The Immersion Review - Stick Arts #3

VOL 1

Stick Arts ISSUE 3

Maintaining & Reimagining Arts

For the martial arts comprehensivist

Top - Maxime Chouinard Bottom - Keegan Taylor

VOLUME 1

Stick Arts ISSUE 3

Maintaining & Reimagining Arts

218 Steaphen Fick

20

The European Quarterstaff

Maxime Chouinard & Nathan Featherstone

Bataireacht

196

240

Nicole Holzmann

Roger Norling

La Canne de Combat

Joachim Meyer, the 16th-Century Fencing Master

174 Alejandro Rodriguez Buenafuente

Juego de Palo Canario

Rondel Benjamin

92 Keegan Taylor

116

50

A Journey through the Monastery of Kalinda

Mahipal Lunia Speaks with Keegan Taylor

Warriodhood: A Deep Discussion

Kalinda

60 Mahipal Lunia Speaks with Rondel Benjamin

Life and Strife: An Ongoing Conversation

CONTENTS

Maintaining & Reimagining Arts

Vol. 1:3 - Stick Arts

138 Scott Park Phillips

Reclaiming the Magic of the Chinese Staff

150 Damon Honeycutt

Monkey Kung Fu Staff

164 David Giomi

Shaolin Staff in the 21st Century

296 Adam H. C. Myrie

Stick Fighting in North Africa

270 George E. Georgas

The Greek Stick/ Staff Fighting

318 Ethan Minor

The Bando Staff

MAINTAINING REIMAGINING AND TRANSLATING MARTIAL ARTS TURKU IS THE OLDEST CITY in Finland. This means that it also has the country’s oldest cathedral.

Like many such large buildings, it was not completed in one generation, but was modified and made grander as the centuries went on.

It is a constant reminder of past times, though, as is the city’s medieval castle that was host to royal intrigues of both Swedish and Polish kingdoms. The ruins of a bishop’s castle in the neighboring town tell of how such contests were not always peaceful.

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Like a medieval cathedral or castle, systems of martial arts need maintenance in order for them to be passed down through the centuries. This is particularly so, as technologies of fighting have long since made close-quarter combat less significant for victory in battle. Even the mighty walls of a castle can become obsolete when cannons can fire into its yard from a hill across a river, something unimaginable at the time of its construction. Yet, like a cathedral, some martial art systems are about

Editorial by Juha A. Vuori, Ph. D

more than the building or the technology they used to wield. Ways of fighting can contain philosophical, cosmological, and other forms of belief, and serve other functions beyond prowess in violent engagements. Indeed, forms of combat, even when performed ritualistically, in sport, or in theatrical forms, can work to join a community together.

The simile of a cathedral can offer some insights into the longevity and passage through time of mar-

tial art systems, but it also has its limits. Indeed, people who train such systems are not as stationary as grand buildings. For example, the migration of people has meant transportation and translation of martial arts to new social, cultural, and political surroundings, too. A society where weapons like knives are ubiquitous affords different forms of individual civilian conflict from one where weapons are illegal. Concomitantly, not all arts are displayed in public for all to see or participate in. As such, forms

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of martial art have developed to serve certain needs, and these, too, can change with the times and as things around them evolve. Even the religion and its interpretation practiced in the Turku cathedral has not remained the same as the society and its mores around it have transformed. This has also affected who is allowed to use force on whom, and in which kinds of situations.

While Europe is currently experiencing war that has caused a refugee and energy crisis and may yet result in famine elsewhere, the long trend has been the reduction of violence in societies around the world. While social, economic, and political disparities are perennial, most states limit the right and means of inflicting bodily harm on citizens. Far gone are the days when some members of society could be beaten, tortured, or even killed with impunity merely based on their social position, creed, or gender. When this happens today, it can gain worldwide attention. Even capital punishment is rare among the countries of today.

Such a state of expanding negative peace in most societies has implications for martial arts, too; if the immediate use of a combative skill, especially in armed form, is less and less likely in the everyday, why

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should the art be maintained? Similarly, how can one find enough people that share an interest in carrying the knowledge forward when its practical use is becoming increasingly remote?

The articles in this issue of the Immersion Review show how martial arts have been maintained and continually reimagined over the centuries to suit the needs of the holders of their legacy and those who choose to learn from them. Such passage through time and context raise questions about what is essential about an art, and about what gets lost when the art is transplanted to a new setting.

Is it possible, or is it even wise to seek to popularize a once semi-restricted dangerous type of knowledge? Is it better perhaps, at times, to keep it, or versions of it, going through pre-modern face-to-face interaction, away from the gaze of the public? Some of the articles approach such questions by suggesting that it is better to maintain older forms of transmission, while others emphasize adaptation to contemporary mores and ways of conduct. This dilemma is not always a question of either/or, as while something is always lost in translation, it still retains something of the original.

[Photo credit: Mika Hanski, 2021]

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Forms of stick fighting that may have been quite popular and widely practiced have later become frowned upon in many societies.

As the need for sticks in everyday life and the mores of societies have evolved, the practice of stick fighting has become rare, or disappeared altogether. Maxime Chouinard and Nathan Featherstone open this issue of the Immersion Review by presenting us with such a history in the case of bataireacht, or Irish stick fighting. While this martial art was at one time widely practiced to the extent of characterizing Irishness itself, it eventually became more obscure and has been removed from popular imaginaries. The art has been maintained in the margins, though, and is being adopted for use in mixed styles of stick fighting like the Dog Brothers Gatherings. The article goes through the living lineages of the art and how it is practiced, and lays out its future.

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Kalinda is an example of how stick fighting can be more than just about physical engagements. Rondel Benjamin introduces this way of fighting that encapsulates hybrid forms of African and Indian life that inform Trinidadian culture. Here, fighting with sticks is part of a larger system that incorporates spiritual, educational, cultural, and healing aspects. These also feature in the ongoing discussion on kalinda between Benjamin Rondel and Mahipal Lunia, some of which is provided for us here. For kalinda, maintaining ways of fighting is a way to recover old ways of being, heal the community, and rejoice in the building of a better future today. Indeed, Keegan Taylor tells us about his personal journey through the monastery of kalinda.

The recounting and discussion of the deep meanings involved in a free-play with gilpins on a beach in Barbados between Taylor and Mahipal Lunia rounds off the special feature on this tradition in this issue of the Immersion Review.

Mentioning staff-fighting to an average person on the street in many parts of the world would probably evoke images of Shaolin monks.

Indeed, China has a long recorded history that is replete with martial strife, and contains many philosophical and cosmological traditions. Accordingly, it is also its own microcosm of martial art systems and styles, as well as traditions of opera and theater that still display martial art elements.

Scott Park Phillips makes a connection between popular comic theatrical performances of monks and Chinese literary classics. Together, they have informed the tradition of the staff work of Shaolin monks, but they were present in seasonal festivals that predate the famous temple. The play with staves served a ritualistic practical purpose in educating dragons to keep the weather harmonious in order to provide for good harvests. The sexual connotations of an enlarging and hardening staff have often been edited out of the play and performance, but Phillips makes an argument for reclaiming the magic of this tradition.

Damon Honeycutt presents us with a different take on the Journey to the West by discussing some of the staff work within monkey style kung fu, or the “cudgel of the great sage.” Here, the myth of the king is interweaved and informs the practical application of the various forms the staff can take. In this sense, the staff is about more than just a practical implement— it maintains cultural traditions.

To round off the issue’s section on Chinese staff arts, David Giomi gives us a look into the pragmatic generation of chi energy in using the Shaolin staff in the 21st century. The staff works here as an implement for learning how to cultivate and concentrate the kinetic energy of the body.

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Traditions of martial art that have been maintained for centuries do not always agree on what is the correct form or interpretation of certain techniques or other aspects of the art. Such disagreements can also include the terminology used in the art, or even its name. Alejandro Rodriguez Buenafuente gives us a sense of this aspect of martial art maintenance through his documentary analysis of the juego de palo canario, a form of stick fighting practiced on the Canary Islands. People have varying motives for why they train martial arts, and such varying personal viewpoints can evolve into a tradition stranding off into directions that aim to maintain folk traditions while others prefer to treat the art as pure sport.

Indeed, many martial arts have been developed for warfare or self-defense to later take on formal modes of sport. This is also the historical trajectory of la canne de combat that we are introduced to by Nicole Holzmann. La canne has its origins in sword fighting that was still part of how the more well-off warded off unwanted encounters on the streets of Paris up until the French revolution, which

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eventually banned sword carry from civilians. During the belle époque, the sword was replaced by an urban walking cane that took on the role of the sword in such encounters. With development in men’s fashion, canes became less common. At the same time, many masters of the art of la canne were lost to the World Wars. The tradition has been carried on to today in the form of a formal sport that Holzmann showcases for us.

While some arts have been maintained, and made grander with the passage of time, forms of life around such constructions tend to transform at a quicker pace. Indeed, many forms of fighting have been lost to time. Still, some discontinued arts have left historical traces of their practice either in the form of archeological finds, cargo lists of ships, court records, or even manuscripts and treatises that concern the techniques of fighting. Beyond the maintenance of living martial traditions, such traces have allowed new generations to explore some aspects of these old forms of martial art.

Indeed, people are fascinated with past forms of life. The cathedral and castle of Turku form the backdrop for Turku’s annual medieval market where historians and archeologists from the University work together with blacksmiths, jewelers, other craftspeople, food vendors, and amateur actors to enliven and reenact the medieval history of the city. A part of the old town is cordoned off with wooden fences, and visitors can experience medieval sights and sounds. Luckily, the smells are limited to pigs roasting on a spit, and such savory smells as the sewage system are not reverted to quite so olden times.

[Photo credit: Mika Hanski, 2021]

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View of Turku Cathedral from Vartiovuori Hill. [Photo credit: Otto Jula (Creative Commons License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en)]

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As interest in medieval ways of combat has increased in the 2000s, the market these days also hosts a medieval tourney with horse-men jousting with lances and armored individuals engaging in buhurts.

In other parts of Finland, there are also Viking markets, where groups of people engage in scripted Vikings-versus-city-guard engagements with appropriate gear.

Indeed, interest in recreating old weapons, armor, ships, siege machines, and even entire medieval castles using technologies available at the time has concomitantly led to an interest in reenacting ways of using these new-old artifacts.

As the professional historians involved in this type of enlivening and embodiment of cultural history tell us, reconstructing a lived past is not possible. Written history is inevitably a narrative reimagining of past events and ways of being. The same holds for archaeology. The traces of the past cannot render a full account of what actually happened, and particularly what they meant at the time. Indeed, even the international organization involved in the embodied reenactment of mainly European history before 1600 is jestfully named the Society for Creative Anachronism.

Hoplologists interested in past forms of combat that may have since been abandoned face the same issues and hurdles in their research. HEMA has become an established form of martial art, yet even its practitioners realize that embodying weapon techniques from manuals is a reimagining of movements and uses of techniques.

While the medieval tourney-enactments in Turku are informed by HEMA practice, there is no such basis for the Viking fighting arts.

While there are numerous Viking artifacts that include swords, there is essentially only one tapestry that visually describes the way they fought. Not all cultures have produced drawn or written records of their ways of fighting.

Discussion on this aspect of contemporary martial art practice in this issue begins with Steaphen Fick’s historical review of European uses of the quarterstaff. The article gives a summary of European manuscripts on long weapons through several centuries and is a great introductory resource for anyone who wants to conduct their own explorations into these historical records and the forms of fighting in them.

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Roger Norling follows this general review with a more focused introduction of how Joachim Meyer presented the use of polearms in his weapon manuals from the 16th century. When reimagining such ways of fighting, it is prudent to take into account the weapon technologies of the time, the context of combat, as well as the laws and customs that concerned armed combat. These provide for vital insights for the practical testing out of the techniques and mechanics described in the treatises themselves.

George E. Georgas leads us into Greek uses of staves in fighting.

