zraver, please read the following from wiki:
"Around 500 BC, however, metalworkers in the southern state of Wu developed an iron smelting technology that would not be practiced in Europe until late medieval times. In Wu, iron smelters achieved a temperature of 1130°C, hot enough to be considered a blast furnace which could create cast iron.[27][28][29] At this temperature, iron combines with 4.3% carbon and melts. As a liquid, iron can be cast into molds, a method far less laborious than individually forging each piece of iron from a bloom.
Cast iron is rather brittle and unsuitable for striking implements. It can, however, be decarburized to steel or wrought iron by heating it in air for several days. In China, these ironworking methods spread northward, and by 300 BC, iron was the material of choice throughout China for most tools and weapons. A mass grave in Hebei province, dated to the early third century BC, contains several soldiers buried with their weapons and other equipment. The artifacts recovered from this grave are variously made of wrought iron, cast iron, malleabilized cast iron, and quench-hardened steel, with only a few, probably ornamental, bronze weapons."
What I want to say is we get your point, Bronze is superior to poorly made Iron, but you should also understand our point, which is high quality Iron alloy and Steel beats bronze.
For most applications yes, but the bell corselet provided superior protection vs any iron or steel armor of the period- its trade off was weight.
I don't quite understand why Mongols would be taken into debate in an Alex vs Warring states thread, but I'll bite.
Mongols fought with the Chinese for long long time, this fact alone proves the superiority of Chinese archery.
Its doesn't follow, prior to being unified the Mongols were divided so the numbers were on the side of China, who also used Mongol cousins in their own army. China like wise had fortifications, deep reserves, interior lines etc. Despite the advantages, several Chinese dynasties built walls to keep the invaders out- walls begin very good at stopping a horses forward progress. Now if your talking wall protected crossbowmen with artillery support vs Mongolian tribal raiders your point is a resounding yes. But once the Mongols were inside the walls so to speak- or the Chinese ventured forth from their walls the battles usually favored the horsemen.
Why? Because when archers have the upper hand, the enemy cavalry will simply retreat, and there's nothing archers can do about it. On the other hand, if the cavalry has the upper hand, we can expect to see a lot of dead archers. I don't need to argue with you on the technicalities, the result speaks for its own logic.
look what happened when the horse got past the fortifications.
Now if the Mongols had heavy armor as you suggested multiple times, this would actually reinforce my point on the strength of Chinese archery.
40% of the Mongol force was lancers, which are equally useless vs fortifications as horse archers and nothing is proven. Do you have accounts of open field fights. Look for example at the Battle of badger Mouth- Mongol arrows not Chinese decided the day.
Now I suggest you don't get so worked up trying to squeeze through tiny mouse holes, propellant is simply material(eg. bow string) that propels another object, it doesn't necessarily have to be chemicals.
True you could use water, steam etc, but propellant is a substance not a thing- a bow string is a particular item.
You are narrowing your perspective too much in each of your points, you might seem make sense in a limited context but that doesn't apply when you consider everything together.
I try and take everything in context.
Crassus may be an incompetent commander, but if you actually bothered to read about Sogdiana you'd realize the text specifically mentioned Chinese crossbows easily penetrated Roman armor and shields.
1. We don't know for sure they were Romans
2. We don't know how many were there on either side
3. We don't know that if they were legionaries if they had any auxillary support
4. We don't know if they kept their equipment or were re-armed by the Persians- most had lost their scutums in combat.
There are several more, but the fact remains that a lot of questions are unanswered and thus a definitive statement about the quality of one vs the other cannot be made.
I know you talked morale and will and stuff like that, but this isn't a super robot anime/game, your shield and armor doesn't heal itself and become stronger when you have higher morale!!!
Never claimed it was, but higher morale does play a huge part. Troops who lack the will to battle will give up far sooner than others and may throw away victory by doing so.
Finally, not matter what you say about the relative strength of European bows, they were not able to do significant damage to Roman legions.
True, the Lorica Segmentata was designed to shed missiles so the gladius could be brought close.
In conclusion, Chinese archery beat Mongol cavalry A, Roman Infantry, and any archer that cannot penetrate Roman armor and shields B.
B does not automatically follow from A. Mongol's beat China, outside of fortifications most fights favored the Mongols. Even if Chinese archery had defeated the Mongols it would mean nothing in a discussion about the Greeks and Romans because the protection levels and style of combat were so vastly different. Mongol heavy lancers and European knights had less overall protection in the 1200's than a Greek hoplite or Early imperial Legionnaire did more than a thousand years earlier.
