“ Such archery was never seen since a bow was first bent in Britain,” one exclaims in a stunned whisper. The spectators in Scott’s telling, too, are astonished. In A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode, for example, from the 15 th century, both Robin Hood and Little John cleave the wand, in two separate scenes: In these earlier versions of the Robin Hood legend, Hood-or sometimes another outlaw from his band-splits not an opponent’s arrow but the “wand,” a small willow stick placed in front of the target, and a much more difficult target than a bull’s-eye. Thomas Ohlgren, a Robin Hood scholar who has edited several books on the tales, told me that he believes the tradition of splitting the arrow simply came from a misinterpretation of tales from the 15 th century. The legend of arrow-splitting is not based on any real-life achievement, but rather on a simple textual misunderstanding, at least according to one historian. (Such a shot, it’s worth noting, counts only as a tie in a real archery competition.)

This time, each arrow shattered upon striking the nock, and they concluded that the feat was only possible when shooting at a hollow arrow or an arrow made of bamboo. Though this type of bow and arrow doesn’t actually shoot very straight, one dissenting viewer donated the straightest possible grain of wood, so that the arrow might follow the grain to the end.

For a follow-up episode, the Mythbusters team responded to skeptics by attempting the feat again, this time using the equipment used in Robin Hood’s time. They found that even when fired at close range by a robot, the arrows could only partially split the target arrow.

The TV series Mythbusters took on just that question in a controversial episode.

Brave merida bow and arrow