Two-Wood Rus Bow

[Soveliss99]

I've done a lot of research in the history of traditional/primitive archery over the years. Concerning the Russian bow model in this, i figured it is a bit inaccurate. Medieval/dark age Russians would of used a bow similar to these Scandinavian/North Eurasian Laminated and two-wood bows:

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http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b128/JuriV/Two-wood/sireliusjouset.png

The top and the bottom sketches resemble more of a Siberian/Inuit bow but the third model down is what very close in design of a medieval Russian bow.

Here is the third sketch in real time:

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http://users.stlcc.edu/mfuller/Novgorod/NovgorodMus325bow.jpg

Notice the birch bark wrapping, bone plate handle and siyahs (siyahs are the thick ends of the bow). Quite a beautiful bow.

EDIT: As I only recently started looking into russian medieval bows, i felt as if this was something worth noting! I love VIKINGR!

 

[Rath0s]

Thank you, what size would it be, hard to judge from the picture.

 

[Soveliss99]

Thank you, what size would it be, hard to judge from the picture.

The Russian bow would of been the size of the "hunting bow" in native. So possibly this bow could be re-skinned to model the Russian bow more?

Its size being similar to this Finnish bow:

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http://i604.photobucket.com/albums/tt121/Miika_photo/51at27.jpg

The mod "Rus XIII" for mount and blade made a bow similar to what i had in mind:

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http://img257.imageshack.us/img257/4628/weaponssmall.jpg

I have no real knowledge of modding or modeling so hopefully this helps. 

 

[Rath0s]

I also saw on the second picture that it was shorter on one side, would the short side be pointing to the ground, or is it the other way around.

 

[Soveliss99]

The picture was taken at an angle. The bow is not assymetric.

EDIT: Since it's a bit misleading, i'd say you refer to it for texturing rather than actual size 

 

[JoG]

The Russian bow would of been the size of the "hunting bow" in native. So possibly this bow could be re-skinned to model the Russian bow more?

Ehm... I'm afraid you're not quite right here. The "Novgorod type" bows (composite sinew-backed bows made of two types of wood covered with birch bark) were about 130-160 cm long. I guess it's a bit longer than the Native hunting bow. Shorter (50-70 cm) bows found there were nothing but child toys.

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[Soveliss99]

yea it's hard to judge the size in the actual game. but i couldn't find the measurements of the novgorod composite bows. thanks for letting know since information on these bows is scarce. could you possibly tell me where you found these sketches, i really would like to learn more behind these bows.

EDIT: Here is a clearer picture of the bow:

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http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa108/Qesheth/Bows/untitled.jpg

Even found one for sale:

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http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.archeryshop.lt/out/pictures/1/27.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.archeryshop.lt/Bows/Recurve/Traditional/Bow-Nemo-Novgorod.html&usg=__4RWY05cLCaOwxJ1ax5nw1eT2Gcg=&h=200&w=133&sz=3&hl=en&start=11&sig2=pbNkaIazZmDLGw-Tso5RdQ&zoom=1&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=DbTQbWz9fcrN7M:&tbnh=104&tbnw=69&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dnovgorod%2Bbow%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26tbs%3Disch:1&ei=46t1TYzuE42ltwfDt538BQ

That novgorod reproduction is indeed 160 cm

 

[The exceeding arrow]

Rath0s, i would say we are lucky with these kinds of people on the forum.

 

[Soveliss99]

Rath0s, i would say we are lucky with these kinds of people on the forum.

means alot 

 

[Harkon Haakonson]

It actually looks like a very pretty bow.

And it's true, I think anyone who is willing to contribute to the mod in one way or another is good to have around in the Vikingr community!

 

[JoG]

yea it's hard to judge the size in the actual game. but i couldn't find the measurements of the novgorod composite bows. thanks for letting know since information on these bows is scarce. could you possibly tell me where you found these sketches, i really would like to learn more behind these bows.

Well... unfortunately for English speaking community, the most valuable information about Rus weapons and armor is in Russian. English-language sources (like Osprey series), unless written by Russian/Ukrainian/Belarussian/etc historians, are often very innacurate.
Do you understand Russian? There's a good paper on Novgorod weapons available online on swordmaster.org.
Medvedev, A. The Weapons of Velikii Novgorod
The chapter on bows
I also used some information found in Russian reenactor forums such as TForum.

Here is a chapter from another book: "Ancient Rus: The Town, the Village, the Castle".

 

[Soveliss99]

yea it's hard to judge the size in the actual game. but i couldn't find the measurements of the novgorod composite bows. thanks for letting know since information on these bows is scarce. could you possibly tell me where you found these sketches, i really would like to learn more behind these bows.

Well... unfortunately for English speaking community, the most valuable information about Rus weapons and armor is in Russian. English-language sources (like Osprey series), unless written by Russian/Ukrainian/Belarussian/etc historians, are often very innacurate.
Do you understand Russian? There's a good paper on Novgorod weapons available online on swordmaster.org.
Medvedev, A. The Weapons of Velikii Novgorod
The chapter on bows
I also used some information found in Russian reenactor forums such as TForum.

Here is a chapter from another book: "Ancient Rus: The Town, the Village, the Castle".

I do not speak Russian. Thank you for posting those! i will take a look.

 

[Spesh]

Translators ftw?

 

[Rath0s]

Translating from Russian to English is not good, I have done it alot before and I can barely read it in english properly. 

 

[JoG]

Translating from Russian to English is not good, I have done it alot before and I can barely read it in english properly. 

Yup, that's true. Slavic languages are very different from Romanic (French, Italian, Spanish) and Germanic (English, German, Scandinavian languages) languages in terms of grammar and stuff. That's why you mostly get complete crap from online translator when trying to translate something from a Slavic language to English and vice versa. Things are getting even worse in the case of research papers where a lot of scientific terms are used.

 

[FrisianDude]

Online translators tend even to be fairly crap in translating within a single language-family. Lucky for human translators.

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Just check, I put

The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.

into google translate, which gave a *perfect* translation to Dutch, but it's a stock phrase, so less reliable. I then edited it to include silliness;

It also ate paint chips and stroked its pink fleshy willy.

which produced an absolutely borked translation.

Het aten ook verf chips en streelde haar roze vlezige Willy.

More accurately that would mean "it ate*¹ paint chips as well and stroked HER pink fleshy willy. (Of course, in this I am adjusting the actual order of the words, it did that okay.)

*1= "aten" is past plural, so not appropriate for a single fox.

I then added

That does not work at all, my dear chum.

which it turned into

Dat werkt niet op alle, mijn lieve kameraad.

Which is reasonable except for the glaring "alle."  Should have been "Dat werkt helemaal niet."

ÁÁÁÁÁNYWAY, back to Vikingr and the Rus.