaker 3: also points out medieval sculpture depicting crossbows in the hands

468
00:25:26,640 --> 00:25:30,480
Speaker 3: of demonic figures. So, for example, at the church of

469
00:25:30,560 --> 00:25:34,320
Speaker 3: Saint Sirnaan in Toulouse, France, there is a twelfth century

470
00:25:34,359 --> 00:25:37,280
Speaker 3: pillar that has sculptures of demons squatting on top of

471
00:25:37,320 --> 00:25:40,960
Speaker 3: it clutching crossbows and bolts, and there are others as well.

472
00:25:41,000 --> 00:25:45,960
Speaker 3: But he tempers these observations by pointing out that medieval

473
00:25:45,960 --> 00:25:49,560
Speaker 3: European personifications of death and disease and sin, these sort

474
00:25:49,600 --> 00:25:54,080
Speaker 3: of demonic embodiments are often wielding other weapons as well,

475
00:25:54,119 --> 00:25:57,160
Speaker 3: like swords and traditional bows, so you shouldn't read too

476
00:25:57,240 --> 00:25:59,920
Speaker 3: much into the cases where they are holding crossbows.

477
00:26:00,440 --> 00:26:02,160
Speaker 1: Joe I had to look up one of these demons

478
00:26:02,200 --> 00:26:05,360
Speaker 1: with the crossbow. Of course, I can't not look this up.

479
00:26:05,880 --> 00:26:09,240
Speaker 1: And it's pretty fabulous because it's like a gargoyle esque figure,

480
00:26:09,359 --> 00:26:12,320
Speaker 1: you know, on a corner, part of a pillar motif,

481
00:26:12,960 --> 00:26:17,000
Speaker 1: and the demon appears to be sort of squatting but

482
00:26:17,080 --> 00:26:20,360
Speaker 1: also sort of loading a crossbow, like he's pushing down

483
00:26:20,400 --> 00:26:22,320
Speaker 1: with his feet and pulling up on the string with

484
00:26:22,400 --> 00:26:25,919
Speaker 1: his hands or claws. But also there's something kind of

485
00:26:25,960 --> 00:26:28,960
Speaker 1: perverse about it, like the demon's kind of humping the

486
00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:29,960
Speaker 1: crossbow as well.

487
00:26:30,480 --> 00:26:34,040
Speaker 3: M yeah, that checks out. Now. If you read sources

488
00:26:34,080 --> 00:26:38,600
Speaker 3: about historical views on crossbows, it is very often pointed

489
00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:43,359
Speaker 3: out that the Catholic Church produced a sort of ban

490
00:26:43,800 --> 00:26:47,520
Speaker 3: on the use of crossbows in war at the second

491
00:26:47,600 --> 00:26:52,240
Speaker 3: lateran council in eleven ninety three condemning quote the hateful

492
00:26:52,320 --> 00:26:56,920
Speaker 3: and death bringing art of crossbowmen. However, Burkholder adds a

493
00:26:56,960 --> 00:27:00,520
Speaker 3: lot of context to this that shows how this just

494
00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:04,560
Speaker 3: this fact in isolation could be misleading. So some context is.

495
00:27:05,040 --> 00:27:08,399
Speaker 3: First of all, the church's ban on the crossbow only

496
00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:13,359
Speaker 3: originally applied to use against fellow Christians, and then later

497
00:27:13,440 --> 00:27:16,240
Speaker 3: in the same century, the church amended that band to

498
00:27:16,280 --> 00:27:18,960
Speaker 3: say okay, you can even use the crossbow against fellow

499
00:27:19,040 --> 00:27:23,800
Speaker 3: Christians as long as it is quote a just war. Okay,

500
00:27:23,880 --> 00:27:26,000
Speaker 3: I assume the people using it would always claim it

501
00:27:26,040 --> 00:27:26,720
Speaker 3: was a just war.

502
00:27:27,240 --> 00:27:29,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, they should probably got a warning on the side

503
00:27:29,520 --> 00:27:32,200
Speaker 1: of the crossbow, just in case, only for use in

504
00:27:32,400 --> 00:27:32,760
Speaker 1: just war.

505
00:27:33,240 --> 00:27:37,639
Speaker 3: Also, according to some scholars, this band was essentially completely ignored,

506
00:27:38,240 --> 00:27:41,880
Speaker 3: like Christian armies just continued to use crossbows to fight

507
00:27:41,920 --> 00:27:46,399
Speaker 3: each other all the time. Also, the church's proclamation didn't

508
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:50,480
Speaker 3: just attempt to ban crossbows, it attempted to ban regular

509
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:54,199
Speaker 3: bows as well, and this was also generally ignored. And

510
00:27:54,240 --> 00:27:58,560
Speaker 3: then also Burkelder cites some other scholars named Contamine and

511
00:27:58,600 --> 00:28:03,639
Speaker 3: Strickland who point out that one among multiple possible utilities

512
00:28:03,640 --> 00:28:07,080
Speaker 3: of these bands, one of them was that it was

513
00:28:07,119 --> 00:28:11,440
Speaker 3: possibly just being used by military leaders to quote keep

514
00:28:11,600 --> 00:28:14,760
Speaker 3: deadly missile weapons out of the hands of non elites.

515
00:28:15,200 --> 00:28:17,000
Speaker 1: Well, this absolutely checks out with a lot of what

516
00:28:17,040 --> 00:28:19,920
Speaker 1: we've been discussing. Yeah, it's okay if we have the crossbows,

517
00:28:20,119 --> 00:28:23,000
Speaker 1: we just don't want the people we're oppressing to have

518
00:28:23,040 --> 00:28:26,199
Speaker 1: the crossbows. I was reading about this as well in

519
00:28:26,880 --> 00:28:29,920
Speaker 1: Vincent van Derven's Crossbows and Christians from a twenty twelve

520
00:28:30,040 --> 00:28:34,040
Speaker 1: edition of Medieval Warfare. There's a quote from this very

521
00:28:34,600 --> 00:28:37,160
Speaker 1: church ruling from eleven thirty nine. I wanted to read

522
00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:39,680
Speaker 1: it here, doing my best attempt at a Michael Palin

523
00:28:40,760 --> 00:28:45,080
Speaker 1: accent from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Yes, quote,

524
00:28:45,520 --> 00:28:49,480
Speaker 1: we prohibit to under anathema that murderous art of crossbowmen

525
00:28:49,600 --> 00:28:52,960
Speaker 1: and archers, which is hateful to God to be employed

526
00:28:53,000 --> 00:28:55,640
Speaker 1: against Christians and Catholics from now on.

