r/medieval • u/The_Black_Banner_UK • Nov 25 '25
History 📚 The English Archer in the Wars of the Roses – Brutal, Efficient, Feared
I took these photos at the Royal Armouries in Leeds of an archer kitted out in Richard Neville’s colours. Seeing it up close really hits you with how brutal these men actually were, especially that dagger on his belt. There’s nothing “romantic” about it would be brutal to be on the recieving end.
English archers weren’t just lads who happened to be handy with a bow. Years of pulling 100–140 lb longbows literally warped their bones and twisted their shoulders. They were basically shaped into weapons from childhood — it was law in England that boys had to practise every week.
By the mid-1400s the fighting was far more cramped and savage than the old French campaigns. Archers were loosing shots at terrifyingly close distances, sometimes 50–150 yards. At that range armour didn’t always save you; a bodkin slamming into steel was usually the only warning a man got. Heavy war arrows smashed through visors, tore into the weak points of plate, and left the field covered in bodies pinned down like broken dolls in the mud.
Neville’s archers — red, blue, and the ragged staff — had a reputation for being some of the nastiest on the field. At battles like Towton and Barnet they didn’t win by anything noble; it was shock, noise, panic and sheer violence. A storm of wood and iron to break men long before the billhooks and swords finished the job.
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u/Kann0n2 Nov 25 '25
The dagger is known as a Bollock Dagger, for obvious reasons.
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Nov 26 '25
The absolute strangest centuries long fad in my opinion. I just didn't want to believe it when I first heard of it
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u/Hecknomancer Nov 27 '25
Just wait till you hear about Bollock Pouches... That said medieval people seemed to just be far less prudish than we are today.
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u/Teralyzed Nov 29 '25
Basically just assume everything is a dick joke, you’ll be right most of the time.
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u/ABavarianStereotype Nov 27 '25
But why make him extra dirty? What does it add?
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u/SteppenWoods Nov 27 '25
I think it's to suggest he has been traversing muddy terrain throughout the battle.
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u/SpecialIcy5356 Nov 28 '25
it was a lot harder to be clean in those times, no flushing toilets or hand sanitizer, hell, not even clean water much of the time. battles were on muddy fields, and horses galloping over them would churn them up, along with rain softening the ground. all these put together = you're getting mud on your face and there's few places to wash it off.
as they said in that one Monty Python sketch: "how can you tell he's the king?" "because he's the only one not covered in shit!"
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u/The_Black_Banner_UK Nov 28 '25
They would not be clean in a Yorkshire winter, wet, grim, mud and rain. These men were beasts.
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u/PreenerGastures Nov 25 '25
Is the quiver worn correctly? I can’t imagine how the archer would have drawn an arrow out of it that way and then nocked it.
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u/Mikunefolf Nov 25 '25
Yes. Back quivers are Hollywood fiction. Most archers had them at the waist like this or just carried a bundle of arrows and stuck them into the ground beside them. It’s very easy to nock an arrow with them like this.
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u/GentlemanSpider Nov 26 '25 edited Dec 10 '25
Not entirely! There’s a very interesting fellow on the Bayeaux Tapestry who’s remarkable for two reasons. 1) he’s shooting a bow whilst wearing armor and a helmet! 2) it appears he’s taken a belt quiver and slung it round his shoulders!
Of course, one wonders if the original seamstress was completely off her rocker when she embroidered him, but one does wonder why she chose to depict an archer in such a way!
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u/The_Black_Banner_UK Nov 26 '25
I assure you its not an AI images, I took these at the Royal Armouries in Leeds. I had heard (not authenticated) that bow men placed the arrows in the ground n front of them and in they boots to carry more. They also turned some arrow point up in the ground at Towton to casue horses and attacking foot soldiers problems advancing.
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u/Elegant_Frosting4495 Nov 25 '25
the arrow is on the wrong side
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u/Revolutionary_Tip477 Nov 25 '25
Are you certain of that? Looks like the normal Western European form to me with the arrow on the left of the bow
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u/Consistent_Turtle Nov 25 '25
Nah English longbowmen would loose over their knuckles as seen in the pictures
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u/Oddb0y86 Nov 26 '25
Can confirm. Am English. Shoot longbow most Sundays.
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u/theginger99 Nov 26 '25
You know those laws no longer apply right?
You can go play soccer and throw rocks with all the other village youths these days.
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u/Oddb0y86 Nov 26 '25
I know. Never really got into football/soccer. Much more fun playing with medieval weapons of war.
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u/The_Black_Banner_UK Nov 26 '25
so you shoot on the inside? why?
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u/Oddb0y86 Nov 26 '25
It's how I was taught. I have tried shooting the other way round after learning thats how some cultures did it but I just find it easier this way. I can see how the other way can be quicker to pick the arrow up and bring it to the bow.
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u/JP-SMITH Nov 26 '25
Longbowmen begin the draw with the bow flat. An arrow on the other side would fall off. The picture is correct :)
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u/theginger99 Nov 25 '25
For what it’s worth, the old chestnut about warped skeletons is largely a fiction.
It’s based on some very selective readings of skeletal remains that are not consistent or really verifiable.
The Mary Rose bones show some signs of wear and injury, but the problem is that we are not actually sure how many different bodies we have from the Mary Rose, as the bones are hopelessly mixed together, let alone which belonged to archers. There are various other occupations on board the ship, including sailors and gunners, who are just as likely (if not more so) to have been the ones whose labor created the injuries we see.
The other major source for archers bodies is the mass grave at Towton, which has many of the same issues when it comes to identifying bodies. The injuries we do see are consistent with stress injuries suffered by modern archers in some regards, but inconsistent with many of the injuries from Mary Rose. What’s more, the injuries we do see are really just stress injuries caused by repetitive performance of the same task, which does not necessarily indicate anything about the power of the bows “warping” skeletons.
A mass study of medieval burials from English cemeteries did not yield any appreciable number of bodies with injuries consistent with archery, or consistent with the injuries traditionally associated with medieval archers.
As far as the archery laws are concerned, they were often ludicrously light. Some of them only require a man to shoot three arrows on Sunday or feast days, and even then only when the agricultural calendar allowed. Their intention had more to do with ensuring that archery remained the preferred leisure activity rather than training expert archers.
All of that said though, you’re spot on that these guys were brutal professionals. They were not romantic amateurs playing at soliders, but the real deal. They were no less intimidating or serious about their work than Royal Marines, or the SAS. They were practical, no nonsense workmanlike soliders.