It put its head over the parapet for the first time in 1908, reappeared briefly in 1920 and only became a settled member of the Olympic community when it was re-adopted in 1972.

In both its early appearances it was one of the least competitive events at the Games, with only three nations participating each time.

In Antwerp in 1920 the Belgians won four gold medals for shooting at bird-shaped targets on 100ft poles.

As only Belgians entered this curious event, it explains why they were so successful.

The only Britons ever to win archery titles also capitalised on absent opposition.

In 1908 in London, Willie Dod defeated a field almost entirely composed of other British archers, and Queenie Newell won the women's event without a foreigner in sight.

Dod's sister, Lottie, won the silver medal behind Newell, making it the first brother-and-sister medal double in Olympic history. 

Britain's archers have done well in recent years with Simon Terry and the British team winning bronzes in 1992 and Alison Williamson taking third place in Athens.

Technical

Since 1992, archery has been a knock-out competition. Initially, the 64 archers shoot a ranking round of 72 arrows, which seeds them for the individual and team events.

In the first knock-out round, the best archer faces the worst, the second-best faces the second worst, and so on.

The target stands at 70m and the object is to hit the yellow bullseye, which is about the size of a CD, for which you get 10 points.

This difficult task is made easier by the significant use of technology in the Olympic bow.

The recurve bow is so called because the top and the bottom of 'the limbs' curl back away from the archer, which helps to increase the bowstring tension.

The bows have sights and stabilisers and are usually made of carbon fibre or fibre-glass.

The bowstring is synthetic and strung to a maximum of about 50lb pressure.

When an arrow leaves the bow, its initial velocity can be as high as 240ft per second, or about 160 mph.

The Major Players

The Koreans have been dominant in women's archery, winning six of the last seven individual titles and every team title since its introduction in 1988. Since the sport was reintroduced into the Olympics in 1972, they have won more than half the gold medals contested.

Bluffer's Guide

Riser - the middle part of the bow that you hold.

Nock (or nocking) point - the place on the bowstring where the arrow goes.

Belly - the part of the bow which faces the archer.

Useless Information

The Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan is the only nation on earth to have archery as its national sport. Unfortunately for the Bhutanese, they use bamboo bows which are useless for Olympic competition.