There are so many interesting points and thoughts coming up here - thank you. Firstly I would have to highlight a couple of my oversights. We know that crossbow men (but not always men) did employ spanners, so people behind the scenes spanning and handing already drawn bows to them and this increases the potential rate of shooting of crossbows and allowed it to be done in better cover than given by being on the 'front line'. I also did not mention that of course crossbows can be spanned and held ready for a shot which is a massive advantage over a longbow which cannot. However also note that a steel limbed crossbow can be held all day, a composite cannot, so cannot sit there ready and waiting all day. I don't know how long you can safely leave a fully spanned composite, but I suspect they would want to get the shot off pretty fast, but still has a waiting/target selection advantage over longbows. Weight of bows is very interesting. Let's not pretend we actually know how heavy a war bow of the period was. Quite simply we don't and it could be that the bow Joe is shooting would be exceptionally heavy for the time. However unless he dropped weight really significantly he would still face the same problems, just to a lesser extent. We must also acknowledge that the bows that came up from the Mary Rose (100 years later) were coming in at an average weight of about the same as Joes and I doubt period ships were that easy to shoot from either. These bows were found in a naval context and were already falling out of use as a military weapon so we can draw inferences but not facts from these. My personal opinion is that we're likely pretty similar to the bows of 100 years before; but again that is my opinion, not a fact. Looking at the 'peek and shoot' difference between longbows and crossbows, of course every extra millisecond you are exposed disadvantages you over a quicker method, but I felt that there was not a massive difference between the two weapons. As regards the ease with which a person can be trained to shoot a crossbow. It is undeniable that you could span and shoot my windlass as I have seen my 10 year old daughter span it, that cannot be said for Joes bow. With a little training you could shoot proficiently and threateningly enough that at 50m the target person would dearly like to be somewhere else. After a couple of hours most people would be striking the target pretty often at this range. However crossbow archers were well paid, usually better than longbow archers and I am sure there are many reasons for this, but still there must have been very high levels of proficiency required for this better pay. But what we also know is during sieges it could be all hands to deck so to speak and walls would be manned by soldiers etc, but also by anyone who could be useful and that included women and children as well as men. Some of these roles would be hurling rocks etc down, spanning bows, fetching etc but also I am almost certain I have either read or seen on manuscripts women shooting crossbows. Of course Richard 1 was also famously shot by a (male) cook using a crossbow. So it is absolutely fair to say that the use of a crossbow was easier for the untrained and possible for those with lesser physical strength. That all said, I was very surprised about the lack of advantage of shooting down offered by the crossbow. As a final note, shooting down is not at all a problem in terms of the bolt falling off, you simply need to put your thumb on the back of the bolt and hold it in place - the nut and string will do you no harm. The spring clip to hold bolts was only invented around 1500, so prior to this your thumb was the answer. As a last point, if anyone is reading this who has a castle, I would love to arrange some filming looking at arrow slits and proper crenellations.

The big advantage of the crossbow is that you can hold your weapon at full draw in readiness without effort. You can wait, and ss soon as the archer appears and prepares to shoot, you can react to him faster.

One advantage you may have overlooked a benefit with the crossbow is if you have someone that is trained while on the crossbow meaning they can hit the target they're aiming at. You could have several people feeding him loaded crossbows and the same guy shooting, with a longbow no matter how great you are you're going to have to stop and take a break it would be very hard to constant shooting for hours on end with a crossbow if you're just the guy shooting it that wouldn't be that big of a deal. And it would be much easier to train for military purposes if you had one person that did all the shooting and had other ones do the loading and hand them the weapon. At least that works well for defensive situations.

It is pretty clear to me that the fraction of a second saved by popping up with a crossbow, and not having to pull on a bow at an awkward angle would be all the advantage you could ask for. Especially since you can give a crossbow to someone with very little experience and they will have some chance of being effective,

Think that last shot perfectly illustrates "why they were so good" - even if just once in a specific scenario a guy who makes things for a living and shoots crossbows every so often managed to outshoot a bow guy who's been doing it for most of his life. And you both only took a few shots and were being friendly and safe about it. I wonder what the results could be if Todd had been regularly shootin' his contraption for a decade straight.