527
00:28:56,080 --> 00:29:01,480
Speaker 3: Who being naughty in my sight? Yeah, not bad Michael

528
00:29:01,520 --> 00:29:06,360
Speaker 3: palein rob but still we Apparently this this ruling was

529
00:29:06,440 --> 00:29:10,920
Speaker 3: not much heated. It was mostly ignored. But anyway, there's

530
00:29:11,040 --> 00:29:14,680
Speaker 3: there's a brief passage where Burkeolder cites another scholar named

531
00:29:15,480 --> 00:29:20,440
Speaker 3: Van Kreveld to describe some of the possible mental justifications

532
00:29:20,440 --> 00:29:24,520
Speaker 3: people had for especially demonizing the use of crossbows. Again,

533
00:29:24,560 --> 00:29:27,680
Speaker 3: you know, it's not hard to see why any any

534
00:29:27,720 --> 00:29:30,560
Speaker 3: deadly weapon would have negative connotations attached to it, But

535
00:29:30,640 --> 00:29:33,360
Speaker 3: like why the crossbow more than like a regular bow

536
00:29:33,480 --> 00:29:38,320
Speaker 3: or more than a sword when comparing missile weapons which

537
00:29:38,360 --> 00:29:42,320
Speaker 3: would include regular bows to swords. One thing that gets

538
00:29:42,360 --> 00:29:45,680
Speaker 3: mentioned in this paper is that it in some ways

539
00:29:45,760 --> 00:29:50,840
Speaker 3: quote threatened an idealized form of close quarter combat. So

540
00:29:51,200 --> 00:29:54,880
Speaker 3: maybe not that there's actually anything beautiful or noble about

541
00:29:54,880 --> 00:29:57,720
Speaker 3: people like swinging swords at each other and bashing each

542
00:29:57,760 --> 00:30:01,520
Speaker 3: other with handheld weapons, but that was an activity that

543
00:30:01,680 --> 00:30:06,440
Speaker 3: had been idealized in literature and storytelling and thus had

544
00:30:06,440 --> 00:30:10,320
Speaker 3: more poetic drama to it, totally apart from the reality

545
00:30:10,400 --> 00:30:11,720
Speaker 3: of that physically happening.

546
00:30:13,400 --> 00:30:15,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it again, it makes sense that this kind

547
00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:17,840
Speaker 1: of view would be very it would very much be

548
00:30:17,880 --> 00:30:22,040
Speaker 1: a top down viewpoint, whereas something like William Tell that

549
00:30:22,120 --> 00:30:26,240
Speaker 1: would be something that arises from the people as opposed

550
00:30:26,280 --> 00:30:30,440
Speaker 1: to from the powers that be. Though saying that, without

551
00:30:30,480 --> 00:30:32,320
Speaker 1: again not being an expert on William Tell, you can

552
00:30:32,360 --> 00:30:35,360
Speaker 1: also imagine the case where, you know, the people would

553
00:30:35,400 --> 00:30:37,440
Speaker 1: have their folk hero, and then the powers that be

554
00:30:37,560 --> 00:30:39,680
Speaker 1: might be like, well, yeah, but he was using a crossbow.

555
00:30:39,720 --> 00:30:41,040
Speaker 1: What does that tell you about this guy?

556
00:30:41,440 --> 00:30:45,440
Speaker 3: Yeah. Another possible mental motivation for this focus on the

557
00:30:45,480 --> 00:30:48,880
Speaker 3: crossbow as like the weapon of a villain, is the

558
00:30:48,960 --> 00:30:53,960
Speaker 3: idea that it somehow gives users a supposed unfair advantage.

559
00:30:54,520 --> 00:30:57,960
Speaker 3: That the idea and again we talked about this in

560
00:30:58,000 --> 00:31:00,959
Speaker 3: the last episode. It's not like you didn't have to

561
00:31:01,240 --> 00:31:03,880
Speaker 3: train to use a crossbow like it did take skill,

562
00:31:03,920 --> 00:31:07,680
Speaker 3: and it did take training, but it probably didn't take

563
00:31:07,760 --> 00:31:13,920
Speaker 3: the level of like muscular physical fitness required, and probably

564
00:31:13,960 --> 00:31:17,840
Speaker 3: maybe not the same amount of practice required for a

565
00:31:17,880 --> 00:31:20,520
Speaker 3: traditional bow that you would, you know, draw and hold

566
00:31:20,560 --> 00:31:23,240
Speaker 3: with just the strength of your arms, or maybe a

567
00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:24,080
Speaker 3: sword as well.

568
00:31:25,040 --> 00:31:28,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's it's fascinating to think about about this though,

569
00:31:28,800 --> 00:31:34,680
Speaker 1: because of course the crossbow is eventually replaced by advances

570
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:37,600
Speaker 1: in gunpowder technology and of course the coming of the

571
00:31:37,640 --> 00:31:41,120
Speaker 1: age of the gun and reading the gun by any

572
00:31:41,160 --> 00:31:44,520
Speaker 1: of these moral standards, like the gun is inherently a

573
00:31:44,560 --> 00:31:46,840
Speaker 1: coward's weapon and a weakling's weapon, but of course it

574
00:31:46,880 --> 00:31:47,840
Speaker 1: comes to rule the day.

575
00:31:48,240 --> 00:31:50,600
Speaker 3: That's true. But some sources do say that a lot

576
00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:54,120
Speaker 3: of the ways the crossbow is viewed and treated in

577
00:31:54,200 --> 00:31:57,040
Speaker 3: culture do end up sort of mapping on to early

578
00:31:57,160 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 3: uses of gunpowder weapons. I wanted to mention one more

579
00:32:01,440 --> 00:32:05,920
Speaker 3: thing that might be motivating sort of demonization of the

580
00:32:05,960 --> 00:32:11,000
Speaker 3: crossbow in compared to the longbow in films, which is

581
00:32:11,200 --> 00:32:15,320
Speaker 3: a sort of inherited bias in favor of the English

582
00:32:15,480 --> 00:32:19,320
Speaker 3: in the depiction of English versus French conflicts, where in

583
00:32:19,360 --> 00:32:23,160
Speaker 3: reality both sides actually did use crossbows at various times,

584
00:32:23,520 --> 00:32:27,480
Speaker 3: but the use of crossbows by the Continental armies by

585
00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:31,320
Speaker 3: the French is more. I think that it did actually

586
00:32:31,400 --> 00:32:35,480
Speaker 3: happen more, and it certainly is emphasized more in historical

587
00:32:35,480 --> 00:32:39,880
Speaker 3: accounts that the French had crossbows. So like, for example,

588
00:32:40,480 --> 00:32:42,880
Speaker 3: the author of this paper mentions movies about Joan of

589
00:32:43,040 --> 00:32:47,120
Speaker 3: Arc which depict Joan's French armies carrying crossbows against the

590
00:32:47,160 --> 00:32:52,600
Speaker 3: longbow armed English, and that how showing things like this

591
00:32:52,800 --> 00:32:56,520
Speaker 3: feels like it's sort of violating the normal language of cinema,

592
00:32:56,920 --> 00:32:59,200
Speaker 3: if like, the audience is supposed to be on Joan's

593
00:32:59,240 --> 00:33:02,240
Speaker 3: side and they're the ones that have crossbows.

