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Bows of this shape can be seen in museums, for example the famous bows made for Sultan Bayezid II (early 16th c.) in Topkapi museum in Istanbul. Note the straight-through-grip limb shapes, fairly abrupt reflex at the beginning of shoulder (kasan) sections, the relatively straight kasan and another abrupt recurvature of the tip (bash). The ends of tips are shaped to resemble the more square, indented "Bayezid tip", unlike the better known, rounded "classical tip". The grips are relatively large and rigid. There are no string bridges which were never necessary in this style. The string is silk with silk loops.
I made the bows according to the usual methods. The cores are hard maple, the bellies horn and the backs covered with sinew. Since I was aiming for stability, the bows were not given the extreme reflex during sinewing, as it is done with flight bows. The tips do not have horn inserts or bone overlays, as the lighter draw weights did not require such reinforcements. The bows were covered with leather on the back side of arms and at the edges. Total physical weight was 330+ grams, less than, for example, the weight of Bayezid bows, but these bows have substantially lower draw weights than the old ones.
Both bows are about 64 lb at 28" draw. I measured the velocity of arrows with one of the bows: 205fps with 475 grain arrow and 182fps with 640 grain, a good performance for a regular longer bow.
All decoration is done in gold, period paints and lacquers, copied from 17th c. bows. Gilded ornaments on the back are known as "hatayi" (flower buds). The belly sides of kasans have framed inscriptions in Ottoman Turkish: the maker’s name at one end and the date of manufacture at the other. The bellies have a couplet in taliq script which reads: "they call your eye a Tatar fit for battle, but God knows, you are an archer Turk with bow and arrows at it’s side". On one of the arms there are two sentences by the last Turkish bowmaker and calligrapher Necmeddin Okyay (1883-1976): "skill is subject to praise, merchandise without clients is lost". A very fitting thought for a traditional bowyer!
Back of arm
Hatayi pattern on a different bow
Belly
Belly
Belly
kasan and bash
Belly of kasan
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Grip
Drawn bow
Materials used for decoration:
Hide and bladder glues, sandarac resin, shellac, oil of linseed, rosin, oil of sandalwood, white lead, ochre, malachite, copper resinate, vermilion, madder, silver leaf, 23-karat gold.
In short, the bows are near-exact replicas of old Turkish bows, down to the last detail of decoration and materials, albeit without the patina of age.
The most important texts on the construction of traditional composite bows are the Klopsteg book (with a few detailes ommited and present in the original article by Hein) and the article by T'an Tan-Chiung (see refs below). The two sources deal with Turkish and Chinese bows, bowmaking of other nations, however, can be inferred from these two, since all composite bows have similar construction. There are also a few articles in the Journal of the S.A-A.
There are three layers in the composite bows: sinew on the back (the side under tension), wood for the core and horn on the belly (the compression side facing the archer).
Various hardwoods and bamboo were used for the bows core. Limbs in Turkish bows were usually made of maple, sometimes yew, in Chinese of bamboo or mulberry. Wood was selected very carefully, although not necessarily flat grain, if made of bamboo, outer side of a stem would face the horn.
All composite bows have several sections, roughly worked to shape before final assembly: a handle section joined to two arm sections (in bows with bamboo arms the handle is a chunk of wood glued in the middle of one split bamboo stem), arms are joined to a mid-portion (siyah in Turkish or a "knee" or "brain" in Chinese), which in turn is joined with strongly reflexed tips, usually straight pieces with nock grooves at the ends, often called ears and reenforced with a piece of horn. Single fishtail splices, about 3-5" long for knees/siyahs joints and 6-9" for arms/handles are used. Sometimes Cornelian cherry was used by Turks as an overlay for the handle section.
