Turkish archery - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Origins

Traditional Turkish archery’s origins go back to the first millennium B.C. to Scythian, Hun and other early Asian archery tradition. The horseback archers of Central Asian steppes have used very similar archery tackle and fighting strategies throughout entire history and the nomadic life style avoids making a clear, distinctive categorisation of the tribes and nations. These nations have lived on the same geography, shared many values and influenced each other’s religion, language, tradition and undoubtedly genetic code. In the complex ethnic genetic pool of Central Asia historians try to find their ways in chasing different linguistic tracks which however is not a reliable argument neither. There is a common culture consisting of social life, religious beliefs, accommodation, art as well as hunting and fighting techniques. Numerous civilizations appeared and disappeared from the history scene throughout centuries and left this common culture and archery school.

No need to tell about the fact that history has been used (or misused) by various political foci and the truth was sometimes distorted by historians. Although the ethnic continuity is questionable, the Asian archery tradition passed to Avars, Magyars, Mongols, Seljuk and Ottoman Turks with a gradual development in the tackle.

Compromising with the official histiography, the word “Turk” was first used in Chinese sources in early 6th century for a Turkish nation called “Blue Turk Empire” (Kökturks). Recently a new term, “Turkic” appeared to describe Turk-related tribes or pieces of the Central Asian culture. Although it’s not easy to follow the specific tracks back to Blue Turks, Ottoman archery is very well documented. The high level it reached, especially in flight shooting is the reason that western world knows and admires the Turkish archery.

Archery of pre-Islamic Turkic tribes

Although the pre-Islamic Turkish archery has not been very well documented, the archaeological excavations made by the former USSR scientists illuminated many dark spots.

Additional information sources are old pictures, reliefs and sculptures.

According to Gumilöv the sculptures in the Ermitaj Museum collection depict typical Turkish mounted archers. The tails of the horses are knotted - an Ottoman tradition - and the styles of clothing and saddles indicate the use of bow and arrow on horseback.

For the early-Islamic phase of Turkish archery, there are 9th century Arabic texts in which the archery skills of partially Islamized Turks are well described. The skills of horseback archers, especially their ability to hit moving targets from on horseback are explained in detail.

The most important source available that includes many details about this stage is “The Book of Dede Korkut”. This book that is sometimes called as “The Turkish Ilyada” contains epic stories, probably written in 12th century but has its roots in hundreds of years before. Other than the linguistic character of the text, social life and beliefs exhibited in the stories indicate a “passing phase” rather than an established Islamic life. Many authors agree that the Islamic motifs have been put later into the stories.

In The Book of Dede Korkut it’s possible to find indicators about how important bow and arrow have been in the nomadic life of Turks. As an example of shamanist-ceremonial use of bow and arrow it is remarkable that the groom was releasing an arrow and building his first night’s yurt to the spot where the arrow landed.

You’ll even come across to indicators of recreational aspects of archery! In a wedding scene the groom and his friends were competing in hitting a small target with bow and arrow, the target being a ring of the groom.

Another point which should be noted is the importance of women as warriors in the pre-Islamic nomadic life as it’s also told in Marco Polo’s travel reports[4]. In the Book of Dede Korkut this truth is expressed in one of the stories: A character named Bamsi Beyrek lists the requirements he was looking for at the girl he’d be married. Besides many other martial skills, he expected her to be capable of drawing two bows at once. There are often referrals to the “heavy bows” of the heroes in order to appreciate their physical strength and to honour them.

Adopting Islam has been a result of the 300 years of commercial, social, religious and cultural interactions between the Islamic armies and the north-neighbouring Turks in the region called “Maveraünnehir”. This interaction ended up with a change of religion and alphabet of Turks[5]. Turks must have noticed and admired that their new religion gives importance to archery, a martial art that already had great importance in their lifestyle. Additional to a verse in Quran there are forty Hadis in which people are encouraged to practise archery.

Seljuks have opened the doors of Anatolia to Turks. It was the skill of Seljuk mounted archers that brought them to their destiny. The historians of that era described them as a highly effective, moving force with the long-ranged weaponry. They were hesitating to “impact” the enemy and to get into close quarter fighting. What they preferred was a lightning-fast “attack and retreat” strategy based on horseback archery skills. Their shorter recurved bows were easier to handle on horseback and gave the warriors great flexibility.

It’s documented that each warrior was carrying about 100 arrows in the quiver, in the bowcase and even in the boots. The consequences was reported in a battle against I. Crusade army: The knights had to stand a 3 hours of uninterrupted arrow attack.