594
00:33:03,920 --> 00:33:06,160
Speaker 1: You know, real quick. Coming back to Monty Python and

595
00:33:06,200 --> 00:33:08,200
Speaker 1: the Holy Grail, there of course is a scene where

596
00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:12,120
Speaker 1: they encounter the French, and if memory serves, the frenchmen

597
00:33:12,240 --> 00:33:16,720
Speaker 1: do not have crossbows, but they do wield an unfair

598
00:33:16,880 --> 00:33:21,240
Speaker 1: ranged weapon against our English knights, and that, of course

599
00:33:21,320 --> 00:33:24,560
Speaker 1: is insults. So perhaps there's some connective tissue there. I'm

600
00:33:24,600 --> 00:33:24,960
Speaker 1: not sure.

601
00:33:25,320 --> 00:33:27,560
Speaker 3: It leads to one of my favorite details in that

602
00:33:27,640 --> 00:33:30,560
Speaker 3: whole movie that is quite easy to miss. Actually it's

603
00:33:30,600 --> 00:33:34,480
Speaker 3: not even a spoken line. It's the fact that John

604
00:33:34,520 --> 00:33:38,360
Speaker 3: Cleee playing a Lancelot, after they get insulted by the French,

605
00:33:38,400 --> 00:33:41,040
Speaker 3: he draws his sword and starts hitting the castle with

606
00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:44,880
Speaker 3: the sword. I think it's one of the best gags

607
00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:48,480
Speaker 3: in the movie. But to sum it up, is there

608
00:33:48,480 --> 00:33:53,400
Speaker 3: a bias in contemporary historical sources about the use of

609
00:33:53,440 --> 00:33:56,080
Speaker 3: crossbows that treats them in this same way, that views

610
00:33:56,080 --> 00:34:00,160
Speaker 3: them as villainous. It's not universal, but there are some

611
00:34:00,280 --> 00:34:03,320
Speaker 3: sources like that, and it may be that those sources

612
00:34:03,360 --> 00:34:07,200
Speaker 3: have been influential and have sort of come through and

613
00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:11,200
Speaker 3: become inherited as part of the language of medieval films.

614
00:34:11,760 --> 00:34:13,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is going to be very interesting to think

615
00:34:13,480 --> 00:34:17,960
Speaker 1: about just in general, as we all continue to watch

616
00:34:18,080 --> 00:34:21,040
Speaker 1: films that have at least a medieval flavoring to them,

617
00:34:21,680 --> 00:34:23,799
Speaker 1: or to read books that have medieval flavoring to them.

618
00:34:23,800 --> 00:34:26,600
Speaker 1: I was just reading from a fantasy novel last night,

619
00:34:26,640 --> 00:34:28,719
Speaker 1: and there's a scene where people were being shot out

620
00:34:28,719 --> 00:34:32,279
Speaker 1: by cross with crossbows, and of course it's it's like

621
00:34:32,400 --> 00:34:36,719
Speaker 1: rogues and assassins who were using the crossbow. Yeah, and

622
00:34:36,920 --> 00:34:48,759
Speaker 1: certainly on future episodes of Weird House Cinema. Now, to

623
00:34:48,800 --> 00:34:52,120
Speaker 1: come back to the crossbow itself, First of all, I

624
00:34:52,200 --> 00:34:54,399
Speaker 1: just want to pick up a few odds and ends

625
00:34:54,440 --> 00:34:57,000
Speaker 1: that I didn't get to discussing, just sort of the

626
00:34:57,320 --> 00:35:00,640
Speaker 1: history and innovation of the crossbow, particularly first of all,

627
00:35:00,960 --> 00:35:04,360
Speaker 1: more in the West. According to Fagan and Rowley Conley,

628
00:35:04,600 --> 00:35:08,040
Speaker 1: the Romans have for them an early explicit textual reference

629
00:35:08,080 --> 00:35:10,879
Speaker 1: to the crossbows, and they would have been in use

630
00:35:10,960 --> 00:35:15,200
Speaker 1: by the Roman army by the fourth century CE. The

631
00:35:15,360 --> 00:35:20,160
Speaker 1: Viagettius actually refers to these in the book Concerning Military Matters,

632
00:35:21,440 --> 00:35:23,759
Speaker 1: but the authors here point out that in the bow

633
00:35:23,880 --> 00:35:26,840
Speaker 1: drawing mechanisms varied. We've discussed some of these already, laying down,

634
00:35:27,920 --> 00:35:31,600
Speaker 1: you know, strap putting your feet into straps, you know,

635
00:35:31,680 --> 00:35:34,640
Speaker 1: kind of like bootholes on the end of the crossbow.

636
00:35:35,200 --> 00:35:40,040
Speaker 1: There was also the Greek belly bow, or the gastrofeties.

637
00:35:40,680 --> 00:35:43,680
Speaker 1: This described in the first century CE, and was loaded

638
00:35:43,719 --> 00:35:46,960
Speaker 1: by bracing the crossbow against the ground and forcing the

639
00:35:46,960 --> 00:35:49,440
Speaker 1: butt of the thing into your belly. I don't know

640
00:35:49,480 --> 00:35:52,399
Speaker 1: if that makes complete sense. I included an illustration here

641
00:35:52,400 --> 00:35:53,040
Speaker 1: for you, Joe.

642
00:35:53,280 --> 00:35:56,960
Speaker 3: Mm, well, I'm seeing the figure in the illustration you're

643
00:35:56,960 --> 00:35:59,680
Speaker 3: providing where it's like he's almost like lean he's leaning

644
00:35:59,719 --> 00:36:02,799
Speaker 3: down on the crossbow with his belly on it, with

645
00:36:02,880 --> 00:36:06,200
Speaker 3: the bottom against the ground. So he's like pressing, and

646
00:36:06,239 --> 00:36:09,760
Speaker 3: I guess I don't understand how the pressing would cause

647
00:36:09,800 --> 00:36:13,359
Speaker 3: it to be spanned or to be what you might

648
00:36:13,400 --> 00:36:16,879
Speaker 3: call a loaded or cocked. I guess maybe one way

649
00:36:16,920 --> 00:36:19,719
Speaker 3: of interpreting this, though I don't know, is like if

650
00:36:19,760 --> 00:36:24,080
Speaker 3: there are two actual shafts that can slide across each other,

651
00:36:24,480 --> 00:36:27,280
Speaker 3: so by pressing on one, he is sliding it down

652
00:36:27,320 --> 00:36:29,920
Speaker 3: the length of the other, and that draws back the string.