One thing that sticks out in the video, is just the mechanical advantage; Joe is tensing up and doing hard work, everytime he wants to give a shot. Tod is methodically reloading with the windlass; but in a siege that might actually be a meaningful difference. Suppose you had to man that piece of wall for hours, while an enemy attempted to storm it -- exhaustion would be an extremely real problem.

This is really interesting to see, the crossbow removes all the biomechanical problems of the bow you will encounter in an non-ideal position

That POV from the attackers view is amazing, really helps to imagine how it would feel besieging a fortification.

This is actually one of the coolest videos I've seen in my entire life. Having a tower to work off of for light theory crafting and testing like this is so cool. Experimental archaeology in fine form!

Now have Tod run up the stairs so we can get authentic time for the archers response time to the enemy. :3

Would you say the crossbow has an advantage for the attacker on the ground? A bow, you cant draw it, and wait for the archer up above to pop their head out to shoot... a crossbow you can load it, point it at the opening and ... wait. You can react to the archer up there poking his body out to shoot.

Thanks a lot. My castle is currently besieged and this video has greatly helped

After watching this I see why actual castles have areas to shoot across the approaches. by pushing out the towers. Another brilliant video Tod! Thanks

This is where the arrowslit is a game changer. A crossbowman stand ready and pick their shots, aiming for gaps in armour. Get them a stool and they can be ready to shoot all day without tiring.

I keep thinking back to the fact it took years to train up enough on a war bow to be useful in the combat space, but training on a crossbow to competency was much shorter.

Being unable to reach the closer targets is the reason behind machicolations in structures actually designed primarily for defence. Ideally you'd also have overlapping cones of fire, so that while you might be unable to fire at someone at the base of your tower/wall, your mate in the next tower could, a factor that continued into the gunpower age, hence the design of Star Forts. (Edited to remove point mentioned in pinned comment)

This is why hoardings were so important: they let you lean out and shoot down at those ranges you otherwise couldn't.

I think you're under estimating that advantage provided by the crossbow to be able to crouch and pop up to take shots. Any advantage you can get in a life and death situation you're gonna take it.

I think the pop-up-and-down advantage of the crossbow is more significant than you mentioned. Todd and Joe appear at 9:26.5 (ish). Todd disappears at 9:28 (ish) and Joe at 9:29 (ish). So, this is roughly 1.5 vs 2.5 seconds of exposure. For a single shot, this is not that much practical difference as the probability of getting shot in that time frame is rather low. However, if over a few hours each person has 50 shots, this means the crossbowman would have been exposed for 1 min 15 seconds and the longbowman for 2 min 5 seconds, with the difference in time growing with the number of shots. I can see this having a significant impact on survival rates for long sieges.

That shot at 0:48 where the archer draws the bow and points it straight at the cameraman. Legitimately frightening. I could see the intimidation factor for someone attacking a castle. Also, balls of steel on that cameraman. I’d have been sweating at that.

The crossbow's advantage really must've been the ability to have it ready to fire whenever, to have it ready to make that perfect shot instead of needing to expose yourself too long to fire.

No matter how good I was at shooting arrows with a longbow at the start of the siege, by week 6 of rationing I'd be glad to be using the less energy consuming crossbow.

It would be great if you would test out the fletched javelins from these towers, as in medieval art they were often seen in siege situations or thrown from ships

wow, I never spotted (or rather, heard) it in the normal series with Joe Gibbs, but the sounds of EFFORT as he draws back that bow! it's like someone's slowly letting air out of a balloon, and really goes to show just how HARD pulling that thing back really is! I have to agree fully that the biggest advantages of Crossbowmen on crenelations has to be that they can do it for longer, and can hold shots longer. I really did NOT notice those effort sounds during the normal testing

If you watch the Chalus Castle siege scene in the 2010 Robin Hood movie with Russell Crowe, you can see how even the actors playing the part of the defending Garrison also struggled with how to effectively return fire from the battlements much in the same way you did. There are multiple instances where you see the defenders hang out at awkward angles to get low angle shots with their crossbows.