Archery in the Ottoman Empire

Archery has been performed as a regular and planned branch of sports in Ottoman Empire since from the second half of the 15th century. Thus, there were 34 big arenas specifically assigned to archery activities in the Ottoman period. These places that were provided in several cities were called 'ok meydani' ("oq-meidany" arrow-place). Those were the places where the contests and trainings were held while they served as grand facilities where the sportsman live and had their own allocations, managers and staff. There were standing sportive activities under a scheduled order in those arenas.

The most notable of these arrow places was of course Istanbul Ok-meydani. It was officially donated to archery activities by Mehmed II. (Conqueror) just after the conquest of Istanbul in A.D. 1453. The borders and purpose of use of the field were set clearly by the Sultan's firman in order to prevent violations such as burial of the dead, entrance of ungulates, construction of houses, agricultural activities.

The facility was opened at Hidirellez and closed at November (Ruz-i Kasim). Shootings and contests used to be held on Mondays and Thursdays, so there were 48 days for official contests and practice and the sportsman could do free practice (mesk) rest of the time.

Traditional Disciplines of the Turkish Archery

There were several kinds of sportive archery contests in Ottoman. The foremost contest was long distance shooting. It was a fact that Ottoman archers had been shooting to tremendous distances.
Turkish target called "puta". Leather bag stuffed with sawdust or cotton seed.
The second kind of contests was target shooting. Due to the name of targets (Puta), these were called "puta shooting" and the bows using were called "puta bows" and even the arrows were "puta arrows". The feathers and the forms of those arrows were suitable for target shooting and arrow points in form of olive stones as it is used today were common.

Disciplines of penetrating hard objects and horseback archery are the other kinds of performance shooting or archery games

Penetrating thick wooden logs and hard metal plates with hardened steel arrowheads was a spectacular performance. A powerful archer with high technique of shooting could easily penetrate a couple of metal plates stick together. Those bored objects can be found in museums. These shootings were called "darp" shootings. The "ayna" targets named after the big metal plates of mirror armour were other kinds of targets.

Another performance shooting named "Kabak (gourd) shooting" was performed on horseback. This kind of shooting done to a target placed at the top of a long pole while the archer was riding at full gallop. The archer made his shoot when he was going just under the target. The name of the shooting came after the targets were gourds in general. In this kind of shooting, concentration, condition of archer, the abilities of riding and shooting were at their top levels. As the entrance of ungulates to ok-meydans was forbidden, the places for gourds (kabak-meidan) were used for this kind of shooting.

Qualifications and Training of the Turkish Archers

Shooting at ok-meydani was bounded to government approvals. One had to have a license or be taking lessons from a proficient archer. A proficient archer was determined to the archer candidates who had provided pre-conditions, and gained the right for education by a small ceremony. With those written approvals, students could only be allowed to shoot and take education at the ok-meydani, but werent allowed to compete or perform flight shooting. Students were informed about the rules to obey, things to beware and their obligations at the beginning of their education. Ones whose backgrounds were ambiguous, ones who behaved improperly, fools and mentally retarded were manifested not to be taught for shooting.

To be a proper archer, one had to complete his long education and finally had to able to shoot at the distance of 900 gez (approximately 594 meters). The successful candidates used to acquire their proficiency license with a mass ceremony and were enregistered.

The Method

A novice archer's initial work was to practice drawing the bow. A special bow called "kepaze" was made for this with a padded string. This practice was done with a Mediterranean release (three fingers) only the bow was pulled to full draw and then let down again. This is done until the archer can pull and let down 500 times without tiring. Practice like this makes the correct draw and technique automatic, much like the practice of moves in some martial arts. The muscles also strengthen and become elastic.
Practice arrowhead for novice archers (Military Museum, Istanbul)

The style of the draw was then slightly changed to the one sued in target shooting, and a heavier practice bow used. Again 500 draws was used as the number to be achieved without tiring. Archers also had to learn the same draw style in the same way whilst seated. Eventually the archer was ready to move on to a strong bow.

Often training with the practice bow would be interspersed with pulling a heavy bow 5 or 10 times to build strength. Another method was to use three bows. The archer would draw the lightest 50 times, then the medium bow 50 times and finally the heavy bow 50 times.
Apparently it was common advise for archers to draw their practice bow 66 times every morning to keep their strength up.

At about this time the lock of the thumb was worked on with an arrow fixed to the string. Finally indoor practice would start using a sack at 44 degrees to the archer. The sack was filled with wood shavings, cotton seeds and similar stuff. Practice had to be every day. The bow used for this simulated flight shooting was a weaker bow. A special arrows was sued for this sack shooting.