653
00:36:30,000 --> 00:36:31,040
Speaker 3: I guess that's possible.

654
00:36:31,640 --> 00:36:34,360
Speaker 1: Yeah, Basically, it looks like he's giving himself an incorrect

655
00:36:34,440 --> 00:36:37,920
Speaker 1: Heimlich maneuver with the crossbow with the business end pointed

656
00:36:37,960 --> 00:36:40,440
Speaker 1: at the ground. On the end of the crossbow, the

657
00:36:40,440 --> 00:36:43,080
Speaker 1: business end of the crossbow, there's this shaft and is

658
00:36:43,120 --> 00:36:46,360
Speaker 1: that is pushed down. As that's forced down, it's gonna

659
00:36:46,360 --> 00:36:49,120
Speaker 1: push the you see it, It would slide ice and

660
00:36:49,200 --> 00:36:52,640
Speaker 1: push the push that it would draw the bow and

661
00:36:52,680 --> 00:36:53,359
Speaker 1: then it would lock.

662
00:36:53,800 --> 00:36:56,600
Speaker 3: That makes sense now, yeah, okay, because a lot of

663
00:36:56,320 --> 00:37:00,760
Speaker 3: the later like medieval European mechanisms, I'm thinking for spanning,

664
00:37:00,760 --> 00:37:04,919
Speaker 3: it would involve more of a pulling mechanism, where say

665
00:37:05,200 --> 00:37:08,000
Speaker 3: a common one is again the belt hook, which we

666
00:37:08,040 --> 00:37:10,120
Speaker 3: talked about last time, say, the combination of a belt

667
00:37:10,200 --> 00:37:12,520
Speaker 3: hook with a stirrup at the end of the crossbow.

668
00:37:12,600 --> 00:37:15,640
Speaker 3: So you would hook something that's attached to the string

669
00:37:17,280 --> 00:37:19,719
Speaker 3: to a loop or a hook on your belt, and

670
00:37:19,760 --> 00:37:22,440
Speaker 3: then you would push down with your foot in a

671
00:37:22,480 --> 00:37:26,000
Speaker 3: stirrup on the shaft of the crossbow at the stirrups

672
00:37:26,000 --> 00:37:28,160
Speaker 3: at the end of the crossbow, so that pulls the

673
00:37:28,200 --> 00:37:30,879
Speaker 3: bow towards your foot and it pulls the string back

674
00:37:30,920 --> 00:37:33,440
Speaker 3: with the strength of your legs and your body away

675
00:37:33,480 --> 00:37:33,880
Speaker 3: from it.

676
00:37:34,200 --> 00:37:38,280
Speaker 1: Yeah. Now, the authors mentioned that there were also Greco

677
00:37:38,360 --> 00:37:41,360
Speaker 1: Roman mentions of crossbows going back to the third and

678
00:37:41,440 --> 00:37:45,720
Speaker 1: even fifth centuries BCE. The third century BC example seems

679
00:37:45,960 --> 00:37:49,520
Speaker 1: pretty valid. This is described and sustibious. But the fifth

680
00:37:49,520 --> 00:37:53,160
Speaker 1: century BCE mentioned seems to be a catapult or a

681
00:37:53,200 --> 00:37:56,879
Speaker 1: siege weapon rather than a handheld weapon. Again, getting back

682
00:37:56,880 --> 00:38:00,080
Speaker 1: to that something we mentioned in the last episode, but

683
00:38:00,120 --> 00:38:02,719
Speaker 1: apparently looking back at some of these ancient texts, if

684
00:38:02,719 --> 00:38:04,520
Speaker 1: you get into this gray area when you're trying to

685
00:38:04,520 --> 00:38:06,600
Speaker 1: determine are we talking about a crossbow here or are

686
00:38:06,600 --> 00:38:08,360
Speaker 1: we talking about some form of catapult?

687
00:38:08,760 --> 00:38:11,560
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that ambiguity doesn't stop there. By the way

688
00:38:11,600 --> 00:38:15,680
Speaker 3: I've read that historical study of crossbows is in multiple

689
00:38:15,680 --> 00:38:19,840
Speaker 3: ways complicated by ambiguity and confusion about the names used

690
00:38:19,840 --> 00:38:22,520
Speaker 3: for weapons and texts and trying to understand exactly what

691
00:38:22,520 --> 00:38:23,360
Speaker 3: they're talking about.

692
00:38:24,040 --> 00:38:27,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, now one more sort of like cocking or drawing

693
00:38:27,920 --> 00:38:30,919
Speaker 1: mechanism of note, you also have the goat foot lever

694
00:38:32,120 --> 00:38:34,480
Speaker 1: that appeared on a number of crossbows, and this was

695
00:38:34,520 --> 00:38:38,760
Speaker 1: basically a lever device that was used to draw the bow.

696
00:38:39,560 --> 00:38:42,160
Speaker 1: I looked at looking at images of it. I guess

697
00:38:42,200 --> 00:38:44,160
Speaker 1: the goat foot comes because it kind of looks like

698
00:38:44,160 --> 00:38:47,279
Speaker 1: a cloven hoof. There's like sort of two hooks or

699
00:38:47,320 --> 00:38:47,960
Speaker 1: grooves in it.

700
00:38:48,640 --> 00:38:52,479
Speaker 3: Yeah, and so in addition, so like the belt hook one,

701
00:38:52,560 --> 00:38:55,359
Speaker 3: you would be trying to span the crossbow just by

702
00:38:55,400 --> 00:38:57,279
Speaker 3: using the strength of your body. But a lot of

703
00:38:57,320 --> 00:39:01,200
Speaker 3: these mechanisms have a machine with some kind a mechanical advantage,

704
00:39:01,239 --> 00:39:03,360
Speaker 3: like a lever or later you would have you know,

705
00:39:03,400 --> 00:39:05,799
Speaker 3: you could get a really powerful crossbow if you use

706
00:39:06,480 --> 00:39:09,680
Speaker 3: objects like a windlass or a cranicquin that would give

707
00:39:09,719 --> 00:39:13,200
Speaker 3: you the ability to essentially crank the string back.

