In Korea, newly born

children had kites flown

and released for them,

taking away any bad luck

they had been born with.

The first kite was flown in China about 2.800 years ago. Kites were used to measure distances, test the wind, lift men, signal and communicate in military operations.

The first kites

were flat (not

bowed) and often

rectangular. Some

kites were flown

without tails.

farmers in Thailand at

the time of the monsoon,

to ask the gods to make

the monsoon winds blow

long enough to prevent

all the rain falling on

their crops and flooding

them.

Kites were introduced to Europe by explorers returning from Asia. Marco Polo, an Italian explorer who returned from China in 1295, wrote remarkably accurate accounts of the construction of kites, as well as how they were flown.

New Jam

 

Kites at night

 

Traditional Malay Kites

In eighteenth century Europe the kite showed its usefulness as a scientific instrument.

In 1749 a Scottish meteorologist named Alexander Wilson used kites to lift thermometers to a height of 3000 feet to measure temperature variations at altitude.

Three years later, Benjamin Franklin used a kite to demonstrate that lightning was similar to the static electricity that scientists were experimenting with at the time. By flying a kite in an electrical storm he was able to observe sparks coming from a key he had suspended from the flying line.

 

Flightshow in Umbria

 

There are a lot of kite festivals around the world. The largest, and oldest, kite festival in the world takes place in Ahmedabad, India on the 14th of January of every year. This festival is a free-for-all, with perhaps 100 000 kites in the sky at once, all trying to cut each other down. The festival has been celebrated for centuries, at the time that the winter solstice has passed and the sun has again climbed above the constellation of Capricorn. The festival is called Makar Sankranti, which means "the conclusion of Capricorn". Tales of kite fighting are found in the Sanskrit religious writings of the Veda and in the epic, the Ramayana. The importance of kites in India is suggested by the Hindi language, which has more than 100 different words for kite.