186 ANCIENT AND MODERN METHODS 



Mongolian release. A picture of Tanniu, painted one 

 hundred and fifty years ago and supposed to be a copy 

 of a Chinese subject six or seven hundred years old, shows 

 plainly the Mongolian release. In a picture by Keion, 

 seven hundred years old, the archer is represented in the 

 act of wetting with his tongue the tips of the first two 

 fingers of his hand ; and this certainly suggests the Japa- 

 nese form of the Mongolian release. 



Among the Emperor's treasures at Nara is a silver ves- 

 sel supposed to be of the time of Tempei Jingo (765 A. 

 D.), upon which is depicted a hunting-scene. Here the 

 release, if correctly depicted, suggests the Mediterranean 

 form. The bow is Mongoloid. The vessel is probably 

 Persian : it is certainly not Japanese. The earliest allu- 

 sions to Japanese archery are contained in "Kqjiki, or 

 Records of Ancient Matters," of which its translator, Mr. 

 Basil Hall Chamberlain, says : " It is the earliest authentic 

 literary product of that large division of the human race 

 which has been variously denominated Turanian, Scythian, 

 and Altaic, and even precedes by at least a century the 

 most ancient extant literary compositions of non-Aryan 

 India." These records take us back without question to 

 the 7th century of our era. In this work allusion is made 

 to the heavenly feathered arrow, to the vegetable wax-tree 

 bow and deer bow, and also to the elbow pad. It is diffi- 

 cult to understand the purpose of the elbow pad in arch- 

 ery, assuming the same practice of the bow in ancient 

 times as in present Japanese methods. It is difficult to 

 believe that a pad on the elbow was needed to protect 

 that part from the feeble impact of the string. If the 

 pad was a sort of arm-guard surrounding the elbow, then 

 one might surmise the use of a highly strung bow of Mon- 

 golian form held firmly and not permitted to rotate as in 

 the Japanese style. 