708
00:39:14,200 --> 00:39:16,480
Speaker 1: And that's the kind of crossbow that a dwarf should

709
00:39:16,520 --> 00:39:18,680
Speaker 1: be using. I mean that just seems perfect. Certainly a

710
00:39:18,680 --> 00:39:21,759
Speaker 1: gnome in Dungeons and Dragons needs a crossbow that has

711
00:39:21,800 --> 00:39:24,360
Speaker 1: cranks on it, cranks, levers, the whole nine.

712
00:39:24,280 --> 00:39:27,279
Speaker 3: Yards, lots of moving parts. Yeah, it makes it more

713
00:39:27,360 --> 00:39:28,600
Speaker 3: like a modern machine.

714
00:39:29,120 --> 00:39:32,719
Speaker 1: Now with military technology, and certainly with the crossbow. You know,

715
00:39:32,800 --> 00:39:35,560
Speaker 1: it often comes down to trade offs, right. So in

716
00:39:35,719 --> 00:39:39,640
Speaker 1: the last episode we definitely discussed the reloading limitations of

717
00:39:39,680 --> 00:39:43,319
Speaker 1: the crossbow, and this was a problem that innovators threw

718
00:39:43,360 --> 00:39:46,759
Speaker 1: themselves that pretty early on. The crossbow packs power and

719
00:39:46,800 --> 00:39:50,080
Speaker 1: it offers reasonable accessibility, but is there a way to

720
00:39:50,160 --> 00:39:54,200
Speaker 1: speed it up again to be able to fire perhaps

721
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:57,680
Speaker 1: more crossbow bolts before too many arrows are fired at

722
00:39:57,719 --> 00:40:00,080
Speaker 1: you by archers and so forth? Are there ways to

723
00:40:00,120 --> 00:40:04,040
Speaker 1: do that while retaining the advantages of the crossbow to

724
00:40:04,160 --> 00:40:07,000
Speaker 1: some measurable degree. And so this is where we get

725
00:40:07,000 --> 00:40:10,800
Speaker 1: into the topic of the Chinese repeating crossbow. I was

726
00:40:10,840 --> 00:40:12,680
Speaker 1: looking at a couple of sources on this. One of

727
00:40:12,719 --> 00:40:16,440
Speaker 1: them is Mechanism Analysis of Ancient Chinese Crossbows by Dong Atol,

728
00:40:16,480 --> 00:40:19,719
Speaker 1: published in the journal Mechanical Sciences in twenty twenty. I

729
00:40:19,760 --> 00:40:24,560
Speaker 1: was also looking at Structural analysis of ancient Chinese crossbows

730
00:40:24,560 --> 00:40:26,840
Speaker 1: from twenty twelve in the Journal of Science and Innovation

731
00:40:27,360 --> 00:40:32,960
Speaker 1: by Su and Yan and the innovation in broad strokes

732
00:40:33,000 --> 00:40:36,080
Speaker 1: seems to go back perhaps as early as four hundred BCE,

733
00:40:36,880 --> 00:40:41,080
Speaker 1: at least in principle, though there are essentially two different

734
00:40:41,120 --> 00:40:44,400
Speaker 1: repeating crossbows from two different eras that you see mentioned.

735
00:40:44,719 --> 00:40:47,680
Speaker 1: So this first one, this four hundred BCE one. This

736
00:40:47,719 --> 00:40:50,600
Speaker 1: is sometimes referred to as the Chuse State repeating crossbow,

737
00:40:52,640 --> 00:40:56,319
Speaker 1: and the evidence for this comes from archaeological finds in

738
00:40:56,480 --> 00:41:00,000
Speaker 1: jung Ling Hube that have been dated to this period.

739
00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:02,640
Speaker 1: According to dong at all So, this area was known

740
00:41:02,680 --> 00:41:05,360
Speaker 1: as the Cheo State during the Warring States period that

741
00:41:05,400 --> 00:41:08,200
Speaker 1: would have spanned four seventy five through to twenty one BCE.

742
00:41:09,160 --> 00:41:13,760
Speaker 1: So this, this contraption seemed to have had a vertical

743
00:41:13,840 --> 00:41:17,759
Speaker 1: magazine on top of the crossbow of twenty arrows that

744
00:41:17,920 --> 00:41:22,200
Speaker 1: drop down into firing position via gravity, and then you

745
00:41:22,239 --> 00:41:24,480
Speaker 1: would you would draw back, fire, draw back, and every

746
00:41:24,520 --> 00:41:26,840
Speaker 1: time you would draw back with an empty slot for

747
00:41:27,040 --> 00:41:31,120
Speaker 1: a crossbow bolt, it would drop into place. Sounds pretty advanced,

748
00:41:31,200 --> 00:41:34,640
Speaker 1: sounds potentially useful, right. However, the thing to keep in

749
00:41:34,640 --> 00:41:37,600
Speaker 1: mind about the Cheo State crossbow is that it's small.

750
00:41:39,360 --> 00:41:42,319
Speaker 1: It's only thirty centimeters long, it's less than a foot,

751
00:41:42,840 --> 00:41:45,759
Speaker 1: and the bow is so short that it would have

752
00:41:45,760 --> 00:41:49,520
Speaker 1: depended on the elasticity of the bow string rather than

753
00:41:49,560 --> 00:41:50,680
Speaker 1: the bending of the bow.

754
00:41:51,200 --> 00:41:54,480
Speaker 3: Huh, So it's more like a slingshot almost.

755
00:41:54,440 --> 00:41:56,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, And they say that it would have only had

756
00:41:56,480 --> 00:41:58,560
Speaker 1: a range of about twenty to twenty five meters, so

757
00:41:58,600 --> 00:42:00,480
Speaker 1: I think somewhere in the range of twenty two yards.

758
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:04,640
Speaker 1: But on the other hand, you'd have something like rapid

759
00:42:04,680 --> 00:42:08,760
Speaker 1: fire or you know, automatic or semi automatic fire as such.

760
00:42:09,480 --> 00:42:11,480
Speaker 1: You know, this wouldn't have been a weapon of warfare

761
00:42:11,600 --> 00:42:14,680
Speaker 1: or self defense, they stressed, but rather a novelty invention

762
00:42:15,160 --> 00:42:17,719
Speaker 1: that could have best been used at best could have

763
00:42:17,719 --> 00:42:21,080
Speaker 1: been used to hunt small birds. The authors also describe

764
00:42:21,080 --> 00:42:23,400
Speaker 1: it as a quote toy of personal invention.

