Kukgung - Korean Horn Bow(Gak Gung) Shooting Demonstration by Heon Ku Kim

[@karlgunther-turkisharchery4272]

Thank You, master, for this wonderful demonstration! I am a Turkish style thumb archer, but I love the beauty of Traditional Korean Archery too and Korean Bows are great.

[@neelnadu]

Master heon Kim this is an excellent demonstration. I really want one of this horn bow.

[@잉크-h4y]

왼팔을 밀어서 활시위를 장전하는 모습이 진짜 우리나라의 전통적인 방법인거 같네요. 귀한 영상 고맙습니다

[@gizmonomono]

Whenever I see someone pull the bow so far back that the arrow head can't be seen from the bow, I get anxiety 😁 Truly masterful

[@amsyaryik7446]

Their not shoot with eyes,their shoot use heart

[@jareth7456]

It's not so hard brother just cut your arrows correctly for full draw a full zone 3 draw and then to you will feel the bump in the field point as it goes over your index finger on the bow hand and you slow the draw at this point but you still continue the draw a few millimeters and release as you are still expanding as you twist slightly on your thumb lock and make the release clean and clear , the palm turns out the bow is still moving forward and follow through, the grip on the bows grip is very important and very important also is to remain detached never emotionally invested to practice often as if your life depended on it .

[@gizmonomono]

@@jareth7456 I know, it looks worse than it feels. It works great for slow shooting, but I usually shoot fast. So I don't dare cut the arrows that close 😁 And the shooting, yes a bit of khatra goes a long way. Also, I think he was doing some string twist as well there.

[@erikaushamburg8279]

He can hold some focus, thats for sure. Amazing.

[@CarlitosMayo]

Amazing! What ist this black thing on the left hand for?

[@peterhaslund]

The sound is... silence. Well, almost 😎

[@jzajzayijun2282]

California?

[@akybosule]

I wonder If they can do grouping shoots at close distance.

[@irzackihmj5259]

If they can grouping at long distance, why they can't in short distance?

[@akybosule]

Becouse of the fletching of the arrows,allowing them to corect the "error" in time on that long distance. On shorter distance (ex.20m) the arrow doesnt have that much time. I would love to see a master grouping at 20m.

[@notapplicable531]

Several comments about "grouping" arrows. 1. The only grouping you are going to get in this particular archery form is with the missed arrows. These targets are covered with a rubber sheet one centimetre thick. The arrows that hit bounce off. Unless you film the incoming arrows that hit, there won't be any record of where they hit the target. 2. There is nothing official, but some jeongs (clubs) place a quarter size target 145 m from the shooting line. We've had one at a couple of jeongs I've been a member of. I know of two archers who have hit this size target five for five. That's five arrows in an area 1 m by 1.3 m. My best was four for five with the fifth arrow just clearing the top of the target. I've had my golden times with Korean bows, but I don't consider myself top archer. 3. Our jeong has set up one of these quarter targets about 30 m away so school kids can come learn something about Korean archery and try their hand at it. One of our members likes to shoot it as well. He doesn't miss, ever. What kind of pattern he lays down, I can't say.

[@yourworstnightmaretonight]

Those small bows were traditionally used for beginners and women to learn practice the basic form and style of Korean archery. Those bows are small in size and portable to carry around so it perfectly fit for certain uses. In the war, Koreans developed much larger bow called 정량궁, which was much difficult to shoot and required strength and experience.

[@Isegawa2001]

Hey, thanks for the info! Could you please share the romanized name of that bow?

[@elee9056]

中井久夫 Chong-ryang Gung (正兩弓, Strong Bow)

[@akoreanman]

I've heard that Chong-ryang Gung's maximum range was around 1 km. Is it true?

[@gagida1829]

@@akoreanman I highly doubt that even modern compound crossbows cannot shoot that far. Note that this is just an assumption without any info.

[@sjjj3564]

Korean bows were mostly small one, the bow in this video is called Gakgung, is for hunting and war. There were larger bow as you called Jungyang-gung (정량궁) which was for military use in Joseon dynasty. There were various types of bows in Korean history.

