Archery is the sport, practice, or skill of using a bow to shoot arrows. The word comes from the Latin arcus, meaning bow. Historically, archery has been used for hunting and combat. In modern times, it is mainly a competitive sport and recreational activity. A person who practices archery is typically called an archer, bowman, or toxophilite.
The bow and arrow is a ranged weapon system consisting of an elastic launching device (bow) and long-shafted projectiles (arrows). Humans used bows and arrows for hunting and aggression long before recorded history, and the practice was common to many prehistoric cultures. They were important weapons of war from ancient history until the early modern period, where they were rendered increasingly obsolete by the development of the more powerful and accurate firearms. Today, bows and arrows are mostly used for hunting and sports.
Archery at the 2000 Summer Olympics was held at Sydney International Archery Park in Sydney, Australia with ranking rounds on 16 September and regular competition held from 17 to 20 September. One hundred twenty-eight archers from forty-six nations competed in the four gold medal events—individual and team events for men and for women—that were contested at these games.
Alison Jane Williamson MBE is a retired British archer who represented Great Britain at six consecutive Olympic Games from 1992 to 2012. She won a bronze medal in the women's individual event at the 2004 Summer Olympics, becoming the first British woman to win an Olympic archery medal in ninety-six years. Williamson achieved two medals at the World Archery Championships and represented England at the 2010 Commonwealth Games, winning two silver medals.
Bowhunting is the practice of hunting game animals by archery. Many indigenous peoples have employed the technique as their primary hunting method for thousands of years, and it has survived into contemporary use for sport and hunting.
Limba Ram is an Indian archer who represented India in international competitions, including three Olympics. He equalled an archery world record in 1992 at the Asian Archery Championships in Beijing. He was awarded the Padma Shri Award in 2012.
At the 2008 Summer Olympics, the Archery competitions were held between 9 August and 15 August, at the Olympic Green Archery Field, a temporary venue on the Olympic Green, Beijing's Olympic Park.
The archer's paradox is the phenomenon of an arrow traveling in the direction it is pointed at full draw, when it seems that the arrow would have to pass through the starting position it was in before being drawn, where it was pointed to the side of the target.
Brady Ellison is an American archer who competes in recurve archery. He holds the record for the longest continuous period as the world number-one-ranked men's recurve archer, from August 2011 to April 2013. He earned his nickname "The Prospector" during the 2015 world championships due to his proclivity for 'finding gold'.
Modern competitive archery involves shooting arrows at a target for accuracy and precision from a set distance or distances. This is the most popular form of competitive archery worldwide and is called target archery. A form particularly popular in Europe, North America, and South America is field archery, shot at targets generally set at various distances in a wooded setting. There are also several other lesser-known and historical forms, as well as archery novelty games.
The women's individual archery event at the 2012 Olympic Games was held from 27 July to 2 August 2012 at Lord's Cricket Ground in London in the United Kingdom. The event was one of four which comprised the 2012 Olympic archery programme of sports and was the eleventh time the women's individual competition was contested as an Olympic event. Forty different nations qualified for the competition, sending a total of sixty-four archers to compete. The defending Olympic champion from 2008 was Zhang Juanjuan of China, who did not compete following her retirement in 2010.
Ki Bo-bae is a South Korean recurve archer and three-time Olympic gold medalist. She was the winner of the women's team and women's individual events at the 2012 Summer Olympics and of the women's team event again at the 2016 Summer Olympics, where she also took bronze in the individual competition. Her tally of four Olympic medals places her among the most decorated archers in Olympic history.
Maja Buskbjerg Jager is a Danish recurve archer. A two-time competitor at the Olympic Games, Jager was the women's individual champion at the 2013 World Archery Championships, an achievement for which she was awarded the Danish Sports Name of the Year prize for 2013. She is also a multiple medalist at the European Games and the European Archery Championships.
The archery events at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo took place in Yumenoshima Park. Five events were planned with a mixed team event staged for the first time.
The women's individual archery event at the 2016 Summer Olympics was held from 5 to 13 August at the Sambadrome Marquês de Sapucaí in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. One of four archery events as part of the 2016 Olympic catalogue of sports, it was the fourteenth time a women's individual competition was contested as a discipline at the Olympic Games. Forty different nations qualified for the event, sending a total of sixty-four archers to compete. The defending Olympic champion was Ki Bo-bae of South Korea.
Sjef van den Berg is a retired Dutch competitive archer. He has won a total of two medals at the 2015 European Games, and eventually finished fourth in the men's individual archery at the 2016 Summer Olympics. Van der Berg currently trains at HBV Ontspanning in Sint-Oedenrode, under the tutelage of his coach Ron van der Hoff, a former Olympian at the Athens 2004 edition.
Riau Ega Agatha Salsabila is an Indonesian recurve archer. He represented Indonesia at the 2016 and 2020 Summer Olympics.
Karma is a Bhutanese recurve archer from Trashiyangtse in eastern Bhutan and lives at Thimphu also in Bhutan.
Alexandra Longová is a Slovak competitive archer. Longová made her debut on the Slovak national team at the age of ten, and eventually competed in numerous international archery tournaments, spanning the 2015 European Games, the 2016 Summer Olympics, and European Championships. Longová currently trains under the tutelage of head coach Matej Miskovsky for the Slovak squad, while shooting at Blue Arrows archery range in her native Bratislava.
The women's individual recurve competition at the 2019 European Games was held from 21 to 26 June 2019 at the Olympic Sports Complex in Minsk, Belarus. It was the second time the event was held as part of the European Games archery programme. A total of 48 archers from 32 different nations entered the competition, with a maximum of three entries per country. The event offered one qualifying spot for the women's individual event at the 2020 Summer Olympics for any archer reaching the semi-finals from a nation that had not already qualified. The defending champion, Karina Winter of Germany, did not take part following her retirement from the sport.
