Were there any "Repeating archery bows" in history? Were there any attempts to create one?

by canned_pho

A man named Joerg Sprave created a repeating archery bow attachment/"arrow magazine" recently and gave it to some youtubers for reviewing.

For example video of it in action: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-ypO3ZQXd0

He claimed that no such thing has ever been created in history, even though it seems to be made completely from wood and simple materials. The magazine is just attached to the bow with rope.

Is that true? Why has it never been created in history? It seems it would have given a huge tactical advantage in historical warfare.

Chessativ

As early as 260 BCE, what is known as the "Warring Periods of China" , The Different houses of Chinese Nobility were engaged in constant warfare with each other. This period is quite important because it heralded multiple bureaucratic and military reforms that would define Imperial China for years to come.

Now pertaining to your question specifically, as Logic dictates each of the noble families (Dynasties) were trying to get every military/political edge that they could get over their opponents. According to the "Wu-Yue Chunqiu" *吴越春秋) A book about the early dynastical civil wars written in the Han Dynasty, it was engineers and inventors from the state of Chu which invented the first battle used example of a repeating crossbow.

Examples of the Crossbow have been excavated by Archaeologists and they work in a remarkably similar (and yet clever!) manner to what is shown in the video. Though it is important to note that some experts do argue that a separate "lever" is missing which would technically make the mechanism easier to operate but at the same time it is argued by many experts that it was unnecessary when it comes to that particular Chinese Model.

The Advantages of this Style of Crossbow were Firstly the Rate of Fire and Secondly the Fact that it did not take a lot of training to learn the mechanism. This meant that the warlords could prepare Militia and Conscript armies at an extremely fast rate as the Spear and the Crossbow were weapons that required relatively little training but in numbers proved to be effective in Battle. The repeating Crossbow continued to be used until the Qing Dynasty and its style was improved in the Three Kingdoms Period. Records of this time by Zhuge Liang do recognize these repeating crossbowmen as Chu Ku Nu and hence many Historians refer to the Chinese Crossbow by that name.

Now while the oldest examples of the repeating crossbow come from China, The Romans also adopted it. Coming from designs from the "Hero of Alexandria", The Romans in their Imperial Period Developed the Cheiroballista (Literally Hand Ballista) It was a miniaturized version of the Ballista (Roman Skorpion) and used a simple Spring Loaded Mechanism. It was used by Roman Garrisons up until the Late Imperial Period. It is even known to show up in records of during the Crisis of the 3rd Century.

While The Chieroballista is an actual handbow I think that it would be unfair to skip over the Greek Polybolos. The Polybolos was different from the average Ballista as it used a wooden magazine that was mounted over the cradle which handled the bolts. It used a flat link chain as its main mechanism and once the first bolt was loaded. A Windlass would rotate clockwise drawing the mensa and the bowstring back and triggering the mechanism. A Simple Hand lever in the anti-clockwise direction allowed this mechanism to be repeated. This weapon was designed in the 3rd Century BC by Dionysius of Alexandria.

Leonardo Da Vinci also designed an automatic crossbow. Unfortunately, like most of his inventions it was not practical. The mechanism was too complicated and by that time Cannons and Gunpowder were the emerging art of warfare. Though I do recall that they made a working model of his Crossbow in 2013?

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lpOJAt9Gpc) -Video of Leo's working Replica

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Now while the repeating crossbow was invented, It was not as practical as it seems. I will list the reasons so it does not seem as rigorous as a read If you are short on time

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  • Firstly, The Mechanism was often prone to failing. While most of the time these crossbows worked just fine, The mechanism could fail quite easily. What's worse is the fact that due to its rather delicate mechanism it was a weapon that required very high maintenance. And on Long Campaigns for the Average Soldier, he just could not afford enough time/ resources to maintain the weapon. (Normal Bows could survive in swamps. English Longbowmen before the Battle at Agincourt carried their longbows over their heads)
  • Building upon the first point, many soldiers simply did not want to carry the repeating crossbow due to its known failures. It is important to note that in many armies of antiquity while the Frontline troops were heavily disciplined and trained (Greek Phalangists, Roman Legionaries), the light infantry and skirmishers were more often than not Conscripts/Mercenaries who had no intent on risking their lives. These men often preferred more reliable equipment as it gave them a better sense of security. Simply meaning that while technically a repeating crossbow could be much more effective in Battle, the average Mercenary/ Conscript liked to have a much more reliable simple bow in their hands
  • It was hard to mass produce; while generic blacksmiths across the empire may have perfected the sword and bow and could create hundreds on their Lords Command, the Repeating Crossbow required a lot of Finesse and thus was quite hard to mass produce as not everyone had the abilities required.
  • The Effective Range was quite simply put Pathetic. It was only effective up to 70-90 meters depending on the model. For context, the English Longbow is effective up to 200 meters and the Genoese Crossbow can penetrate armor up to a distance of 300 meters if my memory stands correct. (Note: All of these distances are effective distances i.e the distance from which the weapon can reliably be lethal. penetrate armor). Such a limited Range meant that it was not very useful in most Battle Situations
  • The Ammunition it used was smaller. This not only reduced the effective range but made the weapon. less lethal and less accurate at the same time. A trained Arbalest could dispense 2 bolts in about a minute. A Professional English Longbow could do about 8. And while the Repeating crossbow could technically dispense up to 20 it was possible that none of them would land an effective hit. While the Longbowman and the Crossbow were bound to be very accurate. This meant that effectively more ammunition had to be produced to achieve the same goal.

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I hope I was able to answer your question! If anyone is seeing this no matter how later down the road and has some questions feel free to ask and I will try my best to get back to you.

Please do note that my personal area of expertise is Warfare from European Antiquity (Roman Greek etc) And while I did doublecheck my facts and citations, I may have made some mistakes in the Section related to China.

Cheers!

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Links (For Further Research)

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