Great video. This is probably why they had both archers and crossbowmen garrisoning fortifications so they can balance out each other's flaws...and this combination was commonly (or at least not uncommonly) used across both western and eastern Eurasia.

I so appreciate the perspective Joe gives here. I have experience shooting heavy bows, but seeing these cross shaped arrow slits in castles never made me think of the issues it would give me shooting out of it! Having Joe explain the issues that come with it makes me go "oh yeah, how did I not see that, it's obviously not ideal, nor easy to train" I think you are doing great work here

Absolutely fascinating as ever thanks Tod. So many interesting aspects in just 12 minutes! The insights from having a real archer (Joe) is just invaluable. Within a few minutes i learnt it was actually physically difficult for him to shoot down that steeply. Something i had never read or considered before. Thanks again and Merry Christmas to you both!

You are discovering many things those of us who archery hunt from tree stands have had to adjust for - there is a disadvantage when the target gets too close and in addition it requires a lot of training to be good shooting from height down vs. shooting on level ground ( aim point changes and your draw length to anchor point also changes). Oh, and longbows - yeah, lower limb hitting is a common issue.

In larger castles, multiple overlapping fields of fire meant that other defensive areas could target attackers closer and visa versa

This is actually ace man I so happy there are people making these sore of videos. Really brings history to life keep up the good stuff lads

So happy you guys explored this. I have been pondering what bow to invest in after I had crenelations installed for home defense.

I think the most important advantage the crossbow has is that it can be aimed continuously and effortlessly. If you know someone is behind cover, you can aim at said piece of cover and wait until there is an opportunity to shoot your opponent. This is just not possible with a powerful bow. The need to draw the bow first and then lose the arrow immediately means there is always a delay between a target presenting itself and you being able to shoot it. So practical accuracy in a siege ( or skirmishes in forests for that matter ) should be much higher for the crossbow.

Maybe this is why most castles had enfilading fire positions?

The ability for a crossbow to do snapshots, shots of opportunity might be more advantageous from the ground actually. 🤔 if you have a loaded crossbow down there you can aim up at the battlements for long periods of time and when Joe stepps out to draw and aim his bow you can shoot him through the face in an instant.

Very interesting seeing the practicality of theory and novel writing (e.g. Bernard Cornwalls Grail series). Amazing effort Tod and Joe to create that realism element that adds another dimension to historical siege actions. Someone give these men a castle to play with.

For the guys closer to the wall you could just toss out plumbata by the bucket

An important thing to bear in mind which was only touched on at the end is endurance. A longbow can shoot much faster, but it's exhausting. It's arrows are also bigger, more expensive, and less storable than crossbow bolts. The ability of a crossbowman to put a steady stream of projectiles in the enemies face over hours and days will be much greater than a longbowman's, even with the longbow having a much faster peak shooting rate (because that peak rate can't be kept up for any length of time). What matters in a siege, after all, is the weakest defence you can put up continuously; not the strongest barrage you can muster for a few minutes.

Thanks for the great content Tod and Joe. Always awesome to see you both collaborate. Good work.

The amount of information and respectful debate in these comments astounds me. Great reads! Loved the video. Can't wait to see what you've got in the pipeline next. Many thanks!

Honestly, this really does make me wonder about actual historical draw weights of bows. We only are working from one specific historical example for weights (Mary Rose) and that was a very specific environment. I know as a very amateur hobbyist with a little leaning I can shoot down and over a wall pretty comfortably with a 70-80 lbs bow (albiet a short Turkish style with a thumb draw, haven't tried a longbow yet) at a pretty steep angle. If the arrows aren't punching through plate at 140lbs anyway, and you're still hunting for gaps in the armor, would a 70lbs bow also serve that role equally well? I can't remember if you tested maille with a 70lbs bow, but it would do an absolute horror show on cloth and flesh as bow hunting has long established.

The reverse scenario would be really interesting. How long can you poke your target out till Joe Gibbs hit it from below?

