Neo-Assyrian Bow Release Aid - #1 - performing the mysterious Assyrian release :-)

2019 05 21
More humoristic than historical : testing a release aid that permits to reproduce - approximatively - the mysterious assyrian release that is show on various Assyrian reliefs (see previous videos). The "mediterranean release" is also depicted on the reliefs, but here, we focus on the "mysterious releases" : those that don't show clearly wich finger(s) draw the bow string (index only , index + thumb, no finger at all ?).The aim here was to try to reproduce the position of the fingers while drawing a bow (not a strong bow here). I did it from memory, and only after, while gathering all the info for the video, did I remember that even for the "mysterious release" we have a number of different depictions. Some of them not so mysterious, maybe compatible wich a pinch draw (between index and thumb) or a pinch draw + three last fingers drawing the string. I didn't try to reproduce that here.

Conclusions : we probably can do better, with a smaller release aid, easier to conceal. also I woud need to place my draw hand higher and use a bow allowing an even longer draw. The comparison between the depictions and the live test poses more questions. Particularly : what was the orientation of the draw hand : more transversal (palm facing the torso, as in the mediterranean release) than horizontal (as in the thumb release) ? can you really curve your wrist as a traditional japanese - or assyrian - archer if you keep the palm of your draw hand facing your torso ?