Armbruster (craft)

The Pogner (Bogner) at work, from Hans Sachs and Jost Amann, Eygentliche description of all states on earth , 1568, engraving by Jost Amman

An Armbruster was a manufacturer of crossbows . Today, as part of the enthusiasm for the Middle Ages, there are manufacturers of replicas again . Replicas were especially made in historicism . Furthermore, crossbows were and are industrially made for sport shooters.

history

Crossbows were already known to the Greeks and Romans, and crossbows were also known in China. The archery profession resulted in a specialization in armbruster. From the late Gothic onwards, masters worked in the artisan class of armbrusters. Normally a crossbow was commissioned by a gentleman or a city, had to deliver one or two crossbows a year and maintain the crossbows of the authorities in times of war and peacetime. He was allowed to sell the rest of the crossbows he made freely. In 1360 up to 52 armbrusters can be found in Prague. Since initially only wooden or horn bows were built, the bow smith came along with the steel bow as a supplier. Archers were located in cities where the blacksmith's trade had a long tradition, such as Brussels, Esslingen, Milan, Mondragon in Spain, Piedmont or Steyr. In addition to the armbruster, there were a number of secondary trades such as tension belt maker, winch maker, arrow smith, arrow shifter and kurbaner (maker of the bolt quivers). With the development of black powder and the matchlock , the craft of the crossbow passed into that of the gunsmith and gunsmith .

Big winch crossbow

Important collections

Larger inventories of historical crossbows there are among others in the Burg Altena , in the Historical Museum in Bern, at the Coira , the Bavarian Army Museum , in Zeughaus Innsbruck , in the armory of Dresden , the Badische Landesmuseum Karlsruhe , the Cologne City Museum in Sibiu , in Linz Castle , in the Tower of London , in the Armeria in Madrid and in the Manchester Museum . In the Hermitage in St. Petersburg has the largest collection.

literature

• Egon Harmuth, Die Armbrust , ADEVA, Graz, 1975, ISBN 3-201-00933-4
• Egon Harmuth, The Crossbow. A manual. Graz, 1986, ISBN 3-201-01298-X
• Günter Wetzler, Armbrust-Schießen , Weinmann, 1999, ISBN 3-87892-053-9
• Uwe Gross: tension hooks. Rare finds of medieval crossbow accessories. In: Preservation of monuments in Baden-Württemberg , 34th year 2005, issue 4, pp. 225–230 ( PDF )
• Holger Richter: The horn bow crossbow. History and technology . Verlag Angelika Hörnig , Ludwigshafen 2006. ISBN 978-3-938921-02-9 .
• Richard Kinseher, The bow in culture, music and medicine, as a tool and weapon , BoD, 2005, page 110 ff. ISBN 3-8311-4109-6 ( online preview )
• Ralph Payne-Gallwey, The Book of the Crossbow , New York, 1995, unmodified reprint of the London edition, 1903, ISBN 0-486-28720-3
• Johannes Willers , Die Nürnberger Schnepperschützen , in Nürnberger Altstadtberichte Ed .: Altstadtfreunde Nürnberg , Heft 3 (1978), pp. 73-88

Web link

• Website of a manufacturer with information on the history of crossbow production

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Egon Harmuth, Die Armbrust p. 75 ff.