Why Ancient Archers...
 

carried a few arrows in their hands:

Forgotten archery

lest we forget.

makes legolas look like a slowpoke.

also applies to swords (and other 'obsolete' weapons) where we have forgotten the techniques they actually used, and only remember the formalised 'modern' stylised techniques as used in olympic fencing.

http://lochac.sca.org/abertridwr/Vikings/archer02.gif

Impressive!

Amazing skills

Yup, and often used even today. Check out various pictures of Papuan archers.

I believe old musketeers used a similar trick, keeping a couple of bullets in their mouth during the open salvos of the battle.

F

Kronkcew - great points.

The difference with this video is that the arrows are held in the drawing hand rather than the bow hand.

Holding in the bow hand is common enough - South America, Africa, China, Japan, Oceania, Europe, at least. I've only seen holding in the drawing hand from Japan (before this).

This particular version requires thumb draw. I want to play with it a bit and see how it works (in slow motion). My first thought is that the usual lock might not work; this might need the Japanese lock used in kyudo or the Mamluk "pillion lock" (where the middle finger is over the thumbnail, rather than the index finger). Must try!

I ENJOYED THE VIDEO AND ITS GOOD TO SEE OLD TECKNIQUES REDISCOVERED BY CIVILIZED MAN, OF COURSE IN MANY PARTS OF THE WORLD THESE TECKNIQUES NEVER WERE LOST IN THE FIRST PLACE. :D

IT IS A COINCIDENCE THAT I JUST WATCHED A FILM WITH SOME IMPRESSIVE SHOOTING BY A YOUNG AFRICAN BOY. THE DVD WAS OF A MOVIE MADE AROUND 1950. THE EXPEDITION WAS SPONSORED BY THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT AND THE MUSEUM OF MAN AND WAS TO FILM MANY OF THE NATIVE GROUPS BEFORE ALL THE OLD WAYS WERE LOST. THE NAME OF THE MOVIE WAS " CONGOLAISE" AND FEATURED ROBERT ST. JOHN AND ROY MORGAN. I FOUND A COPY ON DVD ON EBAY BUT IT MAY BE ON THE NET AS THE MOVIE IS IN PUBLIC DOMAIN. LOTS OF INTERESTING SHOTS THOUGH THE NARRATION IS A BIT CORNY.

Picking up on Fearn's comment in respect of firearms use, a modern shooter who uses a single shot rifle for hunting will often place two or three rounds in his mouth when it looks as if he will need rapid fire, or between the fingers of his left hand. I've used old Martini rifles converted to modern wildcats quite a lot, and either of these ways of holding additional rounds gives very rapid fire.

here's a russian girl that is almost as fast out of her quiver.

Linky

and a lefty guy:

Linky

two:

Linky

note the position of their drawing hand!

This might also be of interest,

http://www.tirendaz.com/tr/?page_id=1052

http://www.tirendaz.com/tr/?page_id=1778

the overdraw devices were interesting. some bow designs will break if you over draw them by too much.

i note that in all the shown videos of this thread, archers used not only the thumb ring draw, but the three finger western draw, and used both a thumb up and an inverted thumb down style. also the arrow was rested on the palm side or opposite on the knuckle side of the bow. both left and right handed shooters were shown. (one even appeared to be a lefty showing a newbie how to shoot left handed. hope she too was in fact a lefty. :))