Yes, there have been bows that are long, but not like the longbow. The longbow had a very heavy draw weight, around 90-120 lbs. That’s the weight you have to pull to get it at full draw. The yumi possibly had a a lower draw weight (although Korean and Mongolian composite bows had draw weights of around 100 lbs as well). It had a shorter lower limb which meant it could be used on horseback, while there is no way a longbow could be used on horseback (look it up on Youtube). So the longbow and the yumi are two technically different bows.
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reliv3@lemmy.world 7 months agoReading your links, the correction you made seems semantically insignificant. Yumi is the word for “bow” in Japanese and longbows describe a bow that are long. Longbows are not unique to the English, and there are a lot of bows that can be described as longbows. So my point is, if samurais used yumis that are long (which some did) then saying they used longbows is not incorrect. Nevertheless, thank you for letting us know what the Japanese called their bows, it was educational.
lapislazuli@sopuli.xyz 7 months ago
reliv3@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Very interesting indeed. Thanks for sharing. I’m just pointing out that people are assuming “English Longbow” when saying “longbow”. Which, to be fair to these folks, the English Longbow is likely the most famous longbow in history. Nevertheless, even the Wikipedia page sourced above mentions that longbows existed in “many cultures” and there is a separate Wikipedia page for the English Longbow. This pushes me to conclude that there is a symantical difference between the two terms, “longbow” and “English Longbow” though many people assume the latter when the former is mentioned.
Paddzr@lemmy.world 7 months ago
As someone who did archery at national level… Your comment is triggering my need to point out how difficult and different “longbows” are.
I couldn’t handle it after years of playing. The term longbow in archery is as calling everything AR15.
Aux@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Well, a lot of rifles are called AK47 even though most of them are not.
ouRKaoS@lemmy.today 7 months ago
According to the media, every gun is either an AR-15 or a Glock.
Aux@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Depends on the media I guess, because every gun is literally AK.
reliv3@lemmy.world 7 months ago
That’s pretty cool that you did archery at a national level.
Respectfully, I still think that I am correctly interpretting the information on the Wikipedia links sourced above. I’m basing my conclusion off two pieces of evidence. The longbow wiki page linked above mentions that longbows existed in “many cultures”, and there is a separate Wikipedia page for the English Longbow. This pushes me to conclude that there is a symantical difference between the two terms, “longbow” and “English Longbow” though many people assume the latter when the former is mentioned.
ZombiFrancis@sh.itjust.works 7 months ago
I think that’s an English thing because they’re still celebrating Agincourt.
AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Yeah, MIT prefers pistol dueling for its Certification of Piracy