Ways of fighting are not only depicted in manuscripts, but myths, legends, and stories also indicate how weapons have been used in earlier times. The article once again points to the importance of historical and political context in discussing how various periods of occupation and changes in ways of war impacted the use of staves for fighting. Still, staves and skill in fencing could come in handy even in the 20th century, when knives were used as the implements of political assassinations and attempts at them, as Georgas recounts one such attempt that took place in Japan.

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Adam H. C. Myrie’s article explores the use of sticks in ancient Egypt and the Maghreb region through the history, basic techniques, and the current place of stick fighting there. This represents North African efforts to preserve the history of fighting arts based on research of oral and other non-written forms of passing on traditions.

This work has then been formalized within associations as ways of training, and published in newly written manuscripts. Once again, the training and traditions have taken on different forms that can emphasize sport activities or more cultural forms.

Ethan Minor presents the past and current ways of applying the bando staff as it has been used in Myanmar. Staves have not only been ways of self-defense or combat in conflict, but they have also had more civilian uses in maintaining health, procuring food, moving in environments, and providing shelter. Like with so many other forms of combat, the same implements can be used to both hurt and heal when it comes to the staff. Accordingly, there is a close connection between the staff and its user, beginning from the manufacturing and choosing of the staff to its practical application.

Reimagining forms of martial art properly requires the same kind of sensitivity as transcultural ethnography, anthropology, or study of history. Indeed, a hoplologist needs to be wary of the possibility of succumbing to “cultural colonialism” in their investigation.

Explorers should not assume or impose universal ideologies or values, even when things can be tested out competitively “in the cage.”

Whether one is studying hoplology within maintained systems of martial art or exploring historical forms with discontinuities, there is a need to do so within a shared space of understanding among cultures that requires a perpetual task of translation and reworking of one’s particular position.

When this is done properly, a hoplologist may transcend one’s own culture in the evaluation of one’s own and others’ cultures through their ways of fighting. This is so

despite the fact that different cultures have different standards for the admissibility of ideas, whether those concern cosmology, religion, philosophy, or other standards of knowledge.

Academics have the luxury of distance and set standards for their practices of research. The practitioners and keepers of an art, though, inescapably face the dilemma of translation through time and culture. How does one maintain arts that were developed and used in wild frontiers when a specific type of expressive honor-bound masculinity was tied to celebrating extremely risky behaviors, such as gambling, excessive drinking, and public acts of violence? The establishment of a modern centralized government has often meant the end of this type of general masculine behavior and the retreating of such activities to the corners of so-

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ciety. Practices of class and other social stations, as well as systems of honor in mainstream or more marginal parts of society, have also had a bearing on forms of martial art. Some forms of art have lost living connections to their roots entirely, yet have been resurrected by later generations, which may allow for more diverse groups of practitioners to partake in the art.

Those who pick up the mantle after a long disjuncture see such lost arts as still providing benefits to a practitioner in a contemporary world.

Yet, what is lost in these types of moves? Do deadly arts that have survived or that have been resurrected inevitably merely become a folkloric dance bereft of all risk and danger? What would this mean for the future of martial arts? As full-contact combat sport—whether armed or not— has shown, though, these types of activities are not without even the risk of death. Indeed, it is problematic to demonize the sportification of an art. Sportifying an art is not all about loss; it can still maintain

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the memory of past forms of being and allow for risky behaviors and contests among people so inclined.

At the same time, sportification, like festivalization, can serve political purposes when connected to nationalistic ideologies and ideas of martial bodies. Indeed, society, culture, and politics all matter for practicing martial arts, and for understanding them academically.

Accordingly, many arts have been kept within families, tribes, or other restricted groups while maintaining different moralities from those found in mainstream society.

Such arts have been quite effective in particular times and places. The issue remains what happens when such traditional forms of transmission are continued, when they are reinvented, or sportified. What is retained, and what is lost in their translation?

Answers here depend on the reasons for why someone trains, teaches, or maintains an art by other means. Is the purpose practical application, intellectual or spiritual enlightenment, sport or other forms of competition, cul-

tural discovery or appreciation, self-expression, or simply physical exercise? All are valid reasons and result in various views on what is the essential part of an art to maintain or transform. Similarly, is the context for the use of an art military, constabulary, or civilian?

Is the art used to serve, or has it been appropriated by the state, or is it used to work against forms of oppression, whether sanctioned or not by the state? Is the practitioner committed to work within the law, bend the rules or mores of mainstream society, or even break the law? As the articles in this issue have also shown, a martial art can be deployed to suppress communities, but it may also be a means of resistance against such structures.

Indeed, a martial art can be about more than its combative aspects. It can be about recognition, healing, community, and spirituality, about maintaining, reimagining, and translating ways of being.

Juha A. Vuori, Ph.D @ juha.vuori.54

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STAFF / TEAM CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Mahipal Lunia Explorer-in-Residence, The Immersion Foundation Executive Editor, The Immersion Review @theimmersionfoundation

@immersion.foundation

http://www.therenaissancepath.com http://www.theimmersion.foundation

Juha A. Vuori, Ph.D Professor of International Politics, Faculty of Management and Business Tampere University, Finland https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1487-2961

Mika Harju-Seppänen mika.harjuseppanen@gmail.com

PEER REVIEWERS 2 Anonymous Reviewers

PRODUCTION Hana Shin Editor & Producer

The Immersion Review, founded by The Immersion Foundation, is a conduit for penetrating insights in combat and combative behavior. It is a space for the dedicated martial artist, who dares to seek ideas from diverse fighting systems.

The Immersion Review is a peer-reviewed journal for the martial arts comprehensivist.

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BATAIREACHT A ONCE-FAMOUS IRISH MARTIAL ART COMING BACK TO LIFE Maxime Chouinard & Nathan Featherstone

IF YOU GO TO IRELAND today, it is unlikely that most of the people you will meet will be aware that a martial art was once extremely popular in their homeland. Mention that it was called bataireacht, and you will undoubtedly raise eyebrows. Explain that this was the art of using the shillelagh, and you will get many varied reactions.

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· Maxime Chouinard & Nathan Featherstone | 21

Until the late 19th century, you would have been hard-pressed to find a parish in Ireland where no one practiced bataireacht, to the point where it became somewhat of a preconceived notion in other European nations. If you were Irish, you were surely quite an expert at stick fighting. This idea is now extinct, but bataireacht itself is not, though it is incredibly rare, especially in its country of origin.

In this article, we will examine the history of the practice and explore the living lineages that are still taught today—how it relates to the modern martial arts scene, how it is perceived in Ireland, and finally how this is all shaping its present and future.

Where It All Started As with most martial arts dealing with sticks, it is extremely difficult to pinpoint the origin of bataireacht. The job is made even harder due to the fact that, before the 18th century, Irish history was almost exclusively shared through oral tales, and descriptions of daily life were put under writing, more often than not, by foreign visitors or invaders. The written descriptions we have of Irish fighting methods before the Williamite War could probably stand on a sin-

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gle sheet. Nevertheless, there are clues that can be found in those descriptions.

We hear of clubs in the Irish Heroic Tales, such as in The Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel, where warriors are said to carry “great clubs of thorn with bands of iron.”1 We also hear of an insurrection in a Dublin friary in 1381, where monks used clubs called crannibh.2 It should not be surprising to find weapons like these in Medieval Ireland, as the cudgel (a ball-headed club) was common all over Europe at the time, as can be seen in countless representations, including in Ireland.

Although they were probably not a new phenomenon, we read with increasing frequency about faction fights and the sticks used in

1 Charles W. Elliot, ed., Vol. 49, Epic and Saga: Beowulf, The Song of Roland, The Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel, The Story of the Volsungs, and Niblungs, The Harvard Classics (New York: Collier & son, 1910).

2 Mervyn Archdall, Monasticon Hibernicum: Or, A History of the Abbeys, Priories, and Other Religious Houses in Ireland; Interspersed with Memoirs of Their Several Founders and Benefactors, and of Their Abbots and Other Superiors, to the Time of Their Final Suppression (Ireland: W. B. Kelly, 1876), 69.

Daniel Macdonald’s “The Fighter” (1844).

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them, by the very start of the 18th century. In 1710, William Moffett, an Irish instructor, writes one of the first clear descriptions of the weapon in a poem: “And at these fairs he ne’er was seen Without a cudgel and a skeen; A cudgel of hard thorn or oak, With which he many craniums broke.”3 The origins of faction fighting are shrouded in mystery. It could have appeared as part of traditions around pattern days, or could have simply been a continuation of raiding wars fought among the Irish clans before the 17th century, which incidentally shared many organizational commonalities with faction fights. The term covered many different types of group fighting, held during festive occasions such as fairs, weddings, funerals, or sometimes to settle feuds between factions such as 3 William Moffett, Hesperi-Neso-graphia: Or, a Description of the Western Isle. in Eight Canto’s (Printed and sold by J. Baker, 1716).

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the Liberty Boys, Shanavests, Caravats, Four Year Olds, Three Year Olds, and many others. The fighting could be done for pleasure, or deadly intent, though in all cases deaths could occur. Certain authors, like William Carleton, drew a line between party fights, done for political and/or religious motives, and faction fights done for more abstract reasons.

Although stick fighters, or bataires, were mostly men, women were also represented in these occasions, sometimes as stick fighters themselves, which was apparently more common within the Traveller community, but also using makeshift flails made from handkerchiefs filled with stones.4 It would be easy to think of such encounters as groups of violent thugs swinging sticks haphazardly—and this is very much how they 4 Mícheál Ó hAodha and T. A. Acton, Counter-Hegemony and the Postcolonial ‘Other’ (Cambridge Scholars Press, 2006), 65.

are perceived today by most Irish people—but the reality was quite different. Bataires not only attracted attention because of their fights, but also because of the skills they exhibited in a martial art that was referred to as boiscin (fencing) or bataireacht (cudgeling). Allanson-Winn, an Irish peer and famous figure in the boxing and fencing scenes of Victorian Britain, had this to say of the stick fighters he observed in County Kerry: “Sometimes a great deal of skill is displayed, and I often wonder whether a really expert swordsman would be much more than a match for some quick, strong, Kerry boys I could pick out.”5

Coat-dragging was a ritualized way of declaring a fight. A bataire would drag a coat on the ground, daring anyone to step on it, expressing the desire to fight. Coat-dragging is still an expression in Ireland today, denoting someone who is looking for trouble. Erskine Nicoll's “A Call to Fight” (ca.

1860).

Winn’s opinion was reflected in similar stories—sometimes even reported by their opponents— where bataires bested trained 5 Rowland G. Allanson-Winn and Clive Phillips-Wooley, Broad-Sword and Single-Stick with Chapters on Quarter-Staff, Bayonet, Cudgel, Shillalah, Walking-Stick, Umbrella and Other Weapons of Self-Defence (London: G. Bell & Sons, 1911).

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A group training bataireacht outside a tavern. Charles Mackenzie (ca. 1805), National Library of Ireland.

swordsmen. Bataireacht was taught in families, and, as with many vernacular martial arts, we read of children learning by imitating the adults. While adults fought, children sparred with sticks nearby.

Many schools were also said to exist around the country: “Professional teachers of the art seem to have been numerous.

Down, apparently, to the first quarter of the last century, there was at Cahir, Co. Tipperary, a school for the teaching of stick-fencing, and the instance seems not to have been an isolated one. A choice selection of fencing-sticks used to be placed

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on a stand in the street opposite to this establishment. A grown male person handling one of these sticks through curiosity would be asked by a pupil of the school: ‘Are you able to use that stick?’ and the answer being in the affirmative, battle was at once joined. Thus did the school advertise itself.”6 We do know what bataireacht looked like, thanks not only to quite a few historical sources, but also to a few remaining lineages.

The image we have of the art is 6 P. Lyons, “Stick-Fencing,” Béaloideas (1943): 269-272.

remarkably consistent—A mainly one-handed art which uses sticks held around the third or middle section. The lower part, called the buta, is used to protect the arm, and serves as a kind of guard, not only to block but also to cover.

When blocking, the buta can be used to strike simultaneously the opponent’s strike being returned at him through a fulcrum effect.

