Writing in 1574, and looking back on the growth of unity in the Low Countries, the significance of archery and crossbow guilds, and their landjuwellen – their great competitions – was clear to the governor of Veere in Zeeland. Just as the Olympic Games had built unity between the city states of ancient Greece, so shooting competitions shared values and, in competing together in large shoots, the guilds demonstrated and strengthened their inter-urban networks. Networks were vital to the Low Countries; the towns of Flanders were powerful in their own right, but gained from regional networks and from the ideals of social peace.

Archery and crossbow competitions benefited from established networks, especially those of trade and interactions along rivers, but they also served to strengthen regional communities. Small networks grew out from large towns into their hinterlands, bringing economic and political benefit, but also the possibility of tensions. In looking at charters granted to shooting guilds in smaller towns and analysing the guilds’ festive interactions, it becomes clear that shooting guilds were part of small networks, used by the civic powers to demonstrate authority and to emphasise community with smaller neighbours. In considering regional networks, many recent works have shown not just the high level of urbanisation in Flanders, but also the strength of urban networks and desires for the ‘Common Good’. The shooting competitions present an exciting lens through which to analyse such networks in action. The location of and attendance at competitions reveal the significance of rivers, as well as the efforts that civic governors went to in order to build and maintain politically and economically powerful links through festive bonds.