I love to see videos like this, it really puts things into perspectivce to see practical tests like this, keep up the good work

Would be interesting to see what difference a lighter bow would make and would they use different arrows at a shorter distance, especially firing downward?

A good justification for building hoardings before an expected siege. Gives your defenders more angles and options for attacking the enemy without exposing themselves to angles that would be as susceptible to missiles. Edit: There are a few archery techniques out of Eastern archery(Turkish/Turkic) that are for shooting downward where you draw the bow from behind your your head to be able to get an angle to shoot downwards that could be used both at short range on horseback and when shooting from the top of a wall or fortification, but those bows being much shorter are probably much more conducive to awkward positions on ramparts than a longbow.

An amazing video thank you. What a skilled guy Joe is. Respect 🙏

I love these types of videos. keep it up brother. This came out and I got the notifications and couldn't wait to get home to watch it from work.

Thank you so much for doing what you do! please don't stop

I'm a bit of a longbow fanboy but I think the crossbow might have come into its own with untrained people who could be quickly taught how to load it for a shooter. Something like a goats foot lever

As always loved the video and am intrigued to learn more! Hopefully you can find a thick walled castle soon!

Thank you for doing what you do. You're such a blessing.

I love that Tod is so dedicated he manages to put these weapons in as much context as possible. Well the crossbow can reload in the cover of the merlon. Or someone behind the merlon can be reloading crossbows and giving them to you if you're doing sniping fire(obviously in an assault you would want volume of fire so they would be shooting their own crossbows).

On the subject of shooting at someone close to the walls: Standing on something to get higher up would change the angle a bit to make a shot more manageable. On the subject of being an exposed target in between the crenulations. It depends a lot on the background. If you siluett against a clear sky you'll make an easier target then if you have a dark background for instance if the tower had a wooden superstructure like many castles had. If you are lurking in the shadows you might have time to take a well aimed shot.

What a great demonstration. Thanks for the great work and effort.

Enjoy the moment. Love your videos with Joe.

The archer is exposed to counter-shooting while he draws. Re close range targets, flanking shots from other positions would probably be used, rather than from straight in front. The advantage the crossbowman has as a besieger, is that he can have an opening covered and shoot as soon as a target appears.

First, fortifications were rarely just bare stone - there would have been wooden barricades and fences giving further protection to the defenders, possibly allowing bowmen to hang out from the stonework. Secondly, you do not need to shoot from the middle of the open space; you could be partially covered by the stone as you shoot through the smallest degree of space between the stones. Lastly, reduce weight of bow or span but use heavier projectiles thus using height to provide the extra velocity (also meaning spent projectiles are less effective to the beseigers).

i have 2 bows and 2 crossbows, no where near as strong as the ones you're firing, my big crossbow is 175lbs and my strongest bow is 55lbs but this was super interesting, keep up the great work my dude

Great video! I cant say enough how much i enjoy watching the both of you.

I'm not going to repeat what others have said here regards the endurance of a crossbow versus an archer. Just want to say Seasons Greetings and a Happy New Year to you all :)

So ideally, you'd want a range of bows, to suit the range. The closer range, lighter bows are usually shorter, so you should be able to achieve a more comfortable posture and manoeuvrable stance. Great video!

Those extra split seconds you get while shooting a crossbow could mean life or death when you're been shot at. Plus its less strenuous than a longbow if you wanna be shooting for a long time. Thank you for the video, its really great as always!

Always happy to see Joe! Great video like always!

I think a major thing is, this structure is missing arrow slits and machicolations. The argument between Longbow and crossbow, in my opinion boils down into training and ease of use. It taking a fair amount of practice and strength building to be able to pull a war bow and hit the target. Then the eventual transition from crossbow to blackpowder. The execution of loading aiming and firing being quite similar between the two. What might be an interesting experiment is get some Lads together who have never done any form of archery and see how much time training it would take to get them to a war bow level. Compared to using a crossbow.

Makes you think about "Arrow slits" in castle walls, may not be as easy as I have allways assumed it would be. Great film as allways Tod & Joe, experimental history at it's best, challenging assumptions 👍.

