Han Dynasty Bow Tactics

[TheAzn]

I'm just really curious about this. For a long time, I have heard about the amazing feats that other cultures can perform.
Some of these feats included:
1. The Parthians using the "Parthian Shot". In this tactic, the Parthians pretended to retreat, but then would suddenly shoot from behind their backs.
2. I'm not sure about the culture, but there was this case where an archer can release 3 arrows in around 1 second. This rate of fire cannot be sustained, of course, but this shows that an archer can release a "short burst" of fire.

The question is, are there any contemporary sources that listed some of the amazing feats that the Han Dynasty archers can do?

[Justin Ma]

Stephen's "Chinese Archery" has a number of interesting stories along these lines. For example, the feat of piercing a stone with an arrow is attributed to the Han Dynasty general Li Guang (although this feat has been ascribed to other legendary figures as well).

[jack farrell]

The martial arts has always attracted big egos, archery included. We must walk lightly. I have read stories of archers doing things which a gun cannot perform.

[Justin Ma]

The martial arts has always attracted big egos, archery included. We must walk lightly. I have read stories of archers doing things which a gun cannot perform.

Ha ha. On that note I want to share a great expression I learned from someone a while ago: "They say that martial arts builds character. But really, it builds characters."

[daryush]

The martial arts has always attracted big egos, archery included. We must walk lightly. I have read stories of archers doing things which a gun cannot perform.

Haha! I want to hear some of these!

[Artemiz]

The martial arts has always attracted big egos, archery included. We must walk lightly. I have read stories of archers doing things which a gun cannot perform.

Haha! I want to hear some of these!

Maybe there's an archery equivalent to the Clint Eastwood westerns where he shoots once and kills everyone!

I also remember my father telling me about one of the five tigers, General Huang Zhong from the story of the Three Kingdoms (San Guo Yen Yi), being able to shoot multiple arrows at a time!

[Bede]

Shooting multiple arrows at one time isn't difficult, but each arrow has a proportional share of the total energy. Two arrows equals half the force each; three arrows equals one third the force each. It is an equation of diminishing returns. One powerful arrow is usually more effective than two weaker arrows.

Another detail is that the arrows sometimes follow very similar trajectories meaning they both hit close to each other.

[Artemiz]

Well, perhaps to clarify I should say the story goes that he could hit multiple TARGETS at the same time with Heaven's own speed and accuracy.

[Stephen Selby]

The one particular Han period feat that seems to have been trained for (and not belong to the realm of myth, such as the stone piercing) is 'shooting at sound'. That is, archers were trained to hit a target based on where they heard a sound come from in the dark.