Note 417 — Chapter IX · SOUL-IMAGE AND LIFE-FEELING

Here there is no need to postulate firearms (as distinct from gunpowder used in fireworks) in the Chinese Culture. The archery of the Chinese and Japanese was such as only the British 14th-century archery could match in the Western and nothing in the Classical.

It should be noted also that it was in our 14th Century that—quite independently of gunpowdergunpowder—archery and the construction of siege-engines reached their zenith in the West. The “English” bow had long been used by the Welsh, but it was left to Edward I and Edward III to make it the tactical weapon par excellence.—Tr.