It should be remembered that we're used to seeing castles in ruins so a lot of features (like roofs in the main halls) have rotted away over the years. The crenellations in a maintained castle wouldn't have been exposed like the ones in this manor house (which would have mainly been for decoration and for status as only the king could authorize a house to be built with crenellations). They would have been covered by what are called hoardings. It's sort of like a wood shed that would run the length of the wall and would have stuck out past the edge of the wall. They wouldn't have stood up to a ballista or trebuchet but would have protected from arrows and crossbows. Most importantly they would have slots in the section the stuck out past the wall so archers and crossbowmen could shoot straight down to the base of the wall. From what your archer is saying it would have been difficult for him to fire straight down but it wouldn't have been an issue for a crossbowman.

Would love to see you do a video on medieval handcanons and see their effectiveness against armour and uses and all other fun things you can find out ❤️ Merry holidays from Sweden ❤️

The other advantage the Crossbow has that didn't get mentioned besides the awkward angles is that anyone can use the Crossbow. Unlike Joe's long bow where you need specific training just to draw it and even more training to become proficient at it, the Crossbows biggest advantage is that anyone can pick it up and shoot it effectively with little to no training. Great video as always Tod so thank you to you and Joe both and Merry Christmas to you both! 👍👍

I imagine the crossbow's rate of fire could be improved by having one or two "loaders" per shooters... Also the thought of tripping in one of those stairways is not a good one ;-)

Best medieval channel ever. You are great guys.

5:20 that's what you got heavy rocks for.

Damn, that looks as though Joe would eventually do himself a mischief. The archers of the time will have known their limitations and surely wouldn't have risked injury trying to target the nearest attackers. I'll wager they were quite disciplined in 'managing' their sweet spot.

That is why modern forts (in the age of canons and muskets) were constructed in such way, with bastions to provide clear lines of fire along each wall. That is why castles began to have towers in corners, slightly pushed out, so you can shoot from one tower along the wall, and protect other tower (which then evolved into roundel, then into bastion / bulwark). I wonder if proper machicolations or hoardings would help in shooting at enemies at close range?

always a great time with Joe Gibbs!

Love the medieval Figure 11 - "Charging man-at-arms" 👍

I think the limbs of the longbow being visible over the walls long before the shot, would be a potentially deadly give away, for anyone trying to kill archers on the walls. I also wonder how hard or easy it is to shoot through arrow slits or murder holes

Well, aiming down was always a problem for me too, shooting wooden toy crossbows back in the day. Bows, not so much, but they were fairly lightweight. Besides you two using proper weapons, I would personally be too much afraid of hitting the wall with both the bow and crossbow limbs, so there might be a bit of that going on with you as well, where its hindering you more than it realistically would. Youre just hesitant to put your fairly expensive pieces of kit in harms way. Be that as it may, there is a limit as to how far down can one reliably hit targets. In a real castle, that problem is solved with not aiming that close at all though, as there is always someone in the other tower or wall part to do that for you, as you will do for them, hopefully :D And I guess, if things really get that bad, there are always rocks to throw over the top?

Always good to get another video with Joe!

Another great video Tod!!! I enjoyed your video and I gave it a Thumbs Up

What about the advantage of the crossbow to remain loaded and ready to fire as soon as your enemy pops out from behind cover?

A crossbow, you can shoot it even if you are a kid or a woman. You can have a kid or woman reloading them while you shoot. Etc.

That was amazing accuracy

Amazing video. I am highly fond of the crossbow but man I love the British Longbow so much. Superb to see them both being equally effective.