After a period of this training and if the weather was suitable the archer is allowed to practice outside. The bow used for this stage of training was 130 lbs draw. When he got tired he would finish with a lighter bow. Each morning and each evening 300 arrows would be shot.

Occasionally an arrow with "peculiar fletching" was used. This seems to have been some kind of flu-flu as it rapidly slowed and had short range. It was used to detect errors in technique and to be able to see the course of the arrow.

At last the archer was deemed to be ready to try flight arrows, starting with easy flight arrows and ending eventually with the best and hardest. There were four types. He would shoot 60 to 100 of each every day. Now he would be ready to try to enter the archers guild but would have to be able to prove through eye witnesses that he could hit distant marks and shoot over 900 gez.

a. Flight shooting (for record)

Places of shooting were detected according to the direction of wind. The point where the shooting was made called was called 'foot stone' and the directions specified by erected stones called 'main stone' were named as 'range'. In this 'flight shootings', the longest distance that an arrow could reach was taken as a new record under specified rules and conditions. A marble column, 'range stone' that bears the name of the archer, his profession, the date of the shot and the distance on the shooting face was erected. Those writings were in poetry and penned by a famous poet of the time, written by a calligrapher and finally engraved by masons. Each of these columns was an art object and those that could survive today are astonishing. Despite being a site nowadays, the area of Istanbul Ok-meydani is still an open-air museum (See picture gallery).

b. Long distance shooting contests

Long distance shooting contests, often confused with flight shooting were completely different types of sports activity. In this type of contest, archers made their shoots to any direction, by any wind and used to try to beat each other. The main difference, the distance wasn't measured in this type of shooting; the winner was the furthest one.

Long distance shooting contests, frequently confused with flight shooting were a completely different type of sportive activity. In this activity, archers made their shots to any direction, by any wind and tried to beat each other. The main difference between long distance shooting and flight shooting was that, the distance wasn't measured in long distance shooting: the winner was the one who shot the furthest. Shots were performed from a fixed point named 'foot place'.

2. Target Competitions

Target shooting began as a training in the skills needed to hit a target, either an animal or an enemy.

Scoring & Rules:
In target competitions, shooting was between either individuals or teams. Number of arrows to shoot defined before competition and it was generally even. And the number of hits determined the score which was calculated by counting the arrows on the target. It was like today's "hit or miss" system.

After the completion of shots, arrows were pulled from the target and dropped to the front of the Sheikh of Meidan (chairman of the archery club). If the hits were equal, the results will the competitors would tie. All shots have to be performed in right knee and the right foot on the ground.

Betting was forbidden in anyway
If an arrow was broken after a shoot (or shot a bird while its flight) the archer could repeat this shot.

Range:
Shooting ranges changes between 250 gez (~165 meters) and 400 gez (~265 meters).

Targets:
The targets were generally pear-shaped leather bugs stuffed with cotton seeds or sawdust. Also flue-shaped baskets were used in the competitions.

3. Performance Shootings

There where another shots generally are performed and seems like as a show or game other than official target and flight contests. And the "target" has lots of means in Turkish archery:

Clay blocks which were softened with water before a shoot.
Mirrors or metal plates (please see Mirror Armour in Wiki) and very hard objects to penetrate an arrow, like marble, wood logs and plowshare.

used as targets by archers on foot... And horseback archer uses;

Small pots placed top of tall pole (in Gourd Archery)
Human sized dummies,
or soil mounds,

as a target. These type of shots has "keep in form" mean before the game or the show.

Turkish Bow

The Turkish bow is a recurved composite bow used in the Ottoman Empire. Turks used this kind of bows since The Bronze Age. The construction was that of the classic Asiatic composite bow, with a wooden core (maple was most desirable), animal horn on the side facing the archer, and sinew on the back. Animal glue held it together. From the decline of military archery, mainly flight archery was practiced, and the standard Turkish bow became a particularly light and efficient weapon. The sport declined gradually until the reign of Mahmud II who made great efforts to revive it. He also ordered his archery student, Mustafa Kani, to write a book about the history, construction, and use of these bows, from which comes most of what is now known of Turkish bowyery.

Zihgir

Zihgir is the given name to the thumb ring

Thumb ring

A thumb ring is a piece of equipment designed to protect the thumb during archery. This is a ring of leather, stone, horn, wood, ivory, metal, ceramics, plastic, or glass or which fits over the end of the thumb, coming to rest at the outer edge of the outer joint...

used in Ottoman Empire. Turkish thumb rings were made of wood, metal,ivory, bone, horn or leather. Surviving examples are richly decorated. Some are carved from precious stones. These rings symbolized that the person wore it was a warrior, and in time became a symbol and objects of prestige in Ottoman society.