Archery

[3] The oldest known evidence of the bow and arrow comes from South African sites such as Sibudu Cave, where the remains of bone and stone arrowheads have been found dating approximately 72,000 to 60,000 years ago.

At the site of Nataruk in Turkana County, Kenya, obsidian bladelets found embedded in a skull and within the thoracic cavity of another skeleton, suggest the use of stone-tipped arrows as weapons about 10,000 years ago.

[citation needed] Classical civilizations, notably the Assyrians, Greeks, Armenians, Persians, Parthians, Romans, Indians, Koreans, Chinese, and Japanese fielded large numbers of archers in their armies.

[13] The Bronze Age Aegean Cultures were able to deploy a number of state-owned specialized bow makers for warfare and hunting purposes already from the 15th century BC.

[24] For example, Xiong-nu mounted bowmen made them more than a match for the Han military, and their threat was at least partially responsible for Chinese expansion into the Ordos region, to create a stronger, more powerful buffer zone against them.

[24] It is possible that "barbarian" peoples were responsible for introducing archery or certain types of bows to their "civilized" counterparts – the Xiong-nu and the Han being one example.

(In this event, archers shoot vertically from the base of an abbey tower to dislodge a wood pigeon placed approximately 30 m (98 ft) above.

Sir Ashton Lever, an antiquarian and collector, formed the Toxophilite Society in London in 1781, with the patronage of George, the Prince of Wales.

The clubs were "the drawing rooms of the great country houses placed outside" and thus came to play an important role in the social networks of the local upper class.

Archery was also co-opted as a distinctively British tradition, dating back to the lore of Robin Hood and it served as a patriotic form of entertainment at a time of political tension in Europe.

[47] Deities and heroes in several mythologies are described as archers, including the Greek Artemis and Apollo, the Roman Diana and Cupid, the Germanic Agilaz, continuing in legends like those of Wilhelm Tell, Palnetoke, or Robin Hood.

Armenian Hayk and Babylonian Marduk, Indian Karna (also known as Radheya/son of Radha), Abhimanyu, Eklavya, Arjuna, Bhishma, Drona, Rama, and Shiva were known for their shooting skills.

Archery, and the bow, play an important part in the epic poem the Odyssey, when Odysseus returns home in disguise and then bests the suitors in an archery competition after hinting at his identity by stringing and drawing his great bow that only he can draw, a similar motif is present in the Turkic Iranian heroic archeheroic poem Alpamysh.

[49] The Nymphai Hyperboreioi (Νύμφαι Ὑπερβόρειοι) were worshipped on the Greek island of Delos as attendants of Artemis, presiding over aspects of archery; Hekaerge (Ἑκαέργη), represented distancing, Loxo (Λοξώ), trajectory, and Oupis (Οὖπις), aim.

[50] Yi the archer and his apprentice Feng Meng appear in several early Chinese myths,[51] and the historical character of Zhou Tong features in many fictional forms.

[52] In West African Yoruba belief, Osoosi is one of several deities of the hunt who are identified with bow and arrow iconography and other insignia associated with archery.

Compound bows are designed to reduce the force required to hold the string at full draw, hence allowing the archer more time to aim with less muscular stress.

Shafts of arrows are typically composed of solid wood, bamboo, fiberglass, aluminium alloy, carbon fiber, or composite materials.

Aluminium shafts were a very popular high-performance choice in the latter half of the 20th century, due to their straightness, lighter weight, and subsequently higher speed and flatter trajectories.

Some arrows may simply use a sharpened tip of the solid shaft, but separate arrowheads are far more common, usually made from metal, stone, or other hard materials.

[55] Njál's saga describes the refusal of a wife, Hallgerður, to cut her hair to make an emergency bowstring for her husband, Gunnar Hámundarson, who is then killed.

Most modern archers wear a bracer (also known as an arm-guard) to protect the inside of the bow arm from being hit by the string and prevent clothing from catching the bowstring.

Common with competitive archery equipment are special brackets that allow multiple stabilizers to be mounted at various angles to fine tune the bow's balance.

A smoother, and more fluid release of the string will produce the most consistently repeatable shots, and therefore may provide greater accuracy of the arrow flight.

Some modern recurve bows are equipped with a mechanical device, called a clicker, which produces a clicking sound when the archer reaches the correct draw length.

Fletching that is not arranged to induce rotation still improves accuracy by causing a restoring drag any time the arrow tilts from its intended direction of travel.

The huge ratio of length vs. cross sectional area, coupled with velocity, made the arrow more powerful than any other hand held weapon until firearms were invented.

Practice arrows, for instance, have a blunt tip that spreads the force over a wider area to reduce the risk of injury or limit penetration.

Bow hunters generally enjoy longer seasons than are allowed with other forms of hunting such as black powder, shotgun, or rifle.

These compound bows may feature fiber optic sights, stabilizers, and other accessories designed to increase accuracy at longer distances.