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What is the smallest historical inaccuracy that has ever bothered you in a work of fiction? (hexbear.net)
submitted 4 days ago by to c/history@hexbear.net
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Bonus points of course if it has no plot relevance

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[–] 20 points 4 days ago (9 children)

Im the Odyssey he dry fies his bow (pulling and releasing the string without firing an arrow) which is very bad for the bow and can even break it.

The dude does it to a very old bow that hasen't been used for years too.

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  • [–] 15 points 4 days ago (2 children)

    I’ve already forgotten most of the film, did he fully load the string or just pluck it? The problem with dry firing a bow is that without an arrow all of the stored energy gets dissipated into the bow stave. If it’s a small pull enough to produce sound it’s probably not an issue

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  • [–] 3 points 3 days ago (3 children)

    why would dry firing damage the bow more than wet firing? how much does an arrow weigh?

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  • [–] 2 points 3 days ago (2 children)

    Its more that the string firing is producing a lot of force that is supposed to go into an arrow and not the limbs of the bow

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  • [–] 2 points 3 days ago (1 child)

    I guess an arrow does fly really fast. Must be some really fucked up exponential math?

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  • [–] 4 points 3 days ago

    Well the bow I used to used when I was a teen, which is a recurve bow for weaker people (I'm smol and I was just starting out. I swear I could fire stonger bows but those jerks underestimated me) was a 25 pound bow, which means the string requires 25 pounds of force to pull back. An ancient greek war bow would have much more force than that, I imagine. Especially because all those grown men couldn't string Odysseus' bow.

    I could be wrong about the dry firing. I just remember my instructor telling me to not even think about doing it.

    This is all for fun though. It's a fantasy movie in the end.

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