Tent pegging

Tent Pegging

An officer of the Indian Army tent pegging with the lance
Highest governing body	International Tent Pegging Federation
Nicknames	Tent Pegging
First played	4th century BC
Characteristics
Contact	Yes
Team members	Single or Section
Mixed gender	Yes, separate competitions
Type	Individual Lance, Individual Sword, Team Lance, Team Sword, Lemon cutting, Half section(Pairs), Single (Indian) file
Equipment	Lance, Sword
Venue	Tent Pegging Ground
Presence
Country or region	Worldwide

Tent pegging (sometimes spelled tent-pegging or tentpegging) is a cavalry sport of ancient origin, and is one of only ten equestrian disciplines officially recognised by the International Equestrian Federation. Used narrowly, the term refers to a specific mounted game with ground targets. More broadly, it refers to the entire class of mounted cavalry games involving edged weapons on horseback, for which the term "equestrian skill-at-arms" is also used.

Cavaliers have practised the specific game of tent pegging since at least the 4th century BC, and Asian and later European empires spread the game around the world. As a result, the game's date and location of origin are ambiguous.

In all accounts, the competitive sport evolved out of cavalry training exercises designed to develop cavaliers' prowess with the sword and lance from horseback. However, whether tent pegging developed cavaliers' generic skills or prepared them for specific combat situations is unclear.

According to the International Equestrian Federation, "most equestrian authorities are of the opinion that tent-pegging originated in India in the middle ages in the battle fields as a tactics used by the horsed cavalry against elephant mounted troops" A cavalier able to precisely stab the highly sensitive flesh behind an elephant's toenail would cause the enemy elephant to rear, unseat his mahout, and possibly run amok, breaking ranks and trampling infantry. However, other scholarly sources suggest that the sport originated earlier in Central Asia or the Middle East and was later on popularised in India.

The term "tent pegging" is certainly related to the idea that cavaliers mounting a surprise pre-dawn raid on an enemy camp could use the game's skills to sever or uproot tent pegs, thus collapsing the tents on their sleeping occupants and sowing havoc and terror in the camp. However, there are few reliable accounts of a cavalry squadron ever employing such tactics.

Because the specific game of tent pegging is the most popular equestrian skill-at-arms game, the entire class of sports became known as tent pegging during the twilight of cavalry in the twentieth century.