Yabusame – Ritual Mounted Archery

Tokyobling's Blog

Last of the series of Yabusame photographs I got at the Ogano Spring festival in Saitama prefecture just about a week ago. The horses used by the archers were all traditional Japanese breeds, small and hardy requiring little fodder and fearless in battle. All of them came very close to extinction half a century ago when they were deemed to small for the war effort and the government was focusing on stronger breeds.

The speed can be seen in some of the photos: by the time the archer has released the arrow and the splintered boards of the target start flying apart the horse is already well past the target, speeding towards the next one in line. The boards were collected by the judges and marked by a local calligraphist. They were then sold to the audience to be displayed in their private home shrines as a talisman of protection…

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Old China photographies

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2601651/Hello-old-China-Photographs-1860s-believed-earliest-existence-offer-fascinating-insight-life-Far-East.html

These incredible photographs are believed to be among the earliest of their kind in existence and offer an fascinating insight into life in the Far East during the 1860s.

The images, which form part of a captivating magazine, show life in China and Japan during the mid-19th century, and portray villagers going about their day-to-day tasks.

At an auction in Cirencester today, the photographs sold for more than six times their £2,000 guide price, with an anonymous buyer winning a bidding war to purchase them for £12,500.

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Close shave: A street barber carefully cuts a client’s hair in this image from China Magazine taken in the late 1860s. The photographs sold today for £12,000 – six times their guide price