The stick is typically gripped with the thumb up along the shaft, a detail that again comes back in nearly every historical description. This may appear strange to proponents of martial arts where the common wisdom is to hold the weapon in a hammer or handshake grip, for fear of being disarmed, but it is actually quite the opposite in bataireacht, where a hammer grip is judged to be more unstable due to the lack of control.

San Francisco Sunday Call, August 20, 1905, page 4.

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The story is told of a young man about to set out for the fair of Ardagh, when his old father, telling him to guard himself, twisted the young man’s stick out of his hand with a quick twirl of his own.

“There you are now boy! Didn’t I tell you not to close your thumb over your fingers? Up along the stick you should put your thumb to give you power over it.”7 Some people today saw these skills being practiced. The historian Marianna O’Gallagher (19292010) from Quebec City once told me that her father Dermot (18911977), a former mayor of SainteFoy, knew how to fight with a shillelagh, a skill he had learned from his father Jeremiah who emigrated in 1860 from Macroom in County Cork. Unfortunately, he never showed much of it to his children, but she did learn a few things which were identical to what is

taught today.8 Unfortunately, the O’Gallagher style disappeared, but the little which was shared helped to confirm our knowledge of the practice.

By the mid-19th century, a major social upheaval came to hit faction fighting and, by association, bataireacht. While the British colonial authorities mostly turned a blind eye to faction fighting, by the Victorian era, they started to suppress it with a renewed fervor, due in no small part to the complaints of industrialists who saw faction fighting as a threat to the economy, encouraging absenteeism and discouraging investments.9 The downfall of faction fighting was not entirely caused by British repression, though, as other factors played in. Following the Great Famine, Ireland saw a renewed movement for indepen8 Marianna O’Gallagher, “Marianna O’Gallagher,” January 1, 2008, http://irelandmonumentvancouver. com/side-3-the-100-names/the-100names/marianna-ogallagher/.

7 Kevin Danaher, “Who’ll Say Boo to a Mulvihill?” Irish Digest 1st ed., Vol. 71 (1962): 48.

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9 “Irish Faction-Fight,” The Journal of Civilization; Its Necessities, Progress and Blessings (1842): 61.

The widow of the mysterious Donald Walker published a posthumous book in 1840, where, among things such as wrestling, boxing, and fencing, her deceased husband included the shillalah. Walker’s entry is short, but gives us some rare visual details of the techniques. His comment on bataireacht being “not a very scientific amusement” illustrates some of the contempt that the elites had of the art. Donald Walker, Defensive Exercises (1840).

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dence. The Home Rule movement, which aimed to increase the political power of Irish citizens, saw its demands rejected time and time again by the British government.

Among the reasons invoked to reject such democratic changes were faction fights. Newspapers caricatured the Irish as a violent people, or sometimes even an inferior “race,” unable to control their impulses and, as such, unable to govern themselves.

In reaction to this, the Irish elites pushed for alternatives to faction fighting. The Gaelic Athletic Association was in part created to counter the rise of British sports in Ireland, but also as a means to offer an alternative to faction fights—one that had clear written rules, and, as such, was much eas-

Jafsie teaching bataireacht in the Bronx, 1928 [Source: Fox Movietone].

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ier to control.10 It does not seem that the idea of making a sport of bataireacht was ever truly considered, and so the art slowly disappeared from the public eye.

Nevertheless, bataireacht was not completely extinguished. In 1905, an anonymous author in the San Francisco call gave us one of the most detailed descriptions of bataireacht techniques, complete with photographs. In 1928, bataireacht even made it on the screen, as Dr. Condon, a.k.a. Jafsie, is filmed giving a lesson in New York City. Faction fights with blackthorn sticks were still reported as late as the 1930s, and in the 1960s and 1970s, shillelaghs were wielded by residents of Northern Ireland wishing to protect their neighborhoods, as evidenced in television news reports.

Living Lineages As I hinted earlier in this article, bataireacht is not simply a thing of the past. Though the art is now extremely rare, we now know of at least two distinct lineages, with perhaps more to be uncovered.

10 David Storey, “Heritage, Culture and Identity: The Case of the Gaelic Games,” in Sport, History and Heritage: Studies in Public Representation, ed. Jeffrey Hill (New York: Boydell & Brewer Group, 2014).

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Antrim Bata: King of the North Antrim bata came onto the public stage in the early 2000s, thanks to an online discussion group on Irish stick fighting, created by the late Ken Pfrenger. Around 2005, a member of the Ramsey family from County Antrim came upon this group, hoping to find other people in Ireland who, like him, knew and practiced bataireacht.

I visited Ireland in 2007, and having heard of bataireacht, I was curious to know if I could find somewhere to try it. I joined the discussion groups, and was told by Louie Pastore to contact Mr. Ramsey,11 who agreed to teach us. We met in Cork, where he was visiting family, and he showed us what he had learned from his family. The number of techniques was rather impressive, with more than 40 techniques ranging from strikes with various parts of the stick, parries, punches, kicks, and grappling. Our aim was not to become instructors, but by the end, we were unceremoniously given permission to teach. After three years of practicing together, we decided to open up the practice to others.

11 As he has asked his complete name be left out of the public realm, we only refer to him as “Mr. Ramsey.”

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Antrim bata was named as such in honor of the county where it was practiced. The Ramsey family moved to Ireland in the 18th century at the latest, and married with local Irish families. As this martial art is vernacular, it is almost impossible to draw a clear history, as records were not kept. The family lore does say that certain ancestors were active in faction fights, with one nicknamed “Ticketyboo,” who was said to be quite an expert. The family also competed in the combat sport most commonly associated with Ireland today—boxing.

Antrim bata is probably the most representative of bataireacht as practiced by most Irish bataires. It relies most often on a one-handed grip, leaving the off-hand free to strike or grab—a much needed option in a busy faction fight—or to control an opponent’s stick, but it is also free to block strikes if needed as well as throw rocks or other smaller objects to the opponent, as was de rigueur in most of these fights.

The grip is very fluid in Antrim bata. The hand placed at the third allows for a very strong protection and quick strikes, but gripping the stick by the top with the off-hand allows one to rapidly extend their

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reach. The off-hand can also come unto the stick to strike in what would usually be a punching or grappling range, or alternatively, both hands can move to the lower end in order to create space when outnumbered, a grip that would look very familiar for practitioners of jogo do pau or Italian bastone.

Antrim bata also preserved many rituals, some appearing to be direct holdouts from faction-fighting days. Catholicism of course played an important part. For example, before a fight, a fighter is told to engrave crosses on the soles of their shoes, and to pray to their chosen patron saint.12 Once the fight starts, fighters begin to “stomp” and “wheel.” Those peculiar habits are recorded in many descriptions of faction fights, and could even be linked to medieval Irish warfare. The fighters start to rhythmically stomp the ground with their feet, all the while shouting war cries, poems, insults, or all of those at the same time. This is done as a warm-up routine, but also as a means to intimidate and 12 In the modern day, we do not demand that students pray. They are instead encouraged to take a moment to silently focus in the way they see best, be it actual praying or meditation.

distract the opponent. To that latter end, fighters are encouraged to talk while fighting, in order to keep creating distraction, but also to relax themselves.

Various other traditions also exist around bataireacht, many of them centered around the trees used to create sticks. Hawthorn, for example, while being quite close to blackthorn, is generally shunned as a source of terrible curses. Blackthorn itself is associated with war and is said to be inhabited by malevolent spirits that will seek vengeance if a stick is cut down during certain nights.

The high guard in Antrim bata (2007).

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Antrim Bata practice.

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The Doyles: The Dance of the Whiskey Stick The Irish diaspora has held on to and preserved many Irish customs even as they have come into decline in Ireland. This is especially true of the Canadian communities in Newfoundland, an area that was heavily populated with Irish immigrants. This is where the Doyle family style came to be and where it survived. Also known as Rince an Bhata Uisce Beatha in Irish or the “Dance of the Whiskey Stick” in English, it is often referred to as RBUB in short.

The current head of the family style is Glen Doyle, whose living family style was brought over from Ireland by his ancestors and taught to successive generations of the Doyles living in Irish Newfoundland, Canada. He was in turn taught by his father Greg Doyle, a decorated war veteran who served in the Canadian forces during the Korean war.

Glen Doyle started training in the art of boxing in 1969 under the tutelage of his father, Greg Doyle.

In 1972, Greg introduced Glen to a family legacy, an old and almost

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forgotten tradition: the art of Irish Stick Fighting. Keeping in line with the authenticity, the style was passed on clandestinely. Martial arts worldwide, especially family styles, were often kept secret, a trend that still occurs in many aspects of Irish society even to this day.

Glen’s realization of the effectiveness and functionality of his family’s style of stick fighting pushed him to ask his father for permission to teach outside the family to anyone who wanted to learn. For years, Glen’s father denied him permission to teach anyone outside the family, until sadly fate stepped in and changed the face of Irish stick fighting forever. In March of 1998, Greg Doyle was diagnosed with terminal cancer, and the final talk between father and son covered every aspect of their lives together and resulted in Glen getting his father’s full support to share their family style with the rest of the world. From this point on, Glen would go on to teach his family style to a number of instructors who would travel from across the globe to learn under him and see the style flourish once again.

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Nathan: I first became aware of RBUB and Irish stick fighting in general when I was in high school sometime in the mid-2000s through the online discussion group. I was doing historical re-enactments at the time, and began to become aware of HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts). This led me to question if Ireland had any martial traditions of its own and, after long research, I came across references to bataireacht, which eventually led me to the Yahoo forum on the topic. This forum was a rich source of information, with Glen and many other teachers and researchers being involved.

The one chief characteristic of RBUB that—to most outsiders— looks unique is the grip. The stick is held in a third grip similar to other styles, yet the stick is held in both hands horizontally to the floor with both palms facing down. The stance very much resembles that of a boxer with the feet apart and weight dropped low.

While there are many things with-

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in RBUB that are reflected in other styles, its main unique feature is the overall meta of the style—that is, to engage the enemy in order to break distance, and to remove their ability to use their range, while still being able to attack.

This is done by a series of blocks and counterattacks, and once this is accomplished, the horizontal grip comes into its own, allowing the use of both ends of the stick in an almost quarterstaff-like fashion—yet more reminiscent of boxing—as well as the ability to push your opponent away through using the middle section of the stick.13

13 Maxime: It is important to note that, while RBUB has its own way of delivering these techniques, most of them are not unknown to other styles.

From the perspective of Antrim bata, RBUB appears to have focused almost entirely on a set of techniques we would call “infighting,” which are techniques used to fight from a punching or grappling range.

Nathan Featherstone, instructor of RBUB and AB captain at the Rambling Kern School, Dublin.

Maxime Chouinard, Head Instructor of Antrim bata.

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Back into the Fight: Bataireacht in the Wider Martial Arts World As bataireacht started to grow once more, it began to attract the attention of other martial arts. Both of the authors actively sought to create links with different groups, as well as experience how bataireacht itself would fare against more established styles.

Maxime’s Experience Maxime: For myself, I was already active within HEMA, and so this was a fairly natural fit. I found quite a lot of interest, though the nature of Antrim bata, being a more classical lineage-based art, proved to be a bit of a black sheep in the historical martial arts scene, especially since the movement itself is primarily focused on swordsmanship—stick fighting being a fairly niche corner.

As a newcomer—a strange concept for a martial art that is older than many more popular ones practiced today—Antrim bata was quickly put under the considerable pres-

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sure of the very competitive martial art scene. Although the style proved that it could very well hold its own against any other stick fighting style, it needed to truly prove itself in order to be taken seriously. Meeting Sébastien Poirier, a.k.a. Pirate Dog, in a seminar I was giving in Montreal, I was invited to attend the Montreal Dog Brothers Gathering in 2016. Those Gatherings are, in most of North America and Europe, considered to be the most extreme stick fighting events. I joined and fought at the event, which proved to be a major milestone for myself and Antrim bata. It was a great learning opportunity, and also proved that Antrim bata was able and willing to step up to the challenge of the modern martial art scene.

Antrim Bata brings along some truly unique riddles to most sparring partners that are unaccustomed to its quirks. From an outside perspective, the strike may look rather light, and the grip fairly limiting in reach. The opponent usually

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finds rather quickly that not only the grip allows for powerful and rapid strikes, but also allows to dynamically change the reach of the weapon, which almost universally proves to be the most challenging aspect for martial artists used to more fixed measures.