765
00:42:24,040 --> 00:42:28,440
Speaker 3: That's interesting, so more of a demonstration of principle or

766
00:42:28,520 --> 00:42:32,040
Speaker 3: demonstration of ingenuity than something that would have been especially

767
00:42:32,120 --> 00:42:33,680
Speaker 3: useful in this form.

768
00:42:34,200 --> 00:42:36,080
Speaker 1: Right, Like I guess if there were a Dungeons and

769
00:42:36,120 --> 00:42:38,840
Speaker 1: Dragon's weapon, it would just do zero damage across the board.

770
00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:42,799
Speaker 1: But it's interesting. So I should also point out that

771
00:42:42,800 --> 00:42:45,239
Speaker 1: the author's stress that there are no historical writings that

772
00:42:45,320 --> 00:42:49,200
Speaker 1: mention this particular crossbow, and that the idea of that

773
00:42:49,360 --> 00:42:51,960
Speaker 1: being like a toy of personal invention. It reminds me

774
00:42:52,120 --> 00:42:54,840
Speaker 1: even of our invention episodes on the wheel. You know,

775
00:42:55,040 --> 00:42:59,440
Speaker 1: in certain cultures before the wheel could actually really be

776
00:42:59,480 --> 00:43:03,880
Speaker 1: capitalized upon for transportation and so forth, you know, or

777
00:43:03,920 --> 00:43:06,840
Speaker 1: other applications. There are still evidence that it was around,

778
00:43:06,920 --> 00:43:09,719
Speaker 1: sometimes just as a novelty, as a toy. There are

779
00:43:09,800 --> 00:43:14,760
Speaker 1: various reasons that an idea or technological innovation just cannot

780
00:43:14,800 --> 00:43:19,600
Speaker 1: be you know, used, that cannot be employed for anything

781
00:43:19,600 --> 00:43:21,919
Speaker 1: other than amusement, or at least for a certain period

782
00:43:21,960 --> 00:43:22,279
Speaker 1: of time.

783
00:43:22,760 --> 00:43:25,879
Speaker 3: Right. I'm almost tempted to wonder if in some scenarios,

784
00:43:25,960 --> 00:43:31,719
Speaker 3: like making a toy version of a mechanical device would

785
00:43:31,719 --> 00:43:33,960
Speaker 3: be kind of like taking a patent out, like you know,

786
00:43:34,000 --> 00:43:37,080
Speaker 3: you're not making this device at scale that it would

787
00:43:37,120 --> 00:43:39,280
Speaker 3: be or in a way that would be used for anything.

788
00:43:39,320 --> 00:43:41,520
Speaker 3: But you can you can show the principle in small

789
00:43:41,560 --> 00:43:42,440
Speaker 3: scale in a toy.

790
00:43:43,200 --> 00:43:43,719
Speaker 1: Yeah.

791
00:43:44,080 --> 00:43:44,239
Speaker 3: Now.

792
00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:49,640
Speaker 1: The second variety of Chinese repeating crossbow is the zugew

793
00:43:49,840 --> 00:43:54,000
Speaker 1: or zuge New repeating crossbow, named for Zuge Lang apparently

794
00:43:54,520 --> 00:43:59,200
Speaker 1: one through two thirty four CE, military leader and prime

795
00:43:59,200 --> 00:44:03,319
Speaker 1: minister of Schuhan during the Three Kingdoms period. He's also

796
00:44:03,360 --> 00:44:06,040
Speaker 1: apparently the main hero of the fictional Romance of the

797
00:44:06,040 --> 00:44:10,319
Speaker 1: Three Kingdoms, a fourteenth century historical novel, in that he's

798
00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:14,800
Speaker 1: portrayed as a sage and a military mastermind. However, apparently

799
00:44:14,880 --> 00:44:18,239
Speaker 1: he did not actually create invent this crossbow. His name

800
00:44:18,719 --> 00:44:22,080
Speaker 1: is associated with it in some records, and it just

801
00:44:22,120 --> 00:44:26,480
Speaker 1: has kind of stuck. But this version of the repeating

802
00:44:26,480 --> 00:44:30,759
Speaker 1: crossbow did see use and was powerful enough to serve

803
00:44:30,800 --> 00:44:34,720
Speaker 1: as a lethal weapon, sometimes aided by poisoned bolt heads.

804
00:44:36,480 --> 00:44:39,960
Speaker 1: Military historian Chris McNabb describes it as follows in a

805
00:44:40,000 --> 00:44:43,960
Speaker 1: twenty twenty issue of MHQ, the Quarterly Journal of Military History.

806
00:44:44,600 --> 00:44:48,040
Speaker 1: Quote it featured a top mounted magazine in which multiple

807
00:44:48,040 --> 00:44:51,800
Speaker 1: bolts were stacked in a large operating handle. When drawn

808
00:44:51,880 --> 00:44:54,319
Speaker 1: to the rear, the handle both cocked and at the

809
00:44:54,320 --> 00:44:57,360
Speaker 1: full extent of the draw released the bowstring, firing the

810
00:44:57,400 --> 00:45:00,480
Speaker 1: bolt that had dropped automatically into the flight groove. There

811
00:45:00,520 --> 00:45:05,000
Speaker 1: was no separate trigger. The crossbowmen then drove the handle forward,

812
00:45:05,040 --> 00:45:08,160
Speaker 1: pushing the whole mechanism to the front. To re engage

813
00:45:08,160 --> 00:45:10,960
Speaker 1: the string for firing as the next bolt took its

814
00:45:10,960 --> 00:45:14,400
Speaker 1: place in the flight grove ready to go. Now he

815
00:45:14,520 --> 00:45:17,360
Speaker 1: cites a fire rate of ten bolts in twenty seconds

816
00:45:17,760 --> 00:45:21,200
Speaker 1: compared to a more standard and again very general crossbow

817
00:45:21,239 --> 00:45:23,880
Speaker 1: fire rate of three or four bolts in a minute.

