Hi, my name’s Kevin Hicks, welcome to my history channel, the history squad.
Today, we’re going to talk about and show you some medieval arrows, concentrating on the arrowheads,
and go through some. I’ve actually got some originals that were dug up in France,
so without further ado, let’s crack on. So, what we’ve got here is a straight
forward medieval style arrow. We can’t really call it a medieval arrow,
‘cos as far as I know, there are none left. Apparently there was one in the tomb of Henry V,
but it was later on disproved. Now these are very basic, this one is ash, it has a piece of
cow horn through what you call the nock and the fletchings are whipped and on the other end
is a broadhead. So what we’ll do is start with the broadheads. This, much to my amusement,
because I’m a naughty boy – this is a type 16, it’s actually my favourite broadhead.
It’s swept back, it’s tanged so you can’t pull it out. This is a nasty piece of work yeah?
This is where I kind of get the gigglies because if you imagine,
let’s say at the Battle of Agincourt yeah? And you were a French soldier,
you’re marching forward and a terrible hailstorm of arrows comes by and some archers lucky enough,
you know maybe they are archers belonging to one of the knights, you know,
they’ve got the type 16, really good arrows. And as you’re marching forward, thwump, aargh.
And you’ve been shot right through in the groin. Now the only way they’re going to remove this is
they’re going to have to push this right the way througg, which is where my comedy takes over,
I am sorry, but I’ve got to tell you this. Can you imagine right? Bear with me. Frenchman, thwump,
“aargh, non”. And your friend goes “Oh Pierre, vous tirez d’avec un grand fleche d’Anglais?”
Excuse my French “Oh Pierre, you’ve been shot with a big English arrow” “Oui, je regard” “Yes, I can
see!” “Oh, seize, it’s a type 16, non”. Can you imagine after the battle you’re standing
there going ‘aargh’ or you’re lying there and the priest comes up and goes “That’s gonna cost
you a few bob that is. That’s an extraction that’s gonna push all the way through your groin. So, the
type 16, it’s a nasty piece of work because as it flies through the air, it rotates and as it goes
into the body, it actually twists. I’ve done this on the body of a pig, and it’s gone through the
flesh, and the bone, twisting. So to get it out, you’ve got to open up the wound, cover up those
tang bits there and then try to pull him out, or you’ve got to push him all the way through.
Excruciating, the type 16, nasty. But I’ve got some others.
Here we have a large broadhead, some call it a swallowtail, but
it kind of got me into trouble. I say trouble, it was a performance at Warwick Castle
and I’d been told these could be used against horses. To me, it’s just a hunting arrow,
but there I am on stage with all my arrows, I’d already done my shoot, and I hold this up and
I say “Here we have what I regard as a hunting arrow, but it can be used against horses, so like
a horse arrow.” And as I go any further, out of these dozens and dozens of people a hand shot up,
and as I look down into the audience, ‘cos I was up on the stage, it was an American lady,
part of a tour group, and her husband, standing right next to her just went “Oh no.”
And I actually saw him, “Oh no” and there was a groan went up from the rest of the group,
so these people had been through some stuff. And I being Kevin, the bowman, I said “Yes madam,
how can I help you?” Everybody turns to look at this woman and she said “So
that’s a horse arrow right?” I went “Yes, madam”. “How’d the horse shoot the arrow with its hooves?”
Her husband yelped. The rest of the audience fell about laughing, the woman though didn’t,
and I had to explain to her that actually it was shooting the horse.
“Thank you” she said. Her husband just walked off into the distance, bless him.
Broadheads, for hunting. I’ve got another
hefty one. You know, these are meat slicing, but if you’re on the battlefield,
you’re going to have a lot of trouble shooting these. You’ve got to have somewhere to store them,
are they in your arrow bag? You can’t pull them out, yeah? The type 16s are going to be difficult
enough, but you have a look at this one here, this is just a simple crescent moon or a fish tail.
Now I’ve used this practicing and it is purely and simply a hunting arrow and it’s very accurate. If
you hit the soft flesh of an animal, it literally shreds it and fetches the beast down, bless it.
These are as ancient as time. Made from bone, from flint, stone,
man has used these for fetching animals down, it’s a hunting arrow. But I’ve got one broadhead here,
which is purely and simply for war. Pour la guerre. It’s for war. Let me just put these down.
This is the incendiary, or as they would say in French, excuse my French, incendiaire.
It’s a complete piece, the whole end of it is actually steel, and I managed to get myself a
recipe for an incendiary, a fire arrow, from none other than Richard Head, the bowyer,
years ago now. A long, long time ago, and Richard sent this to me, and it was from Germany and I
copied it and basically you have some felt, some woollen felt and as you roll it into a sausage,
you make sure that inside the core there is gunpowder. And I was licensed in those days
and you bind it on. And then there was a recipe for making like a pitch or a tar,
which I did and it dried solid. I figured out you could carry these by the box load, not fixed to
arrows, just a box of incendiaries. And somebody said to me one day “Have you ever used it?”
