This is the yabusame, a ceremony turned into a public spectacle in which horsemen dressed in traditional clothes try to hit three wooden targets with their arrows. The difficulty is that they have to shoot at full gallop along a 250-meter track where the targets are placed about 70 meters apart.
This practice originates from the 6th century as a ritual to entertain and please the gods and spirits, who would appreciate it by granting health and prosperity to the local people. In the Kamakura period (1185 / 92-1334), the first of Japan's military government, the use of this martial art as training for samurai intensified , but it retained a religious and personal development nuance.
Yabusame declined from the 16th century, with the arrival of the Portuguese in the Japanese archipelago and the introduction of firearms. Today, these exhibitions take place annually at Shinto shrines where thousands of people come to admire the skill and self-control of the participants.
