Kite history stretches back over 2,000 years

JAKARTA (JP): Although they were probably independently developed in many areas of the world, kites almost certainly first originated in China more than two thousand years ago. Legends abound to explain their origin, everything from runaway boat sails to a farmer's hat being carried off by the wind and retained by the string around his neck.

In one of the earliest recorded uses of a kite, in 196 BC, Chinese General Han Hsin flew a kite over the palace he was engaged in besieging, enabling him to calculate the distance between his troops and the palace walls. Armed with this knowledge, he had a tunnel dug and entered undetected.

Oriental kites are commonly equipped with devices that produce noise, such as whizzers and hummers, but they can also be fitted with whistles or pan pipes to produce more melodious sounds.

During the foundation of the Han dynasty (200 BC) a general engaged in defending the crumbling reign of Emperor Liu Pang found himself hemmed in by his enemies. At his wit's end for a means of escape, he conceived a last desperate plan. Over the enemy camp, in the dead of night, he flew kites equipped with metal strings stretched over an aperture. Hearing the unearthly sound of the wind through the strings high above, the enemy soldiers took fright, believing it to be a warning of impending danger from the guardian angels, and so they fled.

As it spread throughout Asia, the kite found many practical uses. In Indonesia and the Pacific archipelago, fishing kites made of palm leaves are used to suspend lines and hooks out beyond the breakers, casting no-tell shadows to frighten the fish.

Soaring above the earth into the 'heavens', the kite became deeply bound up in religion and mythology. In Bali, where kites play an important role in Hindu rituals, and offerings are made to the god of kites before flying, they are offered as "prayers on the wind" to bring good fortune.

In some parts of Polynesia, the kite was thought of as a means of contact with the gods and in some cases to represent the extend souls of gods and men.

In Japan, as in China, the kite rose to heights of sophistication and beauty unequaled in the West. Person-carrying kites are recorded countless times, carrying airborne archers, or observers, and sometimes bearing unwilling passengers.

In China, in 1282, Marco Polo gave an account of how, before commencing a voyage, the crew would bind a man, "some fool or drunkard", to a large kite and send it aloft. If it went straight up into the sky it augured a quick and prosperous voyage. But if it failed to rise, no merchant would risk sailing on the vessel.

In a more prosaic Japanese application, the lifting ability of large kites was used to raise large baskets of brick and tiles to workmen building towers.

A kite powerful enough to lift heavy weights must be large, and indeed huge kites have been known in China and Japan since antiquity. The Japanese Wan-wan developed at the turn of the century, reached a width of 24 meters, with a tail of 146 meters and weighed approximately 2.80 tons.

Western kites

Compared to kite development in Asia, western kites remained relatively crude until the 19th century. Early pennon kites developed from the wind-sock banners that had been flown by armies since the time of the Roman Empire. Borne on a pole, the carved dragon heads of the banners sometimes carried torches to spit fire and terrify the enemy, while a cloth tube billowing out behind enhanced the illusion of a flying monster and also helped the arches judge the strength of the wind.

By the 15th century, a flat, rectangular pennant kite, flown by a string, appears to have been well-known in Europe, but through the influence of trade with the East, it was supplemented by the pear-top and rhomboid-shape designs. By the 17th century, kites were commonplace, used for lofting a tail of firecrackers skyward in public spectacles, but otherwise little more than a diversion for children.

A hundred years later, kite flying had become a popular sport, particularly in France, where competition became so heated that opposing teams of fliers rioted in 1736. This event led the authorities to ban kite flying in public places for quite some time.

The shape most commonly associated with kites, the classic trapezoidal Malay, was introduced into the West in the 1890s by an American, William Eddy.

Eddy designed his own version, based on what he had heard or seen of a buoyant Malaysian kite. But a kite of this shape had been flown throughout Malaysia and Java and other parts of Indonesia for centuries.

Modern kites

It was not until the fifties that another quantum leap in kite design took place with the invention of the flexible-kite by Francis Rogallo of NASA. The principles he discovered have been very influential in modern kite design and his flexible wing kite resulted directly in the modern sport of hang gliding.

The next development was the Allison or Scott sled, a semi- rigid canopy kite relying on the wind to give lateral support and hold the canopy open. The bridle is attached to the lateral extremities, holding them down to form keels.

A true innovation is the parafoil invented by Domina Jalbert of Florida. Incorporating balloon, parachute, aerofoil and kite features, the parafoil has tremendous lifting capability. Apart from military uses in moving payloads and as a parachute, the parafoil is popular sporting applications.

The last two decades have seen a great resurgence in interest in kite flying as both hobby and sport, particularly in the area of steerable or stunt-kite flying, an exciting sport that requires skill and fast reactions.

In competition, fliers vie to execute a program of compulsory figures and creative freestyle flying. Most stunt-kite designs are based on Rogallo's flexible surface principle. New variations, offering higher precision, faster speeds and capable of handling a wide variety of wind ranges, come on the market frequently.

Using two or more lines, the stunt flier steers the high maneuverable kite by altering the angle with which the surfaces meet the wind.

Dual-line stunt kites have two steering lines connected to the left and right sides of the kite by a bridle. Four-line, or quad, kites control not only the right and left pitch of the kite, but the angle at which it meets the wind, or the angle of attack. This makes the kite even more responsive to the flier, but requires a higher degree of skill in handling.

(Sources: Kite Crazy, published by SOMA film & video, Toronto, Canada, 1991).