The biomechanical issue of the longbow vs crossbow in this setting is huge and understated. Tod for some reason literally says the main reason crossbows are soo good in a defending siege to himself! and just ignores it. You can leave the area of harm, to arm your weapon and then return to perform a quick snipe (meaning your much much safer compared to the longbow). This is much much safer then clearly what the longbow had to do, exposing himself for a long time and having to load in view as well. And all this is ignoring the tiring effects of utilizing the long bow (likely leading to bad behaviors and exposing your self more and taking risker decisions). Its clear shooting in these awkward positions is extremely tiring for such a heavy long bow, if you had to perform 100 shots, his ability is going to drop off a cliff, while the cross-bow will not. Lastly shooting a longbow requires training, and arguably a hastily defended castle, is going to be manned with all sorts of people mostly from people whom never shot longbows, and this clearly is an opening for crossbows where anyone can pick it up and shoot it. This demonstration at least proved why cross-bows are used in defense, I think Tod needs to flush his mind and watch this again with a clarity.

You have said it before, the advantage of the crossbow is the learning curve, or lack of, if you have 10 trained archers and 30 peasants you have 40 xbowers .. but you still only have 10 archers. The xbow gave untrained users the ability to have a reasonable chance fairly quickly of actualy hitting something with minimal training, it also to me, seems like an easy way to increase volume of fire, and if nothening else it could help to give cover to your trained archers.

Great video, thank you! I'm with you Tod, I think crossbows are very cool, but always still wondering how they get so much credit over a bow (because they're great! thanks Joe by the way, your longbow skills are AWESOME!). There's always more to learn and I appreciate you showing us what you've learned and for keeping an open and honestly inquisitive mind as you try things and discover

I always love seeing Joe in your videos!

I think the biggest advantage to a crossbow in defense of a castle isn't really anything to do with how you use it but who is using it. You can just wack a pile of crossbows in storage and basically anyone who happens to be in the castle can get results from using it. Generally speaking you're not leaving all your well trained archers to hold the fort unless you already know someones coming.

I think, in more of a siege than a storming, the crossbows real advantage is that you can walk around with it loaded, spot someone and take a shot. You don't have to knock and draw an arrow. Also anyone can shoot a crossbow, even a maid or a cook could in theory.

Always appreciate your super interesting experiments Tom

Great video again. I must say in the medieval archers crowd there was a long standing challenge amongst archers to see how close to there own foot they could shoot an arrow. The show offs could put one in the dirt right against their foot. The challenge was practiced for the reasons of shooting straight down wall, down into murder holes , and into wells and tunnels. It was something they had to do and they practiced it and competed in the art. There were ways developed to contort and shoot the bow around ones back. This may have been a factor that limited an archers worth and the weight of bow he shoots. Maybe next time you can use a weaker bow with heavier arrows since you are shooting downward.

At 12 yards or less a rock better than a bow.

I could be completely wrong, but I think that defenders on top of a tower like this one wouldn’t really take the time to take aim at individual enemies. Rather than just peak, fire and take cover as quickly as possible.

9:08 For the exact reason you are doing it yoursel, but need Joe to shoot the bow: training time/consistency required in order to hit the target. Wonderfull video, thanks to both of you.

Dammmnn the archer's paradox at 4:55 was so easily visible. That's crazy!!

As someone who hasn't trained daily with a longbow, i feel I would do better with the crossbow, and my belief is that really is the simple difference, Joe will always out shoot the common untrained man with a bow, BUT the crossbow is somewhat of an equalizer, reducing the skill level required of your cannon (arrow) fodder. As a commander i'd use Joe where he was most use and least vulnerable, due to his added value to me.

So much fun watching you guys enjoying yourselfs!

I read in some castle sieges, children (and adults) were hired and trained to reload a crossbow. They wind it up and let the operator take out the latch from The crossbow as they didn't want the assistant to take it out as mistakes would occur. 10 crossbow men would have 5-7 assistants - it was efficient.

As arrows verses armour has shown, some form of steel covering can reduce the chance of a wounding hit by a huge amount, so a simple helm & chest plate could suffice to allow a cross-bow to be shot at very short range. Edit: If there are archers firing at a particular area, very few people would be brave/stupid enough to come near, so simply firing near soldiers is enough to keep them away.

I think this really highlights the value, and even need, for arrow slits at lower levels as well as proper maccioculations for easier shooting. The top floor may well have been the "long ranged" fire power of the fortification with lower levels serving equally important, and shorter, ranges respectively.