Prof. Goro Shiga, one of Japan's foremost archers, now a visitor in Seattle, will stage an exhibition shoot to which all local archery enthusiasts are invited today at 1 o'clock at 1214 Washington St., where a temporary archery range has been erected.
Shiga is the holder of the 'third diploma of the Butokkai [sic]," which qualification has been awarded to only five or six archers in all of Japan. For the past two years he has been the winner of the national tournaments conducted by the archery association of Japan.
Shiga uses the type of long bow that Samurai warriors of medieval Japan used.
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From the Japanese-American Courier, Sep. 1, 1928 [an English-language Japanese community paper in Seattle]
From time immemorial the Japanese bow has played an important role in the life and history of the Island Empire. The use of the bow dates to the time even before the recorded history of Japna. Probably the first written accounts were compiled 2,400 years ago in the time of Jim-mu Tenno, the first Japanese Emperor, upon whose bow, history relates, a golden hawk alighted one day, to denote victory and conquest.
According to some of the ancient accounts, the first Japanese bow was constructed from the round branches of a mulberry and Indian Bean tree. This type of bow existed until the Heian period (about 600 A.D.) when the more or less primitive and crude bow first began to be embarked by improvements. The Japanese bow of today is probably the result of an evolutionary process towards perfection.
Until the modern history of Japan first began compilation, about the time Commodore Perry visited the empire to open her [doors] to world commerce, the bow was one of the leading weapons used in warfare and hunting. Of course in the present day, the bow is no longer conspicuous in its asset as a weapon, it is however, widely used as a means for exercise and the proper coordination of mind and muscle.
Its prominence as a means for exercise is such that the Japanese theory of archery places certain objectives such as: coordination of mind and muscle, body building, poise and quick mental thinking combined with a spiritual training, before the ultimate object of hitting the bull's eye.
There are seven steps to be learned by a Japanese archer before he lets fly his arrow and each step has a purpose towards culturally developing these principal objects. It is the Japanese theory that once these objectives are attained to an almost perfect degree the arrow will, naturally hit the center of the target.
Archery at the present time is a popular pastime in Japan and its wide practice finds ample reasons in the training of body, mind and spirit that it affords just as in Judo and Japanese fencing.