A sparring session with the local Dog Brothers, 2020.

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Antrim bata also brings to the table European fencing concepts, which are rarely well understood outside of HEMA and of course Olympic fencing circles. Questions of timing and distance are profoundly integrated, and in my opinion, represent a major advantage for Antrim bata over many other styles.

Nathan's Experience Nathan: Prior to learning RBUB, I was actively practicing and competing in a variety of combat sports such as BJJ and MMA. This helped to shape my outlook on Irish stick fighting and martial arts in general, especially in regards to the need to face resisting opponents. Since there are not many weapon-based martial arts practiced in Ireland in general, this forced me to look outside of Ireland, which brought me to the Dog Brothers.

My first exposure to the Dog Brothers was at a sparring day in Aberdeen. While this was only one day, it helped me to understand changes I needed to make in my own training as well as some new approaches I needed to undertake with my students. Later that year, I would travel to Switzerland and take part in my first Gathering of the pack. This is an event open to all, which allows people from all styles to come and participate. Now, as the Dog Brothers

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will readily admit, there are certain differences between a “real” fight and those fights that happen at a gathering. The obvious ones are that the sticks used in the latter case are often rattan, and that there is safety equipment. Now, while the safety equipment is minimal—usually gloves and a fencing mask—it still allows you to take certain hits without serious injury, which, for obvious reasons, is key. Also, while some of the rattan sticks I spar with weigh the same as my shillelagh, they are two very different materials in the way they affect an opponent. For safety reasons, I would never spar with blackthorn, as it would be far too likely to seriously injure, unless they were heavily armored, which creates its own set of artifacts.

My first fight was an eye-opening moment for me, as I was determined to only use RBUB on my opponent. However, straight from the start, the issue for me became apparent. My opponent could tell I had two options: attack his hands

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with stick punches or jabs, as they would refer to them, or close in on him. Having hit his hands with little effect due to the gloves, rattan, and lack of wind up in the stick punches, I then attempted to close in. However, he was aware of this and backed away quicker than I could run, angling off and using his left hand to keep me at a distance. The rest of the round went much the same, with me trying to close, and him fending me off and landing shots as I tried to close. In my subsequent fights, my attempts to engage led my opponents to grapple me instead, which led me to be badly hip-tossed by my opponent at one point.

Needless to say, this led me to reassess my own flaws and what I needed to do in order to make RBUB work in this context. Let me say: this is not a critique on RBUB, but rather something that is true of many traditional arts. There are certain considerations that were not relevant at the time, or in some cases, that simply did not survive to be passed down.

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Over the coming years, I spent a lot of time training with my students, and I was eventually able to figure out some ways to get RBUB to perform well in this context. Mainly, it meant finding ways to make the art a better fit in this setting.

As RBUB revolves around closing in on an enemy who is in a group or without room to retreat, waiting to rush in and using footwork to get my opponent into a corner or next to a wall often served me much better.

One thing I can confirm about RBUB is that it gives you a large toolbox of techniques to use from close range, and when these techniques are drilled with grappling in mind, it allows you to overwhelm opponents who are used to fighting at a longer range. To me, it is truly an infighting style, and serves itself best at this close range.

Nathan throwing a stick punch—a titular technique of RBUB.

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An Old Art Colliding with Modern Perceptions Although bataireacht is still alive and well with a well-documented past full of interesting stories, and there are hundreds if not thousands that can be found in period newspapers, travelogs, fighting manuals, and oral stories, many today still perceive bataireacht as

an unskilled practice—that it was simply men picking up sticks and hitting each other haphazardly.

This perception is due to many things, which we shall examine in more detail, but it is not an easy one to change, as it is truly and deeply ingrained in an active rejection of the culture of faction fighting itself.

An example of the sort of political propaganda that shaped the stereotype of the Irish as violent club-swinging sub-humans. Thomas Nast, “The Day We Celebrate,” Harper’s Weekly Magazine, April 6, 1867 [Source: The New York Historical Society].

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Nathan: After coaching Irish stick fighting in Ireland—for what I believe is now longer than anyone else has on the island—it has given me a deep understanding of not just the style, but also of how it is perceived by the Irish people as a whole. This is something I think many people outside of Ireland do not quite understand. Over the years, attitudes have begun to change and people are now far more receptive to learning about Irish stick fighting compared to a decade ago, but there are still many negative ideas linked to the art that are both deeply cultural and historical, and I will do my best to illustrate this based on my own experience.

One of the first and most common issues I have encountered is that most people simply do not know that a thing such as Irish stick fighting exists, which is usually closely followed by a disbelief that something like bataireacht existed, or that it was a martial art.

When exposed to the history of the

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art, many become more open to the idea. However, for some, even when exposed to the facts, the idea of bataireacht is still impossible to accept.

As often, they will admit faction fights did happen, that folk martial arts existed in every other country in Europe, that they did practice with sticks, but that it was not a martial art. Sometimes, this is often linked to a modern conception of what a martial art is.

By this, I mean a practice that has ranks, titles, manuals, and a clearly laid-out syllabus. However, most indigenous arts lack this, as they were often practiced by the working class, who were often illiterate.

Few martial arts in Europe, and even in Asia, would fit such a definition of martial art until recent times.

Another deeply rooted belief is that bataires were simply just beating each other up with clubs, and that there was little to no skill involved.

This is something deeply rooted within Irish culture and, I believe,

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somewhat of a colonial hangover.

The faction fighters were depicted in this fashion, as were many Irish people of this era, and, as a result, this can often be seen by how the era of faction fighting is portrayed in Irish media and historical interpretations.

Finally, one of the areas of contention is the fact that RBUB and Irish stick fighting in general are more popular and more widely practiced outside of Ireland. This, I find, often creates a sense of distrust amongst Irish people, who then consider that these arts are likely fabricated. However, like many aspects of Irish culture, the Irish diaspora has successfully preserved many aspects of Ireland’s cultural heritage, and so, it is not strange that this form of self-defense would be preserved, too.

Looking forward to the future of Irish stick fighting, my hope is that the work being done by myself and many others to preserve and promote these arts will see them survive and flourish for generations

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to come, as I feel it is an important part of Irish cultural heritage. I feel that, with the correct approach and continued efforts, Irish stick fighting will continue to grow over the coming years.

Maxime: My own experience has been very similar to that of Nathan, the main difference being that I teach outside of Ireland. I find that, interestingly, the popularity of bataireacht is inversely proportional to the presence of negative Irish stereotypes in the local popular imagination. Bataireacht is very popular in places such as France or Russia, for example, while it is somewhat popular in North America, and it still has a difficult growth in Ireland. In Canada or the United States, the image of the fighting Irish does not carry the same weight, and is often looked at with light amusement or fearful reverence, depending on the way it is portrayed—this to the chagrin of the Irish people, who have been trying for more than a century to dispel this stereotype.

A certain understandable fear also exists of Irish culture being appropriated by ignorant “Plastic Paddies.” As Nathan noted, this feeling is truly underestimated in North America and is important to address, if bataireacht is to have any future in Ireland. This initial belief that I was actively—either intentionally or not—spreading ste-

reotypes and invented traditions, resulted in many Irish nationals being openly hostile to what I was doing. Presenting a different take on the history of bataireacht, one that goes away from the Victorian propaganda and cartoons, has been rather successful at proving that this is a serious martial art worthy of being preserved.

Antrim bata workshop, 2021.

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Antrim bata seminar in France.

I often compare the history of bataireacht to that of Japanese martial arts. Both came into very similar situations in the late 19th century. Indeed, the Japanese, who had just thrown out their warrior overlords, openly rejected their martial arts in favor of western practices, to the point where many

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schools closed down, and Japanese bujutsu almost tipped into oblivion. It was through the work of a few dedicated individuals that the image of Japanese martial arts—that of overly violent brutes and bullies, more concerned with fighting each other than moving forward—was completely changed

to what it is today: a noble practice of personnel growth seeped in a spiritual aura—miles away from how many saw it in feudal Japan.

Unfortunately, bataireacht had no Kano, Baez, or Kenkichi. Some important Irish figures of folklore studies, like Patrick Lyons or Kevin Danaher, tried to elevate perceptions of the practice, but with little impact, unfortunately. On that note, I will finish with this quote of Danaher, which is still worthy of consideration today: “The great Fighters are gone, this hundred years, and their dust is lying in Kilfergus and Templeathea, Rathcahill and Rathnaseer. They were men of their time; and though it all seems very foolish to us now, they admired strength and skill and courage. We could do worse than they, and we certainly have no cause to be ashamed of them.”14

Maxime Chouinard @ chouinard1

14 Kevin Danaher, “Who’ll Say Boo to a Mulvihill?” Irish Digest 1st ed., Vol. 75 Issue 1 (1962).

Nathan Featherstone @ nathan.featherstone.3

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KALINDA AN INTRODUCTION TO THE TRINIDADIAN STICKFIGHTING ART Rondel Benjamin

THE ART OF KALINDA IS AN ancient art form traditionally played in Trinidad and Tobago during the carnival period from January to February. It is uniquely indigenous to the island but interestingly blended with various elements of visiting fighting arts from other diasporas and cultures, such as gatka from the Sikh Indian traditions and some Venezuelan garrote.

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Stickfighting is heavily influenced

by African warrior origins brought here by the enslaved peoples coming from the Mother-Continent.

According to the writer Maureen Warner Lewis, the art form in and of itself called “kalinda” began as a ritualized mating dance, performed by the men in the village to the resonating sound of the drums surrounding the encircled space known as the gayelle. The men would challenge each other to the sound of the drum, dancing and performing movements to its rhythms, creating ritual, channeling ancestral power, and competing for the right to choose a woman from the enamored crowd.

When the dance became heated, encouraged by the rapture of the drum, these danced battles would erupt into a desire for greater aggression. In turn, the barely contained energy generated would cause the men to be launched into another space where the ritualistic combat would be played out to its bloody end.

In modern times, kalinda burst forth from the chains of slavery just like the African people themselves, intertwining itself into the very culture and the people of Trinidad and Tobago. Kalinda and other expressions of a people kidnapped and stolen from their

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homes took root anew in various aspects of the everyday life experience of society. Rural communities such as Moruga, Talparo, Mayaro, and Gran Couva are notable examples of this transplantation.

Kalinda is a way of life that embodies the key aspects of African life and traditions encapsulated in this treasure chest, as it were, to be opened by those who interact with it in many ways. The practices and rituals surrounding the game in itself are an experience difficult to imagine because there is almost no experience like it unless one interacts with it in some way.

Fighting Styles Examined Trinidadian stickfighting is primarily a combat style that pits two batoniers, or stick fighters, against each other. Competitors are ultimately trying to best the other, ideally drawing first blood from the head. The competitor seeks to deliver skillful shots to the scalp or forehead via a precise strike delivered from a dual-handed attack system. Competitors fight with a stick that is approximately four and a half feet in length and the width of the average quarter or coin. The stick style is unique because fighters hold the stick with both hands and can strike with either hand while also utilizing the

stick to defend against blows. The footwork can be quite athletic and varying in styles, similar to that of a boxer. Other times, it entails more rooted stances with a subtle type of encroaching footwork to close gaps between the opponents to attack and mount defenses. All of these variations take shape in a dance-like manner to the drum’s beat and rhythm, much like its martial cousin, capoeira.

Fights occur in a space called the gayelle—a ritual space at the four-corner junction of the village.

The site is symbolic of a crossroad interaction for returning ancestors to re-enter this world. Ancestral worship and recognition are critical components of the art, and the gayelle is one of the elements that facilitate this integral part of the equation.

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Whereas combatants in typical fighting styles face each other in what seems to be organized and timed encounters, with fighters chosen by either an informal or formal referee, kalinda is much different. The energy generated by the beating drum, the excitement of the spectators, the vibe, the energy, and the sheer willpower of the fighters as they enter the ring seeking to manifest their glory or destiny, combine in a volatile way.

