THE ART OF WAR IN THE MIDDLE AGES 59
The Origins of the English Longbow
6.2. The Origins of the English Longbow
However this may be, the crossbowmen continued to occupy the first place among light troops during the reigns of Richard and John. The former monarch devised for them a system of tactics, in which the pavise was made to play a prominent part. The latter entertained great numbers both of horse- and foot-arbalesters among those mercenary bands who were such a scourge to England. It would appear that the Barons, in their contest with John, suffered greatly from having no adequate provision of infantry armed with missiles to oppose the crossbowmen of Fawkes de Breauté and his fellows. Even in the reign of Henry III, the epoch in which the longbow begins to come into use, the arbalest was still reckoned the more effective arm. At the battle of Taillebourg, in 1242, a corps of 700 men armed with it were considered to be the flower of the English infantry.
To trace the true origin of the longbow is not easy: there are reasons for believing that it may have been borrowed from the South Welsh, who were certainly provided with it as early as A.D. 1150. Against this derivation, however, may be pleaded the fact that in the first half of the thirteenth century it appears to have been in greater vogue in the northern than in the western counties of England. As a national weapon it is first accepted in the Assize of Arms of 1252, wherein all holders of 40s. in land or nine marks in chattels are desired to provide themselves with sword, dagger, bow and arrows. Contemporary documents often speak of the obligation of various manors to provide the king with one or more archers when he makes an expedition against the Welsh. It is curious to observe that even as late as 1281 the preference for the crossbow seems to have been kept up, the wages of its bearer being considerably more than those of the archer.
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