The relative lengths and the reflexed curvature of the various wooden sections varied, depending on the make and origin of a bow: in Turkish, Chinese, Mongolian or Persian bows the arms were more reflexed before assembly, in Tatar and possibly Indian bows the arms were straighter. In Turkish bows the ears were 3-4", siyahs 6-8" and arms 10-12"; in Chinese bows, the ears were much longer relative to arms, could be almost as long as the arms. Handles were short (6-7"). Bows had different lengths: Turkish bows are generally shorter (flight bows were about 44" betw. nocks), Persian a little longer, Chinese and Tatar could be over 6' long. Turkish war bows were longer than flight, but still shorter than target bows, Chinese bows used by foot soldiers were quite small too.
Chinese (and possibly Turkish) bowyers purchased green wood or bamboo. The parts were shaped and reflexed as needed, seasoned for about a year, fitted, joined with glue and dried for another year.
Pre-shaped horn strips were glued onto the belly of a bow. Both wood and horn were scored with a special toothed tool and glued together (clamping was achieved by tight binding with rope). Maching pairs of water buffalo horns were used almost exclusively, with an exeption of longhorn cattle horns for some Turkish bows. For best Chinese bows, expensive, translucent, white horns were preferred. Buffalo horns have no sidewise twist as present in cattle horns. Cattle horns had to be boiled, heated and pressed into a correct shape in special wooden molds. Buffalo horns are also more flexible and resilient than cattle horns and provide thicker strips. It is probable that in Persian bows, instead of a solid strip, many thin ones were glued together into one wider strip.
The back of a bow was then covered with sinew, leaving most of the ears/tips bare. Sinew usually came from cow leg tendons, possibly neck (back) tendons. Tendons from wild animals (deer, moose etc.) must have also been used, and, in the authors opinion, are better, leaner, stronger, longer and easier to work with. The dried tendon is pounded until separated into fibers, which are sorted into bundles of similar length. The bundles are soaked in glue and laid onto the back of a bow. 2-3 layers are used for a dry thickness of approx. 3-6mm. On Turkish flight bows a ridge along the centre of siyahs was formed to increase cast. Bows were always seasoned after this last operation from 6 months (Chinese) to at least a year (Turkish). Due to shrinkage of sinew and glue (and from deliberate, progressive reflexing betw. layers of sinew in case of Turkish) bows were at this point very strongly reflexed with tips touching or even crossed. The reflex made the tillering and stringing, which followed, a rather long and complicated operation.
Glue was an important component of the bows, the amount of glue in a finished bow was almost equal to the relative amounts of sinew or horn. Only three kinds of collagen-based glues were used: fish, tendon and skin. For the fish glue, either dry skin from "the roof of the mouth" of Danube sturgeon (Turkish, other fish for Chinese) or isinglas (sturgeon air bladder, Chinese) were soaked in water and heated into solution. The Turks mixed this glue with tendon glue, made from boiled tendons. A glue of lesser quality was made from boiled skins. Such glues readily absorb moisture rendering the bows useless in relative humidity above 70%. The bows had to be stored as dry as possible, kept by the fire, in the sun, or in heated cabinets.
The tillering was accomplished by gradual bending a warmed bow with minimal scraping of the horn layer to balance the arms. The arms were also given the desired curvature and/or weight by warming and tying to special wooden forms until cooled. Turkish flight bows were heated in "conditioning boxes" for 24 hours up to 4 days before competitions to thoroughly dry them (the sinew, glue and horn acquire very high strength and elasticity when very dry). Of course, the bows were never shot when warm; heat, as well as moisture, would make them weak and follow the string.
The finished bows (with an exception of Turkish flight bows) were richly decorated with painted and gilded leather or birchbark. Wooden or horn "bridges" were glued on the belly side where the ears join the siyahs/knees as supports for string loops. Chinese bows had cork and sharkskin wrapped handles and coloured writings can be seen through transparent (if white) horn on the belly.
Strings were made from unspun, raw silk wrapped with cotton at the centre and at a few spots along the length. All reflexed, composite bows had strings with two separate end loops for stability, the loops were tied to the string proper with special knots (the knots rested on the "bridges", as above).