“No” And there hangs a tale…. Chepstow Castle, school group, a nice
Welsh school that I used to go to for many, many years. The teacher there,
he became a very good friend. No names, no pack drill. I’m not going to tell any tales,
except his name was Trevor. Oops, did I say that? So I’ve got it set up and I’ve
told everybody concerned what we’re going to do, the custodian, Roger. We shut all of the doors,
we’ve got safety buckets of sand and all the things and I’m going to shoot diagonal
across the courtyard. All the children, the school children are up in the battlements, the teachers
are standing by and Trevor is briefed – don’t touch the arrow, just pour sand over it.
I hold this over the flame and it doesn’t catch. I’m looking at it and the kids are
getting impatient, everybody is waiting, the castle has been closed down for a few minutes,
and then I noticed that fire is dripping off the end, almost like a liquid fire.
And then it dawned on me that the actual coating itself, once you get it going is going to burn.
So, I aimed, glove on my hand and protecting my bow and I shot “thwoosh” diagonally across the
courtyard, and it left this trail, this whisp of smoke and hit the ground. It starts to burn.
It’s not a great big fire, it’s concentrated, and I’m amazed at this, wow! Yeah?
And then I expected the sand to be tossed onto the arrow, but no, the brave teacher steps forward,
he pulls the arrow out of the ground. The ground is on fire now, not very much but enough,
and he stamps on the fire and sets fire to his shoe. Because what we’ve got is a bit of liquid
fire going on. He then waves the arrow, trying to put it out and he is spreading fire all around.
Everybody rushes to, takes the arrow, drops it on the ground, sand to put everything out. We sit
him down and he was alright after a cup of tea. However I had a look, and the amazing thing was,
the arrow itself, only about a third of the fuel had burned down. So later on I did some
experiments. Nobody else there, just me and I lit the arrow, shot it. It burned for 20 minutes.
So you imagine one of these going into the castle or into the town,
as this goes into a roof, whether they be wooden shingles or thatch,
this is going to burn for a long time, it could even drop down inside. It’s not a
fire arrow as the films would have, this is a true incendiary and I can tell you, it works.
So, bodkin arrowheads, these are real ammunition from history. Medieval ammunition, as I call it.
These are superb, this is a long bodkin, it’s a little bit shorter than when it was first made
because I broke the tip off, but this has gone into lots of breastplates and bits of metal,
only a centimetre or so, but it’s punctured it. It’s good, yeah? I’ve got a heavier one here,
this type 14 style bodkin, heavy, will knock a man down, but chainmail to these is no resistance. And
of course if you’ve got padding on, these are going to get into it. If they don’t go through
it they’re going to make it uncomfortable. But surprising for me, is this little boy here,
which I am told is an original. I’ve had it for many many years, 25 years at least. This
is a killer. I shot this for a film at a pig that we’d dressed up. Obviously the pig was dead.
It had heavy padding and chainmail over the top and I shot this, not a great distance,
20 paces or so, and it went straight through and out the other side. I wasn’t surprised until I
went to have a look and a piece of chainmail had looped over the end of this and the arrowhead
had dragged the chainmail all the way through the body together with some of the padding,
then out the back. All of the chainmail had been torn off and it was still linked to the shirt
in the front. This is real ammunition and it’s something I learned early on, as a professional
bowman, is arrows, they’re expendable, learn how to repair them, they are just ammunition.
But I’ve got some ammunition I want to show you, yeah? These are originals. So,
bear with me while I put my magic gloves on. Now I’ve got something very special to show you,
it’s my leaving gift from Warwick Castle. It’s from the young staff there,
those who were working during the summer and they purchased for me this arrowhead. This
is early medieval, maybe saxon, possibly even viking, we still haven’t identified exactly
what it is, it’s not unusual, but what makes it special to me is those young people,
many of them now who are still archers, thought to give me this as a farewell
and a thank you. Now I’ve got two here, that were dug up in France. Here is a heavy bodkin,
and it’s actually been broken. It’s hit something so it’s shattered
the socket out. This is really heavy, yeah? And then my pierce de resistance,
did you get the joke? This is my type 14, once again dug up in France. But I’ve got to show you.
It still has a piece of arrow in it and if you look close at the grain if you can,
that is ash. These are my treasured possessions, they’re not worth much,
but to me, they’re what my ancestors shot, so to me, they mean the world.
So now don’t forget, if you like our little films, thumbs up,
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