Armory

A heavy Manchu composite bow, 19th century.
by Peter Dekker

Materials

Ears: Wood
String bridges: Wood

Limb belly (side facing the archer): Chinese waterbuffalo horn lined with rattan
Limb core: Bamboo or wood
Limb back (side facing the target): Sinew from horses, deer or waterbuffalo. The sinew is covered with birch bark to protect it from moist. Sinew of working ox was preferred by bowyers.

Handle: Wood, sinew and cork. The handle was covered in cork to provide a good grip.

Adhesive agent: Fish bladder glue, made by boiling the floating bladders of fish. Yellow croaker fishbladders were often used.

Measured around from ear to ear 186 cm
Measured across from knee to knee 102.3 cm
Ears 33 cm long
Limbs 49 mm wide and 18.5 mm thick at mid limb
String bridges 70 mm wide
Weight 1375 grams

The bow
This bow is among the biggest composite recurve bows one can expect to encounter. With it's impressive 1375 grams it weighs well over twice as much as the average composite recurve bow. The thick and long ears work as levers to help bend the limbs when drawing the bow, and are indicative of it's huge strength. The size of the nocks suggest that a massive string was used, likely to be about 6 mm thick. To string the bow, it would be bent over all the way to the opposite side. Stringing a bow like this could only be done with two people, bending one limb at a time over special round wooden block and tightly tie it down. When each limb was bent and secured over a wooden block, the string could be placed and after that the blocks were removed. For pictures of this type of bow in strung and unstrung conditions, see the very end of this page. Bows are hardly ever found in strung condition because they were best stored unstrung to prevent them from losing power. However, bigger bows are more often found strung than the smaller types for the simple reason that it is such a hassle to string and unstring them. There is little decoration on this bow, but the overall workmanship is pretty good. The birch bark covering provides a very natural look, where one would easily mistake the material for wood. In fact, a member of the English Macartney mission did so and described the limbs as being "made of flexible wood" when he was in China in the late 18th century. Traces of simple but elegant black paint decoration can be found here and there. See pictures.


The "knee" of the bow and its string bridge.	The bark ends at the wooden ears. Note the subtle black paint line along the line of the bark sheet.	From left to right; limb, knee, string bridge, ear. The horn belly is clearly visible.

The birch bark covering on one of the limbs, probably the reason why English ambassador Macartney mistook the bow's material for "flexible wood".	The grip of the bow (upper right) and the limb. Note the black paint decoration at the base of the limb.	The horn belly on one of the limbs., lined on the sides with a strip of rattan.

Historical background
The power of rigid tipped composite recurve bows of this size was enormous by any standards. The heaviest known examples appear in Manchu reports on archery contests and military regulations and have draw weights of as much as 240 pounds. However, these were rarely shot and usually only used for strength training and in tests for the military examinations. There is one record from 1736 where a soldier actually wins a tournament among the 100 top archers of the Qing empire with a 240 pound bow, but these are rarities. To get a realistic view on bow draw weights of the Qing dynasty, we can look at historical records from the different garrisons. In his book The Manchu Way, Mark C. Elliott mentions two banner garrisons that were considered by the emperor to be in good condition at the 1736 inspections; that of Hangzhou and that of Dezhou.

A 1736 report found that of 3,200 troops at the Hangzhou garrison;
2,200 were able to draw bows of strengths 6 – 10 (#80-#133)
80 could handle bow strengths of 11-13 (#146-#173).

This, he noted, was a marked improvement over the previous year, when only 1,680 could manage bow strengths of 6-10, and a mere 20 strengths from 11-13.

The 500 troops at the small Dezhou garrison acquitted themselved with honor, all of them being able to take a 5 strength bow (#67)
203 a 6 strength (#80)
137 a 7 strength (#93)
85 a 10 strength (#133)

The draw weights are calculated on the assumption that 1 li stands for 10 catties of pull weight and one catty is 1.33 pounds. These bows were said to begin at three li which is approx. 40 pounds. Modern bow makers agree that this type of bow only gets effective and reliable from draw weights of 40 pounds and up. The overall poundage also closely matches the observations of the Macartney mission: "Their bows ... require the power from 70-100 pounds in drawing them."

On the describtions of the Macartney mission, see William Alexander and George Hanry Mason, Views of 18 th century China: Costumes, History, Customs. (1804-5; reprint, London Studio Editions, 1988), 132.

The 1759 Huangchao Liqi Tushi has military examination bows listed as being of strengths 8 (#106), 10 (#133), 12 (#160), 13 (#173) - 18 (#240). I estimate that the bow featured in this article falls somewhere in the middle of this range.

A modern reproduction bow in both strung and unstrung conditions.
This is a 45 pound bow with glassfiber core made in Beijing.