The weight of the bows generally varied from 20 lb (Chinese infantry) to probably up to 100 lb. Turkish flight bows were usually 65 lb (the conditioning process however, see above, could easily add another 20 lb). There was a separate class of very heavy exercise bows. Military examinations in China required drawing heavy bows, up to 200 lb (!).
The Asian/Turkish bows were drawn with a thumb, protected with a special thumb ring, of various forms, made of horn, metal or semi-precious stones. The string rests on the smooth, inside surface of the ring, sometimes covered with a small leather tongue. There is a detailed description of the Turkish release in the Klopsteg book. The release is sharper than the three finger release and arrow spine becomes less important. The string was drawn to the ear. Turkish flight shooters used a device called siper, tied to the bow arm wrist, to allow for overdraw (flight arrows were 24- 25" long); also, a waxed strip of fabric was wrapped over the handle to provide a more comfortable grip.
The bows were highly efficient and the record shot with a light Turkish flight bow was close to 900 yards, far beyond the capability of a self bow.
References:
Journal of the Society of Archer-Antiquaries, published annually by the Society; to subscribe contact Douglas Elmy, Secretary, 61 Lambert Road, Bridlington, E.Yorks, Y016 5RD, UK. Devoted to history and the development of traditional bows worldwide. #7 subsctiption.
Bibligraphy of Archery by Fred Lake and Hal Wright, publ. by Simon Archery Foundation, 1974. ISBN 0 9503199 0 2. Contact S.A-A. for a copy. Extensive references on almost any archery related subject.
A good source of out of print literature on archery is: Howard Theleman, 6620 Lenox Ave., Wisconsin Rapids, WI 54494, USA. Tel:(715)424-1139
"Turkish Archery and the Composite Bow" by Paul Klopsteg, self-published in 1934, sec.ed. 1947, it was reprinted at least once, possible source: see Theleman above. It is a translation (with additions) of an article by Joachim Hein "Bowyery and the Sport of Archery among the Osmanli" in Der Islam, 1925, which is in turn a translation of an Arabic text by Mustafa Kani "Excerpts from the Writings of the Archers", 1847. This is a basic reference for Turkish bowmaking and shooting.
"Investigative Report on Bow and Arrow Manufacture in Chengtu" by T'an Tan-Chiung, an article written in 194?, published in Chinese in 1951 by the Academia Sinica, Taiwan, reprinted in Soochow Univ. Journal of Chinese Art History, July 1981. For a copy contact S.A-A. The article provides a detailed description of making a Chinese bow in one of the last such shops in China.
Provided by Adam Karpowicz akarpowicz@mta.ca
A remarkable example of the use by man of several natural materials in combination in such a way as to obtain a much better result than could be had with one alone, is the Turkish composite bow. This was a reflex bow, which is to say that with the string removed it took a form like that in Fig. 3.13(a) [figure of what looks like a cross section of a vase]; when strung it took the traditional 'Cupid's bow' form of Fig. 3.13(b). The cross-section is shown in Fig. 3.13(c,), in which it will be seen that the bow is built up of three layers. The centre layer is of wood, the back, that is, the part of the bow away from the archer, which is stretched in stringing and stretched even more when the bow is drawn, is of sinew, which is strong and elastic in tension; the front of the bow, which is compressed by stringing and compressed even more by drawing, is of horn which is strong and springy when used in compression. A surprising detail is that the sinew is not, as might be expected, in long lengths, but in pieces only about 50 mm long glued to the back of the bow.
The last of these bows were made about 200 years ago, but their excellence may be judged by the following. Prior to 1910, the record for the distance an arrow had been fired by an archer was 340 m, achieved with a long-bow of osage-orange wood that required a force of over 700 N [157 pounds force] to draw it. At an archery contest at le Touquet in 1910, Ingo Simon, using an old Turkish composite bow requiring a force of 440 N [99 pounds force] to draw it, fired an arrow 434 m (in a letter to P. Klopsteg, Simon wrote that the force needed to draw his bow was only 290 N [65 pounds force]).*
*From "Invention and Evolution" by M.J. French (1988, Cambridge Univ. Press) (chapter 3.4.2)
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