[@jpogigtxcr1778]

So there is a slight cant for Korean Traditional archert? That's good to know.

[@notapplicable531]

If your bow is vertical, you're not going to see the target as your hand and the bow's grip and limbs will block it out. In the video, 10 degrees is mentioned. If you have difficulty finding that, consider this little trick. Use the right edge of the lower limb and align it with the upper right corner of the target and the lower left. Mind you Master Kim raises his bow higher over his head than I do. My amount of lift lets me do this quite comfortably. This little suggestions came from a master/mentor who guided my early development as a hornbow archer.

[@jareth7456]

Mostly in the more ceremonial styles do they keep vertical and when practicality is needed...kant

[@SatsuRyu]

Glad I saw this. Now I know how to tie a bow cover belt. And what is that loop called and for that Master Kim puts over the fingers of his bow hand?

[@Dream_Weapon]

I've been trying to replicate it for the last 45 minutes. I just can't figure it out. I have my own way but I want to learn his traditional way.

[@notapplicable531]

Really late to the party, but here's the word on that leather loop. It's called a "bo goong" (보궁) and sounds like it's pronounced "boh geum". As to it being on his hand, his hand is merely a convenient place to keep it while shooting. At about the 30 sec. mark in the video, he places it down the upper limb and the string. This is to help the bow keep its tuning/shape when he is not shooting. Over time hornbows tend to go back to their natural resting state. Sometimes the bo goong is placed over the lower limb and string if that particular bow has a weaker lower limb and would bow more at rest. Bo goong come in pairs so they are put on upper and lower limbs to give even better control of the bow at rest, should the bow demand that. For really long rests, the goong dae (공대) (the bow cover he turned into a sash/quiver) is wrapped around the bow as you see at the beginning of the video. That's what we see at the beginning of the video. As to making one, the simplist is merely a length of stiff leather two millimetres thick, one centimetre wide and about 20 centimetres long. The leather is doubled over with the rough side inwards. The ends line up and holes are punched in the leather about one cm down the leather. A grommet is punched on to hold the two ends together. The resulting inner length of the bo goong is about 8.5 cm. Some archers prefer longer ones. Now if you were referring to the leather "finger sleeve" on his right index finger, that's another thing again. Although I don't use one, I have made a few for other archers. What I did was reverse engineer an old one, basically tracing it onto a piece of paper, cutting out the pattern on the paper, then tracing the paper template onto some leather. Vendors at competitions sell these and have basic sizes that they trim to custom fit the archer's hand. That's more or less what I also do. The one Master Kim has is made of two pieces of leather although one piece is possible, but much harder to custom fit. The wrist strap can be sewn onto or glued onto the main piece with contact cement. The finger portion has to be trimmed to the size of the finger with two overlaps of about a 4/5 mm (1/4 in.). Those overlaps can be shaved a little thinner - the outside of one and the inside of the other. These overlaps are glued together with contact cement. Master Kim's appears to be fastened on the top of his finger. One final comment of the finger sleeve. The leather should be medium stiff, whatever that means, but more importantly, have a really smooth surface or the arrows will eventulally wear it/tear it in short order.

[@SatsuRyu]

@@notapplicable531 Wow thank you for the really detailed answer! Worth the wait haha.

[@shawnwui591]

@@SatsuRyu actually it's called an armgakji or a sootgakji (암각지/숫각지) and it's what the Koreans used to serve the same purpose as a thumb glove. Its essentially a thumb ring used since the draw is extremely heavy as to not damage your fingers and shoot smoother.

[@dimitristripakis7364]

Very nice!

[@zaboobebop]

thats pretty long distance!

[@Volya224]

traditionally korean bows are fired at about 145m away from the target.

[@menahemd]

Amazing.

[@450o054]

whats the fps on these things?

[@assaultspoon4925]

Higher than most traditional bows. Often between 200 and 250 fps using about 7gpp arrows. Korean bows are extremely fast, and use much lighter arrows than most other horsebows, especially manchu bows, which often use 13 gpp and above

[@jareth7456]

I would argue that Turkish bows are way faster and also can use very light arrows but then who would want to use very light arrows in warfare when penetration is what is going to kill an enemy ...especially one clad in armor, enter the tartar bow that casts longer heavier deadlier arrows with great force "

[@joseochoaherrejon]

Que gueva tirar con el arco, a si como este. Mucho rito.

[@dinofabrizzi2116]

@Carson Chan we still dont know if he got the targets !!! The video didnt show if the arrows really got there or didnt !!

[@krisnasutanandika5665]

Excuse Me Master, are there any standard Draw Weight and Limbs Width for the traditional Korean Bow?

[@moistexistence3090]

To me it seems that Korea focused more on bows than swords. As a Korean person I know that a lot of korean swords look like Japanese or Chinese swords which probably make sense being that we used what was best to us. I also know that we focused a lot on bows too. Nowadays we see a lot of Korean people go in Olympics doing now and arrow competition. Just information that I thought was cool.

[@공군군필여고생]

You're right. Koreans more prefer archerry than sword. So traditional Korean sword named hwando is shorter than Japanese katana because short sword is comfortable to shoot arrows. In Joseon almost people know how to use bow even women.

[@patriotcraftsboy1046]

What’s a typical draw weight on that? I’m an archer myself, and I wanna train with one of these.

[@jacobpark2671]

bout 45 pounds i think

[@notapplicable531]

@@jacobpark2671 Bows around the 45 lb. level are the lower limit. The bow I'm currently using is my winter bow. Three months ago, it was 43.9 lbs. drawing 30.5 ins. Today, it's 49 lbs. That has to do with temperature and that's why I say it's my winter bow. It's had a large amount of horn shaved off it to get it to that level. Most bows are from 50 + to mid 60's. I'd say from the ease and how comfortable Master Kim unstrung his bow, it's problably in about the mid 50's. Another indicator is the angle that he raises his bow at full draw in order to aim and hit the target. High poundage bows shoot flatter and will have a smaller angle with the horizontal.

[@yesno9065]

"Gakgung" is made of water cows horns. The elasticity is very good. In Goguryeo murals, there are murals of hunting and war using this "Gakgung". Traditional manufacturing techniques are also passed down. t1.daumcdn.net/cfile/tistory/23277B4355B303F228

[@pratamaarchery2318]

👍👍👍

[@krisnasutanandika5665]

and how long the maximum range of arrow shoot?

[@임진영-m3o]

max 350m .

[@_trismegistus]

What is the point of the forward facing hold over the head if you are just going to proceed to point the bow to the sky before drawing?

[@stevemarce1988]

❤️🙏🏽🏹🎯💥🔥

[@rokbow2523]

:))

[@henryklaus9261]

did any of the arrows hit the target?

[@2848sk0321]

Dive Guy .ofcous almost

[@irzackihmj5259]

The target is 2meter size. Its like shooting a4 size paper at 15m distance

[@akoreanman]

Sure, it was actually used in the war for killing enemy soldiers located 200~300 meters away.

[@GregVasquez777]

They hit that target in the painted squares, quite often. I've been there b4.

[@yesno9065]

@@akoreanman It usually flies 450-500m. However, there are also records of flying 1200m.

[@sunny123451000]

Targets are not shown. Who knows where the arrows went.

[@임진영-m3o]

우선 자세만 나오는데요 유툽에는 다양한 인종과 여러 나라 사람들이 시청하는 관계상 기초 자세와 과녁과 거리 등 좀 더 자세하게 안내해 주셨으면 어떨까요. 물론 각 명칭부터 역사적 전통성 등도 설명해 주시면 꽤나 도움이될 거 같습니다.

[@1czechit1]

Its frustrating that those bows do not draw to 35"

[@alchemxstxavier5225]

Whos here because of BDO datamine for NOVA?

[@robertcox9795]

wonder: not using rapid fire. so this was being used like English war bow. being wonder which flies the furthest

[@Isl33p]

effective range of English longbow was 140 to 300 metres, Korean warbows were 140 to 350 meters.

[@rakhipandey898]

it is not real archery