The sun was behind me as I approached the target quickly. My horse was in a slow run, and I stood up, knees braced against the saddle and heels down in the stirrups, trying to stay steady even though I felt as if I were in a wind tunnel.
Moving swiftly, I drew an arrow from my quiver and loaded the bow, pulled my arm back and released. There were no foes nor frontline. Rather, I was engaging in the pastime of horseback archery.
There’s something oddly comforting about playing at ancient warfare, about reliving the days when empires spread and fell on the tip of an arrow, especially nowadays when high-tech conflict rages around us.
Horseback archery is experiencing a renaissance across Asia, the Middle East and even Europe as real war becomes ever more destructive and impersonal, fought with drones and artificial intelligence. The allure of what is also called mounted archery always makes me think of the romanticization of Civil War re-enactors, but for an even more bygone era.
Last month, amid the lush mountains of Kyrgyzstan where the Mongol Empire once marched westward on the strength of its mounted archers, it indeed looked like several period dramas had come to life. Athletes participating in the World Nomad Games, an international tournament rooted in ancient warfare and ethnosports, were clad in warrior wear and demonstrating battlefield skills that once could earn someone acclaim.
For months, I had been training in my spare time for the tournament. I had no previous experience riding or doing archery until I came to the sport about two years ago as I was in the midst of reporting as a foreign correspondent on Israel’s retaliatory war against Hamas in Gaza, leaving the Palestinian territory devastated.
While it may seem odd to enjoy an archaic form of warfare while covering a brutal present-day conflict, there was a meditative aspect to the activity, requiring complete concentration, graceful technique and matching your breath to your movements; it blocked out the modern world, even if only for a few seconds.
I had hoped to compete and was set to join the team from Jordan, because I live there as a Amman-based correspondent. But even a tournament celebrating the nomadic way of life still respects the borders of modern nation-states, and because I am not a Jordanian citizen, I was ineligible to compete with the team. Instead, I joined it as a coach.
The Nomad Games began in 2014 and has grown steadily. This year, its sixth, had hundreds of athletes from more than 100 countries competing in various ethnosports such as powerlifting camel-shaped weights, speed building circular tents known as yurts and the ever popular kok-boru, a version of polo played with a headless goat carcass instead of a ball.
Horseback archery itself began its comeback about 15 years ago, drawing in people who are interested in history and others who simply like the athletic challenge of it.
“For sure we think about how our ancestors used to wage war and this was a big part of it,” Abdulrahman Algharaibeh said one day during practice, dressed in lace-up boots, cargo pants, a camo shirt and a baseball cap that made him look more like a U.S. military contractor than a Jordanian Bedouin warrior. “That stays rooted in our mind for sure.”
He recalled watching a popular Turkish drama, Resurrection: Ertugrul — about a 13th-century Turkic chieftain battling the Crusaders, Byzantines and Mongols — and a specific scene in which the protagonists launched an attack on horseback.
“I got very excited,” said Mr. Algharaibeh, a 30-year-old software engineer. “I wanted a horse right away so I could do like them.”
Sitting on a hill at the Nomad Games overlooking the course, Mr. Algharaibeh, Mohammad Al-Khanazreh, another member of the Jordanian team and I watched the competition. Nearby, a man dressed like an ancient Mongolian warrior sat with a falcon in his lap.
Below us, athletes from other countries galloped along the 100-meter-long horseback archery course, finishing in under 14 seconds. The heavy drumbeat of hooves was interrupted only by the occasional thwap of an arrow hitting one of three targets.
“People are going back to their histories,” said Mr. Al-Khanazreh, 42, a retired security officer turned full-time equestrian and archery instructor. “A long time ago they would say that the true horseman is the one who has his sword, his lance, his bow and his shield,” he said, citing a common refrain attributed to the eras of Islamic conquest.
But even on the very first day of the men’s competition, we were pulled back to the present and reminded of modern warfare.
Overnight, Iran had fired missiles at an American military base in Jordan, among other regional targets, saying the strikes came in response to a U.S. attack on southern Iran, which hit a wedding and killed five guests. Mr. Algharaibeh had been hearing from friends and family in Jordan unsettled by the alerts on their phones warning of incoming attacks.
Earlier this year, our preparation for the tournament had also been impacted by the regional war, with Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz delaying a shipment of arrows, leaving our supply running low.
Even when properly armed, horseback archers face a challenge mastering the sport.
During practices, my coach, Bassam Al-Mhana, always urges me to focus, as if I could possibly do anything else when I shoot an arrow.
In a matter of seconds, I have to stand up in the saddle atop my running horse, my knees gripping it tight and heels pushed down in the stirrups to remain steady; smoothly draw an arrow from the quiver, and in one motion load it onto my bow ; and pull my right arm back and release the arrow before passing the target. All this while keeping my eyes on the target andensuring my horse’s gait remains fast and consistent.
One morning, as I was joined at a practice by a Jordanian man dressed like a Bedouin and a Lebanese man who was planning to open his own horseback archery school in Beirut, Mr. Al-Mhana urged us on. “Guys, it’s as if you are heading out to battle,” he shouted.
As the three of us trotted our horses to the start of the course, he added with a chuckle, “Don’t forget to share with us the spoils of war.”
But any spoils these days for mounted archers only take the form of the admiration of peers and the occasional tournament prize.
One competitor, Balazs Vermes, 36, dressed like a 10th-century Hungarian warrior, said he was trying to embody the warrior spirit of his ancestors.
Modern warfare has removed much of the human variable from the battlefield, he said. “Back then if you were good, you had the chance to survive,” he said. “Now you could be very good but in one second a drone can kill you.”
Despite the passage of the centuries, war remains unpredictable, as does the competition.
“I look at this as a battlefield,” Mr. Vermes said. “Things change and I need to adjust.”
By the time he took to the course, it was raining heavily with nearly everyone except the competitors huddled under tents. The rain had softened the track, making it even more challenging for those yet to compete, and the horses’ hooves sent clumps of mud flying into the air.
It was a reminder that in sport, as in war, not everyone competes on an even battlefield.
The post Archers Mount Their Steeds in Pursuit of Centuries-Old Warrior Spirit appeared first on New York Times.
