• <i>Yabusame</i> [流鏑馬] drawing (?): an archer on horseback preparing to shoot an arrow
<i>Yabusame</i> [流鏑馬] drawing (?): an archer on horseback preparing to shoot an arrow
<i>Yabusame</i> [流鏑馬] drawing (?): an archer on horseback preparing to shoot an arrow
<i>Yabusame</i> [流鏑馬] drawing (?): an archer on horseback preparing to shoot an arrow

Toyohiko Okamoto (豊彦岡本) (artist 1773 – 1845)

Yabusame [流鏑馬] drawing (?): an archer on horseback preparing to shoot an arrow

Drawing


1800s
15.25 in x 29.5 in (Overall dimensions) Wash drawing in sumi and color
Signature: Okamoto Shuko
Seal reads: Drawn by the scribe Okamoto Toyohiko
"San mai no uchi" in lower right
Artist's seal in red: 岡本豊彦書画之記
"San mai no uchi" (三枚之内) would seem to indicate that this is one of a set of three or an image to be spread over 3 sheets, put together horizontally. This appears to be a drawing for something to be printed as there are indications of colors to be used in various areas.

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In the Journal of Asiania Sport for All, 2015.13(1) there is an abstract entitled: 'Traditional Sport from Cultural Perspectives in Japan' by Yasuo Yamaguchi of Kobe University. On page 41 it notes that " "Yabusame” is a kind of horseback archery, in which archers try to hit marks evenly set apart by using “Kaburaya” whistling arrows. The old archery game also has been regarded as a sacred one. The origin of “Yabusame has yet to be known, but it is believed to havestarted as a sacred rite."

"Today, the most famous “Yabusame” style is the Takeda School, which requires the positions of commander, archer, judge, sacred gifts manager, arrow collector, flagmen, starter and drummer. The horse runway should be approximately 218 meters long, and three targets are placed there. Each target is a 54cm × 54cm Japanese cypress broad covered by five-color, round-shaped paper. Flowers of four seasons are placed behind the target. When an arrow misses the target but touches the flower, it should be counted as a successful shot."

[Note that properly speaking, this archer on horseback is not practicing yabusame since the horse is not speeding along. Perhaps he is simply a design for an archer on a horse.]

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The yabusame is discussed in a scholarly article, 'Sacred Dance at Sensōji: The Development of a Tradition' by Gerald Groemer in Asian Ethnology Volume 69, Number 2 • 2010: "For much of eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the Sanja Gongen commenced its year with a series of ceremonies featuring kagura and a sacred equestrian archery exhibit (yabusame 流鏑馬). These two events were normally presented on the fifth day of the New Year. Yabusame is not listed in rosters of Edo annual events in the 1690s, though note is taken of other Sensōji performances and rituals. Sacred archery does, however, appear in guides to the city from 1723 and 1735. These record that yabusame at the Sanja Gongen took place on 1/5. Perhaps Tamura and his administration instigated this event or at any rate boosted it to prominence… Edo archery had been on the rise during this era. Around 1724 shogun Tokugawa Yoshimune commanded Ogasawara Sadamasa 小笠原貞政 (the twentieth head of the Ogasawara family, in charge of bakufu etiquette) to tutor the warrior class in proper forms of archery. Yabusame presented at the Ana-hachiman shrine at Takada-no-baba in Edo in 1728 featured equestrian archers dressed in Kamakura-period garb boldly galloping down a 250-meter course and seeking to hit a series of targets. On this occasion yabusame served as an appeal to the gods for the shogunal heir to recover from smallpox, but it was repeated again on many later occasions with no reference to such motives. By the mid-eighteenth century, Sanja Gongen yabusame had established itself as a well-known New Year’s event in the capital. The archery presented was not, however, the sort displayed at Takada-no-baba in the city. Nor did it resemble that exhibited at the famous Suwa, Fushimi Inari, or Tsurugaoka Hachimangū shrines, where it was usually enacted with much fanfare during the eighth month. Sanja Gongen yabusame more closely resembled a ceremony accompanying the “first archery” of the year (yumi-hajime shiki 弓始式) staged at many shrines throughout the Kanto area. Indeed, it looked suspiciously like the archery exhibits (not all equestrian) taking place at Sagami shrines staffed and led by men related to Tamura’s organization. Sagami yabusame was commonly displayed during the first week or two of the New Year… A late Edo-period report states that men at the Rokusho myōjin 六所明神, an influential Sagami shrine closely associated with “masters of sacred dance,” produced yabusame annually on 1/17... A similar ritual took place on 5/5 as part of the shrine’s grand festival... At the nearby Shirahige shrine 白髭神社 in Odawara, yabusame was also witnessed every year on 1/7, supposedly since the Kamakura period... A comparable spectacle was staged on 1/8 at the Samukawa shrine 寒川神社 near Tamura village, the hamlet of Tamura Hachidayū’s ancestors. Here standing archers released arrows at a target emblazoned with a stylized ideograph for “demon” (鬼 oni). This mark was held in place by twelve (in leap years thirteen) bamboo poles... Yabusame at the Sanja Gongen also featured a cypress plaque with the character “demon,” though it was elevated by only one shaft of bamboo... The archer, donning a lacquered court hat and white attire, was mounted on horseback. Through his actions he drove out demons from shrine precincts. This sort of familiar rite was also frequently known as oni-yarai 鬼遣らい (“ousting demons”) or tsuina 追儺 (“expelling calamity”)."

"The religious connotations of Sensōji yabusame were fortified by embedding it in a series of exorcistic events of differing provenance. 1/5 commenced with a solemn performance at around nine o’clock in the morning dedicated to Goō 牛王 (or Gozu tennō 牛頭天王), the heavenly “bull-headed king” traditionally linked to “mountain ascetics” (yamabushi) and the Kumano shrines. This divine “king” was believed to be efficacious in preventing disease and in warding off evil. The ceremony in his honor at the Sanja Gongen was carried out by seven Buddhist priests and two novitiates. After this event Buddhist music (hōraku 法楽) was intoned by six Buddhist priests and three acolytes from a subsidiary temple. During the period of Tamura’s headship the ceremonies then turned to noontime prayers and finally moved on to kagura and yabusame."

The last part of the ceremony was described in 1800: "When the kagura performance is over, Hachidayū lowers the bow and arrow from its position before the gods and hands it to a shrine official. This official mounts a horse which has been brought here earlier. Another official, wearing a figured costume with Chinese-style designs and a demon’s mask, takes the target and attaches it to a green bamboo pole about seven feet tall. Four assistants lead the demon by the hand, hold the target, and run before the horse for yabusame. The archer from the shrine who performs the yabusame begins to shoot his arrows from the east, then proceeds through the torii [鳥居, sacred gate] of the Sanja Gongen, circles twice around the main temple hall from the west to the north, and returns to the Sanja Gongen, where he dismounts.13 It is said that picking up the fallen arrows brings good luck, so all the spectators clamor to obtain them. When the yabusame is over, the spectators fight to obtain the ceremonial rope that has been hung around the Sanja worship hall. In accordance with tradition, nobody stops them from doing so."
warrior prints (musha-e - 武者絵) (genre)