Mongolian Recurve Bows

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The mongolian recurve bow style

The mongolian style is a more than 1000 year-old-style. The mongolian bows are always symmetric bows. Their speciality is, that they have „string-pads”for stopping the string rapidly after the shot. It’s aim is that, that the arrow earns a higher impulse, and a higher starting velocity than at the other bows, which have no string-pads. The bows are composite bows.

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History of the recurve bow

The use of the bow and arrow goes back into the paleolithic. There is evidence of bows and arrows in use Between 8,000 and 9,000 BC in Schleswig Holstein (nothern Germany). Elm and yew seems to have been favoured woods for bowmaking, while arrows were made of hazel. The arrowheads were made of flint and were fastened to the arrow shaft with pine resin and sinews of nettle stems. The pine resin was heated with charcoal to produce a flexible glue of great strength. Ötzi the Iceman found in the Alps carried an unfinished bow made of Yew when he died in the neolithic period. His bowstring was of flax, but we believe sinew (from deer legs) was also used. A major technological advance of the late neolithic was the use of sapwood on the bowface for increased flexibility. This allowed the bows to be pulled with far greater force without breaking. This in turn allowed hunters much greater range and accuracy.

The arrival of metal working meant not only metal arrowheads, but also metal blades, axes drawscapers and so on for making bows. This meant they could be made far more quickly and accurately than ever before. You can always find a mention of archery in literature, art, Greek mythology, language, warfare, Humanities, and much more. The bow was such a pivotal device back in the past, that many historians consider it almost as important as the wheel and fire.

Simply stated, the bow is a stringed projectile weapon designed to shoot arrows. It consists of a slender stave (the bow-stick) and a cord fastened to it at each end under a certain amount of tension. By drawing the string and the arrow back until the stave is bent, and then releasing the string, the impelling force of the bowstring shoots the arrow5. Though it sounds easy, many bows require as much as hundreds of pounds of force to bend the bow sufficiently and then incredible marksmanship to make the arrow fly true.

Bows are of two basic kinds: wooden and composite. The earliest bows were undoubtedly made from wood, probably simply cut from saplings and whittled into the desired shape and strung with animal gut. These earliest of bows developed into the short bow, longbow, and various other plain bows.

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The Mongolian Empire

The empire that Gengis, his numerous (he probably had as many as 1200 children) sons and innumerable grandsons established, was surpassed only by the British Empire in the 19th century. The Mongolian Empire ranged from the Yellow Sea to the Meditarrenean in 1280. The too quick rise of the empire led to a quick fall too, it has fallen into smaller kingdoms, although the Golden Horde lasted as long as 1502 in today's Russia.

Gengis Kahn

Temüjin, widely known today as Gengis Kahn, was born in 1160 near the river Onon, Asia. He as the great Mongolian leader who forged the clans living north of the Gobi desert into one strong alliance. These clans had for long fought for dominance of the area. Gengis's warriors fought their way through the vast steppes and established an empire unprecedented before. Legend has it that the great leade Gengis was born under a lucky star and he will once again come and lead the Mongolians to glory.

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Maintenance of the recurve bow

Recurve bows are virtually fool proof. If you keep some important rules in mind, it is very unlikely anything will ever go wrong with your bow. However, it is a good idea to inspect both the bow and the string before going out to shoot. Cracks on the bow, creeping (see waxing below) or other signs of weakening on the string means something is not right. If the bow ever breaks, it is unlikely that it will injure you, not even the strong ones. However, it can ruin an otherwise perfect day if you discover that your bow is not what it used to be just when you start shooting in the woods.

This goes for the arrows too. Make sure you have plenty of healthy arrows – check for cracks and bends, inspect the feather too.

Avoid dry firing
Never shoot the bow without an arrow. These finely tuned bows are designed so that the weight of the arrow is taken into consideration. If you shoot them without arrows, they will suffer a whiplash effect and may be damaged, even though the damage is hard or impossible to observe.

Aiming
When shooting, aim before you pull the string. Once the string is pulled, you should shoot as soon as possible. Do not hold the bow with the string pulled.

Heat and ultra violet light
Do not leave the bow on direct sunlight for a long time. Heat and UV light is not useful for anything man made.

Bending
Do not keep the bow stringed when you do not use it. When the bow is stringed, the bow is bent and the energy stored in the bow puts quite a stress on the body. This is emphasized when you pull the bow, see Aiming above.

Do not hang the bow by its ends. The weight of the bow will slowly but surely deform the bow, resulting in a gradual deterioration of your bow.

Keep the bow leaning towards a surface facing you, with the back supported. It is the same with guitars, the strings pull the neck in a direction, you should rest it so the resulting force counters the string (although, as you know by now, you never keep your bow stringed for a long time).

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