818
00:45:24,360 --> 00:45:27,360
Speaker 1: But as impressive as this is, the trade off was

819
00:45:27,600 --> 00:45:31,240
Speaker 1: limited power and range, thus the need for poison tips

820
00:45:31,960 --> 00:45:35,960
Speaker 1: on some of your bolt heads. Still, one can imagine

821
00:45:36,600 --> 00:45:38,680
Speaker 1: using this as kind of like a nuisance or shock

822
00:45:38,719 --> 00:45:44,440
Speaker 1: weapon alongside other defensive weaponry. Now, Needham discusses the box

823
00:45:44,480 --> 00:45:48,080
Speaker 1: and tube crossbow used around twelve fifty seven that featured

824
00:45:48,080 --> 00:45:51,080
Speaker 1: a vertical drop magazine atop the crossbow. This was noted

825
00:45:51,080 --> 00:45:54,040
Speaker 1: for its convenience and steadiness. It apparently could also be

826
00:45:54,160 --> 00:45:56,520
Speaker 1: used easily at night because you didn't actually have to

827
00:45:56,560 --> 00:45:59,759
Speaker 1: see what you were doing with the loading. That raises

828
00:45:59,800 --> 00:46:02,600
Speaker 1: questions about what you're shooting at. I don't know that

829
00:46:02,719 --> 00:46:05,480
Speaker 1: that's more properly eliminated. I guess you can imagine a

830
00:46:05,560 --> 00:46:09,280
Speaker 1: scenario where there's moonlight in play and you're in the shadows.

831
00:46:09,719 --> 00:46:13,520
Speaker 1: And it's also worth noting, especially in the writings of

832
00:46:13,880 --> 00:46:18,480
Speaker 1: Needham about Chinese history and technology that the repeated fire

833
00:46:18,480 --> 00:46:21,920
Speaker 1: innovations would continue during the gunpowder era of Chinese weaponry,

834
00:46:21,920 --> 00:46:25,720
Speaker 1: and Nitam mentions the nine dragon guns that could shoot

835
00:46:25,800 --> 00:46:29,040
Speaker 1: nine arrows at a time off a single ignition. This

836
00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:32,640
Speaker 1: was part of the fifteenth century Frontier arsenal. They also

837
00:46:32,680 --> 00:46:36,239
Speaker 1: made use of a form of multi barrel gun that

838
00:46:36,880 --> 00:46:38,520
Speaker 1: this is much later on, but it was apparently in

839
00:46:38,560 --> 00:46:41,960
Speaker 1: line with the European concept of the roboticon or late

840
00:46:42,040 --> 00:46:45,520
Speaker 1: medieval volley gun of the same time period. Now I

841
00:46:45,560 --> 00:46:49,760
Speaker 1: have one more kind of mystery weapon to bring up here.

842
00:46:50,320 --> 00:46:53,080
Speaker 1: This is one that came up pretty early in my research,

843
00:46:53,239 --> 00:46:55,600
Speaker 1: but coming to it last here because I couldn't really

844
00:46:55,640 --> 00:46:58,520
Speaker 1: get a straight answer on it. And it concerns something

845
00:46:58,600 --> 00:47:04,439
Speaker 1: called the panjagon. So this would have been a either

846
00:47:04,560 --> 00:47:08,760
Speaker 1: a bow or a crossbow, or some sort of a

847
00:47:08,800 --> 00:47:14,200
Speaker 1: bow technique. It's uncertain associated with the Sasanian Empire. This

848
00:47:14,280 --> 00:47:17,759
Speaker 1: would of course an Iranian empire from two twenty four

849
00:47:17,800 --> 00:47:21,720
Speaker 1: to six fifty one. We've discussed this empire on past

850
00:47:21,760 --> 00:47:24,839
Speaker 1: episodes of the show. But yeah, it seems to have

851
00:47:24,880 --> 00:47:27,719
Speaker 1: been a weapon or a weapon system or just a strategy,

852
00:47:28,239 --> 00:47:31,880
Speaker 1: and it's unclear if descriptions are referring to a projectile

853
00:47:31,920 --> 00:47:35,200
Speaker 1: weapon or an archery technique. It's even been speculated though,

854
00:47:35,200 --> 00:47:39,040
Speaker 1: that it might have been a repeating crossbow of some form.

855
00:47:39,120 --> 00:47:42,880
Speaker 1: I was looking at a book by Cave Faruka titled

856
00:47:42,920 --> 00:47:47,480
Speaker 1: Sasanian Elite Cavalry AD two twenty four through six forty two.

857
00:47:48,040 --> 00:47:50,360
Speaker 1: I should note that this book has an illustration on

858
00:47:50,400 --> 00:47:52,400
Speaker 1: the front, and this may be like a stock illustration,

859
00:47:52,440 --> 00:47:54,040
Speaker 1: because I found it in some other places as well,

860
00:47:54,520 --> 00:47:59,240
Speaker 1: that shows a man on a horse when in armor

861
00:48:00,080 --> 00:48:03,080
Speaker 1: hiring some sort of strange weapon that has like five

862
00:48:03,920 --> 00:48:06,680
Speaker 1: arrow slots or five grooves, and they are like five

863
00:48:06,840 --> 00:48:12,719
Speaker 1: arrows flying out of the thing. So I assume that

864
00:48:12,719 --> 00:48:17,200
Speaker 1: that is supposed to be an artist depiction of the pandagon.

865
00:48:17,640 --> 00:48:21,600
Speaker 1: But the book itself goes into more detail here. So

866
00:48:21,640 --> 00:48:24,920
Speaker 1: the name means five device, but there are no known

867
00:48:25,000 --> 00:48:28,480
Speaker 1: surviving examples to go on. The author here writes that

868
00:48:28,520 --> 00:48:31,640
Speaker 1: it might have been a quiver system for accessing five

869
00:48:31,760 --> 00:48:34,880
Speaker 1: arrows in a row fairly quickly, rather than what was

870
00:48:34,880 --> 00:48:37,800
Speaker 1: apparently the typical Sesanian approach of holding three arrows in

871
00:48:37,840 --> 00:48:39,840
Speaker 1: the same hand as the bow while you were firing.

872
00:48:41,040 --> 00:48:44,560
Speaker 1: He speculates that it was likely intended whatever it was,

873
00:48:44,600 --> 00:48:48,040
Speaker 1: as a like a spread fire weapon or some sort

874
00:48:48,040 --> 00:48:51,160
Speaker 1: of a technique to spread your fire, while other, perhaps

875
00:48:51,200 --> 00:48:55,319
Speaker 1: more highly skilled archers, and certainly Roman accounts speak of

876
00:48:55,360 --> 00:48:59,560
Speaker 1: Sasanian archery skill could focus their fire. So you know,

877
00:48:59,600 --> 00:49:02,520
Speaker 1: you have say multiple arrows flying through the air, and

878
00:49:03,160 --> 00:49:05,880
Speaker 1: this proposes a certain threat. But then perhaps you have

879
00:49:06,000 --> 00:49:09,280
Speaker 1: more skilled archers that are actually doing the lethal work

880
00:49:09,480 --> 00:49:12,719
Speaker 1: alongside this. But ultimately who knows. Maybe it was some

881
00:49:12,760 --> 00:49:17,239
Speaker 1: sort of repeating crossbow, but the details are lost to history.

