Well this has just got interesting.
Hi its Tod of Tod's Workshop and Tod Cutler here. I've just finished a film
about needle bodkins and fabric armour, but I've had another thought and I'm gonna
go back and have a look at needle bodkins, fabric armour and what happens if
you wax them. Maybe nothing. Before we do that though, just so you know, I've got
some excellent websites full of medieval weaponry so if you're interested in that
stuff go and check out the links.
What am I talking about when I'm talking about
wax on arrowheads? The short answer is I don't really know. The long answer
is more involved. Last year I did a film with a bunch of friends called
Myth busting - Arrows versus Armour and it was looking at shooting an Agincourt era
arrow at an Agincourt era breastplate and what happened.
Spoiler alert. I've got two heads here, the crossbow head on your right hand
side, shorter blunter very very typical of a crossbow head. Don't tell me it's
wrong go look in the museum's. The one on the left is a longbow arrow short bodkin.
Slightly pointier usually and that one's based on a Museum of London find from
1410 I think it was. Obviously the tip is deformed where it struck some steel, but
you get an idea that there's quite difference in the shape of the head. You
know there's a million of you out there and collectively we can really learn
some things and one of the comments that kept coming up was "put wax on the end of
your arrow head". Now I don't know quite what that means but it's talking about a
blob of wax on the end of your bolt head. So there you go; I've just fitted a
little blob of beeswax on the end. Does that do anything? Well today we're not
going to find out because I'm not shooting plate cutters with a blob of
wax on it. The last film I have just done, was on fabric or flexible armour, so maille, but
also fabric armour and needle bodkins. My understanding before I did that film
was that needle bodkins were excellent at going through fabric armour. I did not
find that the case. It was not the most powerful of bows, it was a 350 pound
crossbow, this one here, so equivalent weight to maybe a 70 or 80 pound longbow.
But nonetheless it gives a difference between different bolt types. I mean
here's the hole here and this one went through
as you can see maybe 25 millimeters, an inch. It went through the gambeson and
into the foam beyond. So not most likely not a killing depth. But it got me
wondering because this needle bakken jammed up in the gambeson very quickly and
that's what stopped it going deep. And I wonder what happens if you dip a bit of
wax on this and if there was a difference between this one with the wax
and without the wax. Because as it goes in, the wax will melt, because the amount
of energy that's being expended in deforming that gambeson to get through
is heat. The energy turns into heat. Heat melts the wax, wax lubricates the entry.
Maybe it goes deeper, maybe not let's find out. So we're going to shoot three
dry and then exactly the same three again and I'm gonna mark them and
measure them. Exactly the same three again with a little bit of wax on and
see what happens. I have my three needle bodkins here, my gambeson and a section
of house insulation foam. The reason I'm shooting against the
insulation foam is that I want each shot to be comparable with the last and if I
put it straight onto the straw boss there are hard bits, soft bits and so on.
So I'm going to nail this whole set up onto the boss and then we're going to go
and shoot at that. These bolts weigh in at about 58 ,60
grams each. Lovely needle Bodkin heads made by Will Sherman at Medieval Arrows.
So three hundred and fifty pound draw weight bow.
Let's go again. So you get an idea of the kind of speed that you can load these
things at with a goat's foot lever, it's not bad, it's about a shot every 10
seconds. You can see that they're not going in super deep into the gambeson,
they're getting a bit wobbly.
In fact we've lost one. So you can see how resistant that gambeson is in fact
to these needle bodkins that it was quite wobbly so the third one one of
them fell out. I've marked those two I'm just gonna do a third one again and then
we'll go back mark that. Well that one bounced straight off, so in fact let's
use that as the beginning of our test. We'll see if the wax ones do any better.
These are our three bolts that we just shot. This was the one that actually
skipped out, fell out at the end, but I put it back in until you can feel from
the resistance it was the right depth, and I've marked it. I've marked these
ones as well, and what I'm gonna do is pull them out measure that distance from
the mark to the tip and just write it on the butt of the bolt so we've got a record
of it. I'm gonna wax it. And do it all over again. I've taken the same three
bolts, exactly the same bolts and I put a slight... doubt you can even see it, wax
coating on them. Very thin skin of beeswax. Shoot them again let's see what
happens.
Let's go have a look. So we're back at the at the target again
and I can tell you this is about to get very interesting so I'm going to remark
these and that is the new position. I don't even know if we're going to know
the old position. They all have got the measurement of the depth written on it
and the other ones are just on the other face, but let's pull out and see what we
got...... It really is tough this gambeson; blimey! That is the new mark, that is the old
mark. Next one, so the old one was 26 and the new one is again...40... 45. I did
wonder if there was going to be something and I was hoping there was
gonna be something, but you are never quite sure. That's experimental archaeology for
you. This one was 18, this went in less before,
maybe it's a thicker head and it doesn't have the old mark on it, but it was 18
before and again, amazingly consistent 45 millimeters again. So 45 millimeters into
Imperial - inch and 3/4. Well this has just got interesting. Well I might be a geek,
but goodness I found that interesting. So three-needle bodkins and I wrote the
numbers on the back. First number is depth of penetration dry, second one,
depth of penetration waxed. 26 millimeters 45. 25 millimetres 47. 18
millimeters 45. So off the top of my head there, what we're talking about is an
increase in penetration of 40-45 % (actually 55%) That is fantastic. Medieval people are not
stupid you know, from 800 years ago, same brains we've got. Different technology,
but the same ability to observe and to adapt and to change what they do. I
can't tell you that they put wax on there on their bolt tips and arrow tips,
but there is a persistent thinking that they might have done. Was it on needle
bodkins? Don't know. Did it work? Hell yes it works! You know, that was
brilliant. Now we today, we put teflon on on bullets for getting through fabric
armour, so you know, they're facing the same challenges back then why wouldn't
they have done it. Did they? We don't know, maybe. Does it work? Yes it works.
So another fantastically interesting experimental archaeological test. Or at
least interesting for me anyway and if you're interested in medieval weaponry,
go check my sites out there's lots to have a look at. Thank you very much, I
hope you've enjoyed it