At times the place feels like it will spontaneously explode in a massive fireball. Fighters may huddle together in the gayelle—multiple opponents at a time dancing to the beat of the drum until fighters recognize that a particular pair is more inclined to do battle with each other than another. They would then dissipate out of the ring and allow the battle to begin.

In sanctioned competitive bouts, the ringmasters choose fighters, referees, and judges who regulate the fights and select winners, based on knockouts, blood drawn, or the referee’s decision.

Music and Kalinda Kalinda, or “the way of the drum,” is a unique combat art because it revolves around the music. The musicality of the art form requires great study because of its depth.

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Usually, the music is analyzed separately from the fighting art itself.

There are particular songs sung around the gayelle called lavways, which can be referred to as the battle hymns of the fighters, echoing the sentiments of the African Caribbean warrior as he prepares for battle and faces his own mortality in the form of an able-bodied terror standing before him. The chantelle sings the songs, whose sensitivity to the vibration around the ring allows him to determine what to sing as he leads the drum section, called bateria. The chantelle also takes the crowd’s pulse, who follow along in a call-and-response system he leads. Three drums comprise the bateria: the buller (bass drum), the fuller (rhythm drum), and the cutter (solo drum).

The buller drum plays a very distinct rhythm similar to the gallop of a horse running, while the cutter plays a precise rhythm done in syncopated beats from the buller drum. The fuller drum blends the other two drums, providing a balancing effect to the sound. These three drums primarily make up the section; however, other drums are free to join in and add to the energy as long as the cutter drum is not bothered, smothered, or intersected—all other drummers are welcomed. Traditionally, rum

kegs used to carry and store rum were stripped and used to build a drum. Unfortunately, the practice has since died out, and the djembe drum can be used as a fuller or cutter drum. Still, the best for playing the buller rhythm has a wide bass and bottom. Men often use chac chac (maracas) to accompany the rhythms, offering a mid-frequency sound to the overall rhythm emanating from the drum and bark and call from the chantelle and crowd combined.

An equally important point to note in the powerful role of the lavways themselves is that the songs depict various combat scenarios of the warrior himself. Song lyrics revolve around fatalistic topics ranging from telling family members not to allow anyone to wear their clothing when they die, to the recognition and acceptance of jail time for their intended activities.

These songs also include ideas that potentially enhance the warrior spirit, promoting within the individual warrior-emboldened ideas about themselves with songs referring to fighters as lions and tigers and even wild, ravenous dogs of war. The songs can even allow the fighter to achieve a flow state, especially with the accompaniment of the drums and chorus sung by the crowd.

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African tradition and rituals profoundly inform stickfighting in Trinidad and, not surprisingly, line up with the spiritual expressions of all other African cultures. Various ritualistic preparations are part of the system to get a fighter ready for his season of combat. There are a series of protocols for preparing one’s body, mind, and spirit for the experience of kalinda well before the time of competition and the fights. These rituals involve ritual bush baths with special herbs helpful in cutting off negative energy accumulated around the combatant. They also provide powers of protection as these baths combine with specific prayers and activities intended to assist the stickfighter in getting ready for war and avoiding death and injury.

Ritualistic preparations also surround the creation of a fighter’s stick. First, it is important to note that a fighter’s stick is as significant as a soldier’s rifle—and even more so, as stickfight folklore states that the right stick can even brake or defend against a gunshot.

Acquiring your stick from the forest involves going into the forest and receiving permission from the chosen poui tree to acquire its body to make your stick. The person must cut the branch at a specific time called the dark moon.

This time ensures that wood has the least water saturation and is strong in crafting. Upon its final crafting by either the fighter himself or a skilled stickfight craftsman, it can go through a series of rituals and obeah (magic) that can make the stick quite deadly. The stick can often inflict bizarre injuries and even cause death by simply touching or striking an opponent. And it is for this reason that fighters cloak, guard, and prepare themselves with these baths and even say specific prayers before entering a ring to protect themselves against the effects of obeah and other supposed forces that are real threats to a stickfighter.

Ultimately, the art of stickfighting is played by the warrior-spirited man of Trinidad and Tobago in defense of his community and his duty as being stalwart to an ancient calling embedded within him. Many warrior cultures have settled here and called this land home. And as a result, men of all races enter the ring now to embrace their warrior spirit and work out their salvation through the church of kalinda. The lure of fame and glory and the spoils of war, such as social acceptance and “fair maiden’s hand”—so to speak—await the celebrated victor of a stickfight challenge. Motivat-

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ed by this force of crowd-shared love, support, and gratitude, men of all skill levels and walks of society enter the gayelle unconcerned about the dangers. Alcohol, a necessary fuel to the fire within the space, also emboldens men to go forth into a “nest of demons,” as it were, and often fall to the blows of a superior warrior. Nevertheless, most times, it is done in the spirit of the game, which ultimately is a test of a man’s mettle and paying homage to the ancestors through ritualized violence, which has a deeper meaning for the community.

Deeper Meaning While many may reduce stickfighting to a glorified bloodsport or a battle between drunken old men in front of a rum shop, others agree that this game is far more than naysayers may simplify it to be. Aside from the incredible skill required to practice the art, it is an opportunity for a man to engage his best self. In many instances, the seeking of perfection and calm in the face of adversity, as well as the dance and fight component, lend to a Zen-like quality which instills in a person the need to be effortless in the face of seemingly insurmountable adversity—to essentially be beautiful in the face of all that

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is evil, terrible, and overwhelming; to confront your demons head-on and conquer them not only in actions but in spirit, temperament, and deed.

Kalinda calls forth the entire community to stand and witness their champion, bare it all for the sake of the others, and to show exemplary manhood and warriorhood to upcoming youth, planting the seeds of nobility, honor, and respect within them. To defend oneself and community, that is the bois1 man code.

Kalinda ultimately teaches about paying homage and honor to one’s ancestors, as the game is powered by a sense of remembrance of the past and those that came before them, and it is a form of reacquiring identity not only for the fighter but for the community at large.

1

Pronounced "bwa"

Rondel Benjamin @ rondel.benjamin

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The conversation below is part of a larger project of The Immersion Foundtion, for putting two long-term practitioners of martial art traditions in dialogue with each other in order to: 1) push them to explain aspects of their art in greater depth; 2) to push each other to bring out other equally interesting aspects of their art they both find interesting; 3) and finally to find a common ground where these arts or their concepts come together.

Benji: I would like to lay out the structure of what we are doing in the Bois Academy. I think this will allow us to see some of the key concepts and core areas of study that we use.

The Bois Academy is a collection of practitioners of the three central kalinda arts. As practiced in Trinidad and Tobago, kalinda comprises stick fighting, also known as the bois, the gilpin or machete or

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LIFE & STRIFE AN ONGOING CONVERSATION Mahipal Lunia Speaks with Rondel Benjamin

cutlass, and a flexible weapon art that covers everything from the six-foot bullwhip to what we call a bull-pizzle, or a short flexible cable. Additionally, there is a series of improvised combat arts, including the icepick, white-handled razor, and bottle. We also have the improvised use of the belt, which is part of the old Trinidadian Police Force, CLS tactics, and the sap.

These are arts that the Caribbean diaspora had never articulated as a complete system. Because of our pedagogies and the way we pass information on, sometimes people fail to see the interconnectedness and the structure, whereby they cannot articulate and identify what we are doing as a system. I will give you a classic example. Descriptions of African diasporic arts use the term “games” versus “arts.”

Our pedagogical model uses play and layered gaming to create information or knowledge transfer.

Because it is gaming, it is nonlinear and not defined by belt ranks.

They are not just unconnected individual games but designed with the specific purpose of creating a skill that ensures personal survival.

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I use a real story to elucidate this concept from when I was four years old. I used to go to my grandfather’s uncle. He was a sailor. We called him Achoy, or Great Uncle, a strange name for somebody of Afro-Trinidadian descent. His name and one of the names of our family were Korean, which is Wilson. But when we did the DNA testing, the results came back showing we had Vietnamese and Chinese ancestry.

These family members would have passed through Suriname into Trinidad.

He learned the kalinda suite. What he would have me do when my parents brought me to visit him, he would keep me on the porch with him because I was the boy. He had me butt his hand, and then every time I butted his hand, he would change the place of his hand, and then he would make corrections.

If I butted with the wrong place of my head, he would rap me with his knuckles, and it would hurt. If I butted the right way, he would laugh and reward me. Years later, I found out that he was teaching me the art of the big knuckle, which is the five points of the head that we use. Because you never actual-

[All photos in this article were taken from The Immersion Foundation’s first hoplological expedition to the Southern Caribbean. To access The Secret Fighting Arts of the America, a unique docu-instructional series based on the expedition, please visit: https://immersionfoundation.podia.com/ilf-caribbean-expedition]

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ly butt with the front part of the forehead, there are too many capillaries. Once you butt with this part of your body, it slashes open, and blood runs into your eyes. They would butt with the two top corners, the top of the head and the back corners.

Every time I saw my granduncle, I would play the game with him.

When I went to school and got into fights, I started butting guys. I realized that I was learning to fight.

As I got older, we would play tripping games. He was an old guy on a chair. He tripped me every time I came there, and I fell down and hit my shin. I did not know that he was teaching me knocking, a very

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classic African diasporic game that runs all the way from Louisiana to Brazil. Knocking is an art that occurs from the knee down with the feet or shins to disrupt balance or cause pain.

I remember when I was eleven years old, I lived for a while in the States. Then, when I came back to Trinidad, I had an American accent, and the little children would pick on me, which made me really frustrated. My mom sat me down and said: “Listen, this has to stop. So, this is how we’re going to stop it. Every time you see them, you are going to kick them in the shins and run. You are going to kick them

in these two spots. They are going to either fall or scream out in pain. Because you are faster than them, you’re going to run, and when they get tired, you’re going to find them, and kick them again and run. Eventually, at some point, they are going to get really scared of you because you’re not going to stop, day after day, every time you see them, just kick them, and run.

By the second week, the principal’s going to call me in. That is okay.

When the principal calls me in, I’m going to say, Rondel, you shouldn’t do this. This is wrong. Do not hit other people’s children. The next day when you see them, kick them, and run again. You are going to create a mental mindset, and every time they see you, they are going to give you the space and leave the room. They will want no part of you.”

That was my introduction to guerrilla warfare, Caribbean style.

When you look at the idea of terrorism, I knew it as a child. It was because I had to fight a gang of six boys who were bigger than me, but I knew if I caught them on their own, and I hurt them bad enough and disappeared, eventually I would break their will because they were not willing to take it as far as I would. That was a game, too.

In these family games, I learned two things: using my head as a weapon and using my legs as a weapon.

Then there is the classic Caribbean, what we call a “cowl path(?)”1— which is slapping. Those are the three directions: back, forehand, and behind the head. There was also a game we played as kids we called “clout for clout.” To summarize everything, I have said up to now: we had open-hand striking, the use of the head, and the use of feet. Now that I am old, I recognize that these are games that most children who grew up with me knew.

At different periods in a boy’s life, they would learn these things. It could be our older brother, uncle, or your mother who introduced these ideas or games and then left you to explore them on your own.

You would then come back and say, “Well, I tried this, and it didn’t work,” and they would make a correction. Our pedagogical model blends skill development with experience but is not classifiable in the traditional martial arts way.

That runs right through the gamut of all our combat arts in the Caribbean. The Bois Academy became a place where we started collecting all these different combat forms.

1 Not clearly heard on the recording for transcription [editor].

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Non-Linear Learning Our main objective in the Bois Academy was four-fold: to immerse ourselves in becoming living experts of the culture; to videotape it, archive it, obtain written reference of these forms; to track down lineages, locations, or accounts presented in media, newspapers, or disseminated through popular media, documentaries, videos, cartoons, comic books, or songs; then we seek to disperse it because we believe that with African diaspora arts, there is a tendency for the arts to come under cultural attack in the regions they are from. One

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of the best ways to protect these forms is to take them out of this region and seed them in other locations. That is the goal of the Bois Academy.