882
00:49:17,280 --> 00:49:22,600
Speaker 1: Apparently interesting, where are the repeating crossbows and dungeons and dragons?

883
00:49:22,640 --> 00:49:23,800
Speaker 1: Though not sure?

884
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:26,440
Speaker 3: I don't know. I've never come across one. I assume

885
00:49:26,480 --> 00:49:27,439
Speaker 3: that means they're not there.

886
00:49:29,080 --> 00:49:31,319
Speaker 1: I mean they've got to be there. Someone has at

887
00:49:31,400 --> 00:49:34,120
Speaker 1: least home brewed or repeating crossbow right, and a quick

888
00:49:34,160 --> 00:49:36,440
Speaker 1: search on D and D beyond shows that there are

889
00:49:36,760 --> 00:49:40,359
Speaker 1: some references to them, So maybe the Darrow use them

890
00:49:40,360 --> 00:49:42,920
Speaker 1: in the under Dark. Looks like they maybe show up

891
00:49:42,960 --> 00:49:45,880
Speaker 1: in Water Deep, but they don't have a prominent place

892
00:49:45,920 --> 00:49:47,480
Speaker 1: in the player's handbook or anything.

893
00:49:47,760 --> 00:49:49,600
Speaker 3: This might be a bit a dumb question, but how

894
00:49:49,600 --> 00:49:51,960
Speaker 3: do you get lumber in the under dark? Because they

895
00:49:51,960 --> 00:49:54,560
Speaker 3: don't have trees down there, right, it's just big mushrooms.

896
00:49:54,719 --> 00:49:58,839
Speaker 3: So do you use mushroom fiber as lumber to make

897
00:49:58,880 --> 00:50:01,680
Speaker 3: your you know, your wooden structures and tools, or do

898
00:50:01,719 --> 00:50:03,880
Speaker 3: you have to go to the surface to get trees

899
00:50:03,920 --> 00:50:04,480
Speaker 3: for lumber.

900
00:50:05,560 --> 00:50:07,759
Speaker 1: Well, you've answered your own question, because yes, you use

901
00:50:07,800 --> 00:50:11,200
Speaker 1: the mushrooms. There's a particular mushroom that is called zerka

902
00:50:11,239 --> 00:50:15,640
Speaker 1: wood or zerk wood that is the primary building material

903
00:50:15,719 --> 00:50:16,439
Speaker 1: of the under Dark.

904
00:50:16,960 --> 00:50:20,160
Speaker 3: Man, you know all the answers. I didn't know there

905
00:50:20,200 --> 00:50:21,040
Speaker 3: was an answer to that.

906
00:50:21,600 --> 00:50:23,520
Speaker 1: I ran a campaign in the under Dark for a while,

907
00:50:23,560 --> 00:50:26,400
Speaker 1: so the Underdark I have a lot of answers on.

908
00:50:26,560 --> 00:50:29,440
Speaker 1: But other parts of the D and D world, I'm

909
00:50:30,280 --> 00:50:32,120
Speaker 1: my knowledge is a little more vague and.

910
00:50:32,360 --> 00:50:34,840
Speaker 3: Spread out, And I guess we end where we began

911
00:50:35,000 --> 00:50:37,839
Speaker 3: with with D and D. Well, does that do it

912
00:50:37,880 --> 00:50:39,520
Speaker 3: for you with the Crossbow robe.

913
00:50:39,840 --> 00:50:41,560
Speaker 1: I think so. I mean, there are a lot of

914
00:50:41,560 --> 00:50:43,120
Speaker 1: things in the history of the Crossbow that, you know,

915
00:50:43,120 --> 00:50:44,719
Speaker 1: we didn't have time to touch on, but I think

916
00:50:44,760 --> 00:50:47,640
Speaker 1: we had all the most important things. But we'd love

917
00:50:47,680 --> 00:50:49,759
Speaker 1: to hear from anyone out there if you have examples

918
00:50:49,800 --> 00:50:53,360
Speaker 1: of what we've been talking about. In you know, medieval

919
00:50:53,440 --> 00:50:57,520
Speaker 1: flavored media concerning the crossbow. If you yourself are a

920
00:50:57,840 --> 00:51:00,759
Speaker 1: crossbow enthusiast, then I'm sure you have some insight to

921
00:51:00,800 --> 00:51:03,640
Speaker 1: share with us. Everything's fair game will remind you that

922
00:51:03,680 --> 00:51:06,239
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is primarily a science podcast

923
00:51:06,280 --> 00:51:09,839
Speaker 1: with episodes. Core episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, listener mail

924
00:51:09,840 --> 00:51:13,440
Speaker 1: on Mondays. On Wednesdays we'll usually do a short form

925
00:51:13,680 --> 00:51:16,719
Speaker 1: monster fact or artifact episode, and on Fridays we set

926
00:51:16,760 --> 00:51:19,120
Speaker 1: aside most serious concerns just talk about a weird film

927
00:51:19,440 --> 00:51:22,239
Speaker 1: on Weird House Cinema. Will remind you that if you

928
00:51:22,280 --> 00:51:25,040
Speaker 1: are on social media these days, well, you know, check

929
00:51:25,120 --> 00:51:28,279
Speaker 1: us out. Our accounts are up and active again, so

930
00:51:28,320 --> 00:51:31,360
Speaker 1: you can follow what episodes are coming out on those accounts.

931
00:51:31,640 --> 00:51:35,880
Speaker 1: If you use Instagram, check out sdby on podcast. That

932
00:51:36,000 --> 00:51:38,520
Speaker 1: is our handle there. That is our newish handle, the

933
00:51:38,560 --> 00:51:39,440
Speaker 1: old one.

934
00:51:39,520 --> 00:51:42,400
Speaker 3: Has been lost to us huge thanks as always to

935
00:51:42,440 --> 00:51:45,520
Speaker 3: our excellent audio producer JJ Posway. If you would like

936
00:51:45,560 --> 00:51:47,400
Speaker 3: to get in touch with us with feedback on this

937
00:51:47,480 --> 00:51:50,400
Speaker 3: episode or any other, to suggest a topic for the future,

938
00:51:50,520 --> 00:51:52,640
Speaker 3: or just to say hello, you can email us at

939
00:51:52,719 --> 00:52:02,920
Speaker 3: contact at Stuff to Blow Your Mind dot com.

940
00:52:03,040 --> 00:52:06,000
Speaker 2: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

941
00:52:06,080 --> 00:52:09,920
Speaker 2: more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

942
00:52:10,000 --> 00:52:26,160
Speaker 2: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.