| Ted, I think the sources you posted are written as fables from folklore.
"And if we are to believe their wonderful tales, it took a strong-handed man to use an ancient bow. That of Hidesato, a tenth-century hero, required the strength of five men to pull it. He, however, sank an arrow five feet in length up to the feather into the iron forehead of an enormous centipede, a fabulous creature that carried in each claw a flaming torch. When the arrow pierced its brain, the lights went out and the monster fell to the earth with the noise of thunder. Another renowned warrior shot one night at what he thought was a tiger; on visiting the spot the next morning he found his arrow embedded several inches in the solid rock."
"Their books abound in stories of marvelous feats with the bow and of miraculous escapes. The arrow turned aside, or breaking in the air, or cut in twain with the sharp sword while in flight, or caught in the hand and returned with deadly aim by an expert bowman. The famous Go-go-ro, of Kamakura, in the siege of Tori-no-uni, is said to have received an arrow in his left eye; without stopping to take it out, he shot a shaft in reply that killed the enemy who had wounded him."
__________________  “War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feelings which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.” —John Stuart Mill |