We then had long conversations with our compadres—our allies— in the capoeira angola community, specifically a guy called Cobra Mansa. He came to Trinidad to spend time with us to visit some of our elders and our teachers.

He said we were missing one key: “You have to understand that in diasporic arts we must elevate the

physical, financial, and spiritual environment of our elders and masters.” That is one of the problems with the diaspora. The masters generally were able to pass the information on because they all lived outside of the system.

They were what we call in French Patois, “those who live on the periphery of society.” These are generally men and women of lower class or who live in rural communities, who were not indoctrinated by Western education, and who could pass on traditions in their most original form, outside of the control of Western influences. Be-

cause of that, they generally lived in a great deal of poverty and were not recognized. That became the fifth step in the Bois Academy.

We then researched and filmed a series of documentaries, competed in international competitions, and really started developing a deep understanding of the form. Then some of the old masters heard of us and came to where we were competing. During the initial phase of this research, we did not have any instruction. We had just watched and applied what we saw. From this time, they began to initiate us,

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because when they looked at what we were doing, they said, “Right, you’re following the old way. You all have the right energy. And we now have confidence that we can open up and teach you.” That is when we came on to the formal instruction in kalinda and gilpin.

Because of this, we soon started having a lot of success in the national competitions, and then we came to the attention of the whipmaster. He decided, “Yes, you all are somebody who I can now pass on my family lineage of whip arts.”

Once we entered this phase, the Bois Academy became a site that acted as a type of collective of the combat arts of the region. The old masters started showing us things like white-handled razor, icepick arts, and so on.

Through this journey, the philosophical opinion of kalinda became clear, and the core concept of creating a safe space to allow persons to experience the mechanisms of liminal transport, and then, doing what we call “pointing,” or helping people return back from the liminal transport system and improve. We believe this philosophical underpinning links to an ancient Fulani concept of be-

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coming a stalwart. Combat practitioners like Dammyé from Martinique, Kalinda from Trinidad, and KoKobale from Puerto Rico were all described by the phrase, “and he became a stalwart.” It is to become somebody of great integrity and character, somebody who can be depended upon by the village and community to seek interest, somebody who was capable at all times of bearing the yoke of oppression and countering it with skill. Not necessarily skill in physical violence, but the ability to navigate peace intelligently, especially under risk and pressure. And this brought a whole new layer to what we were doing. All I wanted to do was to hit people with sticks

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at first. But now, there was this unfolding, this access to a series of technologies and a set of information lying under the surface of what we do, not often articulated but very available. We saw multiple spaces in our cultural forms, where this ethos is expressed at a world-class level of excellence. The mechanism of achieving excellence is through culture because it is so subtle in its expression and easily missed. It made us transform the structure of the Bois Academy into what it has become now.

There is a series of eight intersecting circles. One of these is the combat arts. Two is what we call the wisdom school, where what we

set up is a safe space where the elders are willing to share the information and the mechanics of the culture to initiated members of the community.

The combat art school and wisdom school spawned a fascinating thing that I think would be very exciting for anybody who understands archetypes. The standard archetypes for warriors and combatants fall within the classic Jungian models of the Lover, the Magician, the Warrior, and the King. We do not

have that model. We have an integrated model of the True Hero, the Dancer, the Lover, and the King. However, it is not the king in terms of a royal king but a king of meritocracy. In the Kongo-Bantu culture, it is the leader of the mbongi, or the sacred space in each village where the village collects and gathers all this information and knowledge overseen by the king of the mbongi. It is not a royal bloodline king, but the king elevates everybody to this sacred

safe space by drawing everybody in the community. Because of his prowess, he keeps the space open because he is not somebody anybody could bully or challenge. This model of the Caribbean man— the joyful, beach-going guy with the shirt open who can sing well, dance well, and is super physically competent, is the same model that Georges Hébert drew on when he designed his Natural Gymnastics.

Many people do not know that Natural Gymnastics became the origin of the modern military training method in France. This integrated series of overlapping games came from a man who observed Caribbean people during the 1902 volcanic eruption in Martinique. He saw how capable they were when pregnant women were fleeing the eruption and swam out to a distance of two miles into the sea and tread the water for hours with their children. Western thinkers recognize the archetype in the Caribbean of a certain kind of capability. But the mechanics of how they get to the capability is not quite clear, but Hébert was one of the guys who recognized this. They do a set of different things I call “Geo-Practice.”

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Georges Hébert was a French naval officer from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He also designed what we call obstacle courses and is regarded as the inventor of parkour by some. He also developed this whole health system called the “diagnostic method.”

This archetype naturally lends to anybody involved in any form of performance-based environment: being able to access the transcendent self under stress. Performing artists, playwrights, actors find themselves pulled into the skill in the method.

Mahipal: Basically, a method of accessing flow.

B: Correct. But flow is one step; flow is what we call a “crossing.”

After you cross, there is the river, and after you immerse yourself in the river, there is the other side.

The other side is where we try to get to.

M: Yes, I meant flow as getting into that greater harmony, so that a download happens, and that it is the download that manages this world, rather than you trying to impose on it.

B: Exactly. That is one of the challenges of the kalinda method. It requires access in an altered state before teaching. We do not actually teach people in a normal state and then hope to find flow.

We teach them to access altered states and then teach them in an altered state. They return with the download. Because you are not really teaching them, they are teaching themselves. In our pedagogical model, you have to find your dance; you have to find your flow; you have to hear your own drum in your head.

We have the combat school, wisdom school, and thirdly the performing arts, or performance school.

What happened naturally, as I recognized that all of the people in the combat schools started learning how to heal trauma, this became the fourth school. Plant-based medicine, physical manipulation, and energetic manipulation are natural. This whole healing culture is particular about how they eat, when to fast, when not to fast, what to drink, and what not to drink. The interaction with plants and spirits, which is alcohol, is all sacred and ritualistic and not for pleasure, which is common among

warrior cultures globally. In kalinda, it is done organically and induced from an altered state that is hard to articulate. For example, you tell them, “What plant should I use for this?” They say, “Well, go and ask, and come and tell me what they told you.” All right, and then they will come back and say, “Well, I guess I had this dream.”

They say, “Good, then take this, and this, and this.” It is a reverse model and often misinterpreted as vodun or obeah. When someone misunderstands technology, it is perceived to be magic. The Caribbean is famous for its magic. But it runs from New Orleans to Brazil and is systematically applied in a very rigid structure. It is not magic; it is just a technology that is organic and delivered in a mechanism that is so foreign to Western thought and even different from Eastern thought. It does not fit in the two main models of thinking, and it gets discarded. Out of that process, the majority of our students have started engaging with academia.

I suspect this is more to do with the founders, myself and Keegan, and our slant, where we wanted

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the world to see the majesty of what we have. We recognized that we needed to help form allies and structure, not to follow the Western model but to allow dialogue to begin with Western thinking.

We have five people in the Academy who are working toward their Ph.Ds or master’s degrees. We have a series of steps and a set of research and archives that they can access to start sharing different elements of kalinda with the academic world in order for us to have it recognized for what it is.

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The last in the seven schools inside the Bois Academy is what we call the survival school, where you learn all the survival skills from indentureship and slavery and how to cook and find food in the forests.

These are skills for when there is a hurricane or COVID-19. None of these stickfighting elders have any stress. If there is no electricity or no laptops, they go up into the forest; they know where everything is, how to get it, how to construct lean-to’s, how to live just with a cutlass in the woods. One of my principal teachers by the name of David Brown, spent 15 years living wild in the woods, a maroon. His experiences and insights, his survival skills are part of what we are passing on.

The Role of Bantu-Kongo Cosmology The last thing is what we call the initiation school. We have an eightweek program, where we are trying to condense a set of information and skills to present to our initial students to validate whether they can enter the higher schools or not. As in most Kongo or Ba-Kongo cosmological processes, we believe the uninitiated, who do not speak the language, should not learn the inner secrets. That does not mean you cannot use Western thought and language to teach a non-Westerner, but first, I need to teach you the language of kalinda. Kalinda is for everybody, but not everybody is for kalinda. We have to see those who qualify themselves, whose spirit and energy align with kalinda. We believe ritual is its own living thing and the ritual itself protects and guides. Kalinda chooses who she wants or who she does not want. Once they initiate, they can enter these different areas to focus on developing special skills and then lead in those areas.

The Westerners here in the 1600s and 1700s could not understand what was going on with the Africans. It was so terrifying to the Europeans that there was legislation

specific to African males having a blade or a stick longer than three feet in all the Spanish, French, and English-speaking territories.

Having one meant immediate jailtime. What blew my mind was: why would you jail a slave because slavery is already imprisonment?

It means Europeans felt an extra level of discomfort because of how skilled these Kongo practitioners were at their art. And from here is where we kind of step into what we call “Kalinda 101.”

What are the eight things that make kalinda unique? The first thing is kalinda, “the way of the drums or Ka-inda, the way of hurt, or the way of harm.” Another way of defining the word is “drumming the hand,” which does not make sense unless you understand that Ka is a portal. We step into it to allow trance and induce altered states.

In the kalinda secret arts, music is true transcendental engagement.

All kalinda spaces have a musical function. A gayelle, our circle of practice, is not so much a physical space as a psychical-musical space.

The drumming and chanting allow people to access what Westerners call “flow.” It allows us to cross the kalunga line, which is a major concept. Kalinda is the one stick art I found in Africa and in the

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Western world that holds the stick flat across ambidextrously. That is a symbolic, metaphysical grip as well as a tactical grip. It allows for dexterity and a cause of intention.

It is also a visible reminder of “as above, so below”, which runs right through our region as one of the mantras of the practitioners of our art. We recognize that there is a physical world, but there is also a metaphysical world; there is a world of hard reality, but there is a world of immediate access to ancestral knowledge, which they believe is the reverse of the physical world. Holding up the stick like that means I now challenge you to cross this line, that we both have an embodied guile. It is a portal that allows us to intersect worlds so that we are not only fighting physically, but we are fighting in the other world, too.

M: Very hermetic, very Egyptian.

B: I actually think it is very Bantu, too. I believe Bantu thought is what influenced what we now call Nubian thought. Nubian thought is what influenced Egyptian thought. So yes, very hermetic.

There is a lot of good research that shows how the Bantu peoples became Sub-Saharan. They were not

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always Sub-Saharan. They were pushed into sub-Saharan Africa by the Arab expansion into North Africa.

Like in Bantu thought, our gayelles are circular, and so every circle must be built on a cross. This cross has the kalunga line and another line. Each of the four points is related to the speed of daily travel of the sun. Midnight-midday, duskdawn, death-rebirth. It is very Egyptian in every way. We always travel anti-clockwise around the circle in capoeira, dammyé, mani, kokobale, gaga rara. I could go through every art from Louisiana to Brazil, and their core method, physical structures, and the aura of the drums. The way we travel in the space designed with music is almost mirrored. It is precisely the same thing when you see it and understand.

When you look at Bantu thought, people do not realize that Bantu-language-speaking communities run from the tip of South Africa up through Central and East Africa. It is so important because when you look at slave records, the first set of enslaved did not come from coastal Africa. They came from Central Africa. It was Ban-

tu language communities whom we brought from the 1400s to the 1600s. From the 17th century to the 1800s, the Western coastal Africans began to sell neighboring peoples.

First, you sell your enemies. Much of what we call Caribbean thought and energetics, our forms of spiritual practice, our magical practices, the foods we eat, the way we engage in space is very Central African. When I started recognizing the sacred symbols, we used the new ones: crosses, stars, circles, structures, as well as musicality.

The practitioners would mumble things like, “You’re behaving like a real old Kongo-boy;” “You have real Kongo in you.” When you talk about early umbanda circles in Brazil, there was even a Candomblé patio of Angola and capoeira angola. When you talk about Kongo Square in Louisiana, and the kind of old practices of this region, the way they would use feathers, everybody thought that they were copying a Native American Indian.

They are not. The Black Indians in Louisiana dress like Kongo fetish war practitioners from Benin, Togo, some parts of Ghana, South Africa, and Nigeria, down to South Africa.

This understanding of the movement patterns and the societal structures matches how we build the Bois Academy. We created the Bois Academy along kalinda’s secret society lines. At the time, we failed to recognize we were organizing the structures along the lines of Kongo practices. Because they did not have regional kings, they had regional village organizations. Even their spiritual beliefs are not like the Orisha, or a belief of the embodied God. You revise the energetic system, the sun, or the energetic system, and you venerate these energetic systems as systems.

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Crossing the Kalunga The next block that triggered us was kalinda’s understanding led to an older word, which is musundi. This refers to how the Africans fought in Haiti and the upper Caribbean. Some early work on the 1500s in Marian Juana Lewis’s book explained the emergence of musindia and rara bands in the Dominican Republic, known as the gaga bands that would train and practice their skills. We started to recognize that in Trinidad, we practice the same art. But we could not figure out why until we found out about the wealthy Haitian planters just before the Haitian revolution.

That is something called “seguridad population” in 1790. Just before the revolution, Trinidad told Haiti that anyone who had enough money could come here and be given a lot of land. Pre-Haitian revolution people populated the whole of Trinidad, just before enslavement. Some of the lwa or spirit ways I know were sung in the Haitian revolution and had concepts from Haiti. That is why Trinidad and Haiti have such similar cultural practices, because, in many respects, we are a seed of Haiti.

Musundi is really a model for the ecology of practice required for

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kalinda. You take a young boy for training and emphasize movement to build agility. Then teach them to dance, then use whips, sticks, and finally blades and how you progress through relevant attributes both psychologically and physically. Fear management controls body mechanics. There are older capoeira practitioners from Belém do Pará and Maranhâo.

They saw the way we trained and said, “Oh, you’re still in a very primordial capoeira,” where they said this is more like batuque. This is the old stuff. We do a lot of head butting and tripping in kalinda.

This is phase one. We carry people through that.

The next phase is where we have the drum and the mastering of different drumming patterns, the songs, how to use the songs, and the drumming patterns to manage and teach fighters. In our forms, what is called the “little master” or the “small master” are actually the drummers. The drummers can communicate in-flight, in real-time, directly to that deep sense of the person who is fighting.

Step forward, step back, move to the left, move to the right without words and cognition. We have this whole communication system built into the Ka, or the vibrational

energy that jumps. For us, drums are not drums. Drums are living things made up of ether and many energies. After we teach kalinda and drumming, we end with drumming as a liminal transport. But to enter drumming as a liminal passport, we have to pass our students.

Canboulay is a word often defined as “burning” or “killing,” but it does not really mean that. It really comes from other words, a Kongo word to speak about fire procession. I am sure you know that fire

processions are about cleansing.

There is a ritualized cleansing process combined with it.

M: The things of this world are left here, and only the pure can enter there.

B: Correct! We will not let you cross if we do not set you up to cross. We know that if you are crossing and you are not right, you will get stuck. That is why in native thought, soul retrieval is an actual task of shamans, that peo-

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ple sometimes cross on their own without being induced and initiated in the process. Sometimes you have to go and get them back.

What many people call PTSD is in our tradition conceptualized as people who have crossed due to the situation of battle but do not know how to come back. One of our main forms of religious practice in Trinidad is Shango Baptists.

It is a synchronization between Christianity and Kongo practices.

When we put people into a process for initiation, it is called “mourn-

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ing” or “morning.” You always ascend with a pointer when you go through the mourning ground. A pointer is your guide, but not in the sense that they are carrying you to cross you. The pointer’s job is to point you back home because they know that they can help you cross any boundary. The real hard thing is getting you back and what happens when people cross. They do not know that when they cross, they enter, instead of what we call liminal, the inter-liminoidal. When they start trying to get that feeling

back, they go to drugs, sex, gambling. Those are shortcuts to try and get to the liminal, but they always lead you down the wrong path because you are not purified.

You have not been through the fire. The canboulay processes are how we prepare you to cross and how to get you back. It cannot be done by those who do not know, another problem. You cannot read it in a book or watch a YouTube video.

M: It is not a four-week course on the internet.

B: We teach you to come back, which is really about personal protection and has nothing to do with the stick. It has to do with all these psychic and emotional steps of fear control management, spiritual protection, psychic protection, and then we lead you into this pathway that allows for transport.

We help purify and cleanse you to get ready for the next phase. The next phase is, he who has traveled becomes self-aware, he who is self-aware becomes self-actualized, and finally, the self-actualized naturally recognizes the need for communal actualization. You have to return and give it to those who need you. That is where we

help people transition self-actualization into communal actualization. The fancy term in Caribbean literature is African dance society.

They recognized very early when they brought Africans to the new world, that if they did not leave them to attend to their spiritual and psychic selves, they would revolt. They would say, “we’re going to leave you alone; you’re going to do your thing. We’re not going to tell you what to do. We’re going to turn a blind eye to what you’re doing.” A lot of what we now call Afro-American behaviors and Afro-Caribbean behaviors were developed in what we call “windows of time.” These windows of time always involve drumming, dancing, fire, and games.

One of the things that our research in the Bois Academy is forcing us to do is that we have to rethink what we call a “slave society.” We have to really rethink the position of the Africans in their society. The powerlessness that is assumed, was not there. The cooperation with the process was not what people thought it was. The constant negotiation between the enslaved and the un-enslaved needs to be taken into consideration, and the way

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the society was structured and the structuring of society to promote the actualized self and liberation.

That is a big step that people who are initiated in kalinda must understand: the concept of community and how a community really works. We are not talking about democracy or communism.

Rituals were actualized and connected to the ease of possessions to lead you forward. Once we walk them through the African dance society models, we train them and provide codes of conduct that are lacking in much of the diaspora community. We can introduce them to our main concepts in the Bois Academy where we call kalinda the source code. Kalinda and canboulay are literally ascribed to be the source of salsa, tango, calypso, bomba, plena, and like every musical form. When you research its origin, those two words come up: bamboula and kalinda. The Caribbean way of being, which produced, for example, the most successful sporting team in modern sport, which is the West Indies cricket team that no one has beaten for 30 years. When you have exceptional conduct, when you produce the first-ever black American to fly, to have a pilot’s license with a Trinidadian, when you look at Kareem Abdul Jabbar, a Trinidadi-

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an, when you look at Colin Powell, when you look at many luminaries, figures of thought in the Western world, who are of African descent.

What all these people share is a way of approaching space and a world that has yet to be identified as a methodology, but definitely is effective and it is in clear display consistently. You know, you look at, for example, a lot of the most successful American athletes, and you continually find Caribbean roots, you know, you look at baseball and its successful guys, Cubans, Dominican Republic guys, they all are running on a system of being that has not yet been identified.

The Caribbean as the Birthplace of a Globalized World Trinidadians are a people who have spent the last 500 years under the effects of globalization, multiculturalism, and multiethnic interaction. We have had to tend to many problems for a long time that this world is now running into because of technology. We were forced into very small, confined spaces on the tiny little island where we have had to work through. For example, when you look at Tamil and Madrassi culture from India in places such as Jamaica and Belize, places where you find some of the oldest versions of it. When you look at Caribbean French Creole fashion, the most important cloth is called “madras cloth.” What everyone thinks is the Martinican and Dominican, all these cultures have this patchwork pattern cloth. The cloth comes from Madras or Southern India. On all those islands, there were Madrassi. Madrassi and what we call French culture in the Caribbean is very deeply interconnected in their food, clothes, and their beliefs. When you look at Ja-

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maicans, they are famous for two things: Rastafari and marijuana.

Where did those two main ideas come from? The Rastafari? They were highly influenced by the yogis and the sadhus. The marijuana that came to Jamaica came from India; the famous Jamaican concept of the bhang is really a drink that came from India. We have a lot of complexities in our region of culture that are highly interwoven that have produced hybrid cultures.

M: I think one of the big reasons the stories get lost is that the influence of the Indian diaspora is not taken into consideration. They were not accepted by either side.

B: Well, yes and no: they were accepted, but they were not. There has been an omission, or a degree of acceptance. When they came, they were very accepted. The problem is not the first generation. By the time you have the third generation, it suddenly becomes the enemy. I suspect that has something to do with the 1920s and 30s in India, and how partition triggered off stupid things in the Caribbean, where there was a drawing away from the bonds. There was a new narrative written. Certain thoughts were introduced into some of the elites among Indian

society that drew them away from the lower class Indian culture that was bonding naturally with the Africans. In Trinidad, it happened interestingly. When the British began to pull out, they gave all indentured laborers land. When they gave them land ownership and did not give the Africans land ownership, it automatically created the final divide. Even when they left India, they gave land away to create conflict. They left conflict in place. The war they left is to this day in Trinidad. The two communities are split. If I talk to anybody born prior to 1940, they all grew up in the same villages doing all the same things all together. I talked to the old Indian farmers, and they said they were taught to farm by the Africans because they did not know how to farm. These conditions and the Africans have been here for almost 250 years.

There were whole things about the geography, topography, and the plant life that the Africans knew that they taught to them. There was no conversation about Africans not knowing how to farm, Africans being lazy. Then all of a sudden somewhere around 1920, this rift occurred, and then the narrative changed. But because we have been interacting for so long, we have a lot in common.

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Being Trinidadian is really about a way of being. This way of being can only come about by a sense of deep joy and deep play, to come to a place of deep play and deep joy. Games do four things; 1) teach me how to survive; 2) teach me how to heal; 3) teach me how to grow and take on things, to look after things as they grow, make sure it grows right; 4) provide the glue to tie society together. If I do not have these four elements, I cannot have that sense of deep play. Yoga teaches access to alternate states. But yoga does not have risks. Certain types of exercise and movement-based systems can allow us to access altered states, meditations, or whatever.

The problem, or the way the kalinda world perceives it, is that they do not then take that state and pressure-test it by playing. This is how it was taught, but it is not a six-week course or an eight-week course. You have to be born into it.

But if you are not born into it, then you need to have a long apprenticeship with somebody in that world.

Initiation is an investment, so not everyone will be let in. Once you are initiated into our family, if you come to me at any time, I have to see you. If you say, “Benji, the

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police are in front of my house, I just killed my neighbor,” I have to show up. If you are in court, I have to show up. When you are in jail, I have to come to see you every week. “How are you doing?”

“Remember what you were taught, find your way back. You made a mistake.” The question is, can you keep accessing this state? Can you fix this in this life or the next because the understanding of the Kongo spiral and what we call the multiverse, ourselves, understanding that our self is not just one cell, that it is multiple cells, and that multiple cells interact with multiple cells that all interact with one grid cell. Each person we teach is part of our cells. We care for them as ourselves. That is very difficult in our modern time.

I tell them, “You do not understand. Now we are tighter than blood in some ways,” because the way we see it, we see the strands of the DNA. We say there are two strands. What is DNA? It is information. One strand of that DNA is your genetic strand, or your genetic data. The second strand is the information that you take in from outside your DNA. These two mix over time, and that is how

it spreads. This is the reason the word “guru” is taken so seriously.

What the guru does, he is the main processor of that second strand of your DNA. It is a metaphor. I do not want people to think we are injecting something. What “guru” means is “he who removes darkness from me.” That is what it means. When I teach, I take responsibility for that person for the rest of his life; not life, but lives. People do not understand that. If you are trained

in that way, then you understand how significant that relationship is with most people. In the West, they do not get it. They look at me like, what the hell are you talking about? So, I stop talking about it.

There are two or three martial concepts that ring deeply true.

We hold a stick in this pattern in a cross. Our movement goes along with the cross, the V, the circle, and then when those become dynamic,

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they create the spiral. Our movement system is in those shapes.

If you look at capoeira, the footwork is on a V. But sometimes the kicking techniques are on a cross.

So, you have X’s on crosses. When you combine X’s and crosses, and they start moving, you have these three-dimensional spirals all occurring in this space where there are multiples of these things going on all at the same time.

M: The circle beats the line, the spiral beats the circle, the spiral cuts through the line again.

B: Those are very distinctive things. It is one of the things that makes me very curious about the only other stick art that feels that way to me. I was talking to a practitioner of kali in Europe. I reminded him that the part of kali that you are looking at may not be the part that works. He said, “What do you mean?” I said, “Do you know about oracion? Do you know about the tattoos?” He said, “What tattoos?” I said, “You all are practicing kali that’s been passed through a Western filter and organized by Western minds, and not this lifelong bond, where I may show you one thing and then tell you, ‘Go fight,’ and then you come back and you tell me, ‘When I was fighting this happened and I got cut here.’ I

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can say, ‘Right! Because let us work on this now.’” Then the teacher might send you, like Sony Umpad did, to go and spend some time doing cha cha cha. Or go hang out by the bar. With my capoeira mestre, one of the tests to attain the rank of mestre is he would carry you off to get you drunk and tell you to start a fight in order for him to see how you’re going to handle yourself. Those are the old ways, and I am not saying that those are ways we follow now.

Most people buy a martial arts service, so they think, “Oh, I paid you, so this is mine.” I say to them, “Take it, let me see if you can make it yours.” You cannot pay me for kalinda and not drum. I told them, “Do you know the old kali drumming pattern?” He said, “What kali drumming patterns?” If you do not know how to drum the kali songs, then the patterns that they are using in the music, you might miss it.

He said, “How do you know that?”

I said, “I do not know that, I am

not a kali practitioner. Just when I look at it, it feels very similar to kalinda in a different kind of way, because they are an island people.

They have multiple cultural influences like this storm is similar to our storm, but their mix is just different from our mix.”

One of the things that has helped me the most is how this has allowed multiple martial art forms from around the world to interact and become visible. Some of the stuff you all have done, for example, with the Māori type of practice, with the jogo do pau, the way they interact with the Bajan sticklickers and the Italian stick fencers. It creates clarity for us because it creates a portal space, that gayelle space where ideas conflict and cooperation occurs. There is conflict and cooperation.

It has helped us be more confident in sitting in ourselves and our form and saying, well, this is who we are. We do not need to go to kali to prove that Trinidadian kalinda is good. We do not need it. Kali is a brother art or sister art. We love seeing kali practitioners. Nobody loves kali more than me. But what I do is just as valuable. What the Māori do, which people thought was a performance singing and dancing, is what we do too, sing

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and dance. When I see them sing and dance, I see that they know what they are doing and do not need to explain it.

You have to be crazy to do this. I have to be crazy to see as I saw.

There is a clip of the Māori working with you. I saw what they were doing with their stick and the way they held a stick with two hands, and I felt at ease. The two-handed approach to combat has relative merit. Other cultures recognize the relative merits, which is different from our merit, but they still recognize it. I do not need non-practitioners to understand it, but other practitioners get me. For example, now I found out about lathi. The way they hold the stick makes me at ease because there is a traditional folk performing arts in Trinidad called biraha.

There were four troupes that used to travel around Trinidad, doing martial style plays in little circles with willows, what you would call gungguroo(?).2 It was not kata; it was pre-kata. Inside of that form and the songs were a lot of hidden art forms. When I saw them 2 Not clearly heard on the recording for transcription [editor].

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dancing the biraha, I smiled; I knew what they were doing, even if nobody else knew. When I asked a man in his 90s who knows it, “You were doing this, this, and this, right?” he shook his head and said, “How do you know that, boy?

How do you know what I am doing?” I said, “Are you doing it?”

He laughed. He said, “Those who have eyes will see, I don’t have to tell you because you know.” It felt good that he recognized my ability to recognize, and we do not say a single word. After, we just smiled.

As you must know this is how the East Indians passed on some information by creating these traveling folk troupes with singing, dancing, and performance, but they were not only singing and dancing. I see the model is turned upside down in the east, and this is not something that is well understood here.

M: Arriving at the arts, any art, it was the highest offering to a god.

The keyword is the “highest offering to a god.” It is not a sense of entitlement where he is a misunderstood artist of the West. He is a struggling artist. No, that is the privilege that you go through, the privilege you are granted to make the offerings to God, but not un-

derstanding that shifts the whole thing. I keep telling people this is my self-expression. I respond, “First show me you have a “self ” and show me the self is able to express itself. Before you dug me out.

This is my self-expression.” That is something that may come after a lifetime of hard work.

M: I find it ironic and funny that both of these strands keep going apart, and they disappear for a while. Then guys like you and me come back and say no, they belong together, and start pulling those threads together.

B: It feels comfortable to share your ideas and have people who have seen enough of other forms to help recreate lost connections.

This is one of the challenges we have in the Caribbean form. We have a cloudy history. If your history is erased, you become a slate onto which I can write as I want.

When they did that, they created a space for us to write anew. Our people took what they had and built new things. Now we have Afro-Indo diaspora arts that are new in some ways. They are not African, and they are not Indian. There is something else. That is part of our deep beauty now.

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[Photo courtesy of Maria Nunes, 2015]

A JOURNEY THROUGH THE MONASTERY OF

KALINDA Keegan Taylor

[Photo courtesy of Maria Nunes, 2015]

KALINDA, ALSO KNOWN AS “stickfighting” in Trinidad, is a martial tradition involving two batonierres, or bois men, competing for warrior supremacy by exchanging licks and blows with skill and strategy in an attempt to subdue or draw first blood from their opponent. I have played the game for more than a decade. I consider myself a diligent student of the game, its methodology, history, and the unique and varied elements making up the tradition.

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Uniquely positioned as an Afro-martial art, kalinda has many roots from the African continent, transported to the Caribbean by the enslaved peoples in the early 16th and 17th centuries. My first encounter with the game was challenging to pinpoint because, coming from Point Fortin in Trinidad, it is common to run into stickfighting in these rural communities. It engrains itself naturally in these areas known to hold and carry on the spirit of our ancestral traditions.

My interest in kalinda is rooted in my personal love for music. Bois— or bwa, as it is also known—is rooted in the African tradition and thus is heavily influenced by drumming.

And this rhythmic element was one of the major things that drew me to the game. Indeed, many people are affected and seduced by the drumming in kalinda. The infectious rhythms and pulsating beats are responsible for many of the major elements found in the game.

I had to learn all of this in my early days of development and exposure to the game with its many fighters and masters. They imparted their knowledge, each with their own unique methods of teaching their skills to me, as I watched, learned, and experienced the game of kalinda for the very first time.

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David Matthew Brown To honestly explain how I learned kalinda, a solid platform to begin this story would be with the few masters I have had the opportunity to learn with over the decade or so I have been in the world of the stick. David Brown, also known as Acid, was a very prolific stick fighter whose smoothness with the bois and his light feet and rhythmic movement made him an enviable player in the gayelle. The gayelle, the name of the ring where fighters meet to compete, was his domain, and he enjoyed putting on

a show for his anxious audience.

David’s dance was truly his power.

He captivated his opponents with his footwork and charisma before raining down blows of bloodletting force upon the heads of his competitors. I wanted to learn this skill from him. His method of teaching is forever etched in my memory. I am not exaggerating when I say that my journey into kalinda is much like an old Chinese kung fu movie. Seeking out

the master, humbling yourself to his skill, and then beginning your own laborious training was truly the experience I had that directly mirrored these old Chinese classics.

David was very easy-going, smiling, and clever during training sessions. Still, you never felt that this was going to be easy. In retrospect, I think he was always giving me a hard time because he wanted to impress upon me that this game

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David “Acid” Brown [Photo courtesy of Maria Nunes, 2012].

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was a brutal bloodsport where one could imagine oneself losing their life in the ring. He did not want me to underestimate the seriousness of the game or my opponent. David first taught me to dance. The term “dance” refers to the rhythmic movement of one’s feet. Stickfighting draws upon and links to the beat of the drum, and the opponent’s position, who likewise is dancing. Finally, it links will, skill, and ability to strategically and effectively deliver vicious blows to your opponent.

We initially trained to African songs via CDs by Ella Andell, a famous African spiritual singer. Her voice and music took you into a trance that facilitated the development of the skill and mindset needed for the game. We eventually started training with drummers present. With a musical accompaniment in the background, I made a deep-dive into an immersive experience allowing me to feel an actual stickfight, which I had yet to experience.

After getting a handle on the footwork, we moved on to the braking, or defense. In a kalinda bout against your opponent, you are likely to face a barrage of blows

that can kill, disable, or maim you if not defended. Therefore, your first call of action would be to be able to defend yourself. David taught the five basic block cycles, which utilized both hands holding the four to five-foot stick with one hand on each end to create a blocking structure for mounting an effective defense.

The angles taught covered the head from an overhead strike and included angular blocks that protected the side of the head and neck on either side and other blocks that covered the ribs on either side. These blocks cover the areas of the body mainly focused on in any attack in a stickfight game.

After learning foot movement and blocking, we moved on to the full play of the game. Here at this point, we begin to strike and be struck and ultimately be able to dance, brake/block, and strike as a complete and seamless rhythm in time with the music, drums, and your opponent. This type of coordination is quite taxing on the nervous system, as David’s prancing about in front of you, coupled with his deceptive steps and rhythm, is enhanced by his unorthodox yet beautiful movements. All this

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combined to create devastating effects on his opponents, allowing him to successfully score blows on his unsuspecting victims.

I cannot tell you how many times David would have hit me in the early part of my development, but I remember breaking a finger and still having to train with it despite the pain and immobility this injury offered. David showed little to no mercy. It was then I knew I was no longer in a traditional dojo or martial arts class. This was lifeand-death training, and I was in the middle of the jungle with a real lion hungry for food.

With little opportunity to back down, this constant pressure aided in developing a rugged mindset that allows competitors to walk into a ring to fight someone, defend against deadly blows, and have the fortitude to deliver them.

The songs or lavways sung around the games to the beat of the drum prepare the proper mindset.

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Kali I also have to mention that my study of kalinda took me to the remote countryside village of Moruga, where I met David, but I also encountered other stickmen who each had their own unique skills.

After training with David, I met a fighter named Carl Kali Swamper.

Kali was a truly dashing rogue if I had ever seen one. Shrouded in the mystery of being a famous fighter of old and being feared for his out-of-the-ring criminal antics, I was determined to learn this boxing-like technique he brought to the game. His footwork and the way he approached the game were quite different from David’s.

Upon being granted a training session with Kali, I was privy to his training tips that have stayed with me to this day. Interestingly, Kali and I never faced off in mock battles in his preparation of my skill for the real gayelle. It would always be some unfortunate teak tree in the forest that would be my op-

ponent. I would deliver countless blows onto this tree during our sessions as he sat nearby, instructing me on my hitting methods. His approach was very methodical, as he explained very intricate tactics and strategies that opened up the game’s complexity for me. He created plays drawing on elements of human psychology and physiology embedded in the system.

We created plays and anticipated human behaviors with footwork, faints, and pseudo- strikes to eventually create situations where an opponent would be set up like a chess pawn to be hit and cut by the style Kali played. We dubbed it the “hummingbird style” because the footwork was similar to a hummingbird traversing the air with the sole objective of sinking its piercing beak into the flower of blood that is my opponent’s skull.

Kali’s hummingbird technique also relied heavily on drums; yet, his method called for one to find their own rhythm during the game and create chaos and confusion with off-beat strikes, building pressure on your opponent to induce failure.

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Keegan & Kali

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Left - David “Acid” Brown [Photo courtesy of Maria Nunes].

Right - Kali (top) and Keegan with Congo Bara (bottom).

[Photo courtesy of Maria Nunes (left) and JP.Production Studio, 2020 (right)]

Congo Bara To diversify my technique and acquire as much knowledge as possible, I simultaneously sought out the training and expertise of an old grandmaster of the game called Congo Bara. Congo was an old man in his 70s who possessed a hardcore approach to the game.

His style was almost devoid of dancing. It was very direct and reminiscent of the old samurai drawing/cutting styles that would get you cut down with one or two very straightforward yet powerful strikes. His teaching method was

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less formal than the other players I learned from in my early days. He told stories about how he would have approached cutting a man in his days. You would be wise to listen, watch, and learn from these stories because, in reality, they were table-top reviews of masterful plays that were quite detailed and a remarkable display of his memory and prowess. Unlike David in his rural backyard and Kali’s forest training, many of these stories and teachings I learned in the comfort of his living room. Still