Yabusame

A few times a year Yabusame events occur throughout Japan. Yabusame is horseback archery dating back to the 12th century and is performed today just as it was back then. The archer (on his horse) begins at the end of a 255m track and gallops down at high speed. Without slowing down he shoots three blunted arrows at 3 targets spaced along the course and then must stop his horse before the end of the track. The first target is just 36m from the start and the other two are each about 78m after.

There are several ceremonies before the main event begins. We saw a "parade" beginning with the squires(?) that walk each horse along the track to the end. Next all of the supporting staff follows, and finally the samurai. The first five archers to ride mount their horse and ride back. Then they begin!

We watched several archers and witnessed a variety of styles and skills. Here is a clear view of an archer hitting his mark!

If you watch closely you can see that this archer ran out of time and instead of shooting his bow he simply threw the arrow frantically so that he could free his hands to stop his horse in time.

The horses seemed to have their own version of how things should go as well. Some horses did not go as fast as others...

And some were out of control!

It was fairly entertaining, and it was especially cool to see the style of regalia/armor/armament/horse tack that was used thousands of years ago.


**sorry the videos loaded with such horrible quality. I think you get the gist of it though!