Hi
Over here in Norway there is a growing trad archery interest. The archers are loosely and friendly divided into hunters/field archers that are archers foremost, and thos that have a very strong interest of archery of the past, many of whom are also wood-bowyers.
All compete friendly against each other, and all are brothers, no matter the type or origin og bow or arroes, still. I think those present in the beginning of field archery in the US would recognse the situation.
Norwegian FITA branch saw this (the possibility of growth) and we now have two NBF sanctioned classes, one allowing most bows that do not have metal risers and whhels, and one that calls for historic-(hysteric)-ally correct bows.
Remember this is people that like to make rules, and now they try to govern trad-archers, most of which disdain rules...
LAst year it was shooting 3under that was prohibited, we turned that one with an old picture of some indians and referring to "Apache"-draw.
The last is the prohibition of string dampers. Reason given is the alledged lack of historic evidence for their use and secondly the possiblity of tuning the bow with them.
I have searched the net and the literature and come up with sound damping fur on the bow tips, but nothing on the string.
So can anyone help me: historic evidence, description, picture or artifact that can show a string-damper like attachment on a string?
K
The only silencers I remember seeing on Native American bows was fur on the bow tip. Generally the strings they used were heavy enough(raw hide, natural fibers, etc) that they didn't need to be silenced. Also the arrows were relatively heavy witch helped to quiet the string. Pat