Page:A record of European armour and arms through seven centuries (Volume 3).djvu/171

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have had the opportunity of examining. Peter the Saracen, maker of crossbows to King John, fashioned his bows in the media of sinew, ram's horn, and whalebone, skilfully worked. William Conrad, bowyer to the Tower of London in 1302, supplied the Prince of Wales, who was then engaged in an expedition against Scotland, with "2lb. of wiseblase, 4lb. of glue, 4lb. of sinews of sea dogs, and other necessaries of balistae and bow," a record which seems to show that even in the XIVth century the horn bow was the prevalent weapon. In an illustration given by Planché in his "Cyclopaedia of Costume" from the Roy. MS. 14, E. iv, three archers can be seen winding and discharging their crossbows, all of whom are shown as possessing crossbows with bows of horn (Fig. 932).

Fig. 932. "Les Chroniques d'Angleterre" (temp. Edward IV)

Roy. MS. 14, E. iv, fol. 210, British Museum

The Baron de Cosson, in the erudite paper on the crossbow of Ulrich V, Count of Würtemberg, temp. 1460 (see Fig. 936), which he communicated to the Society of Antiquaries in 1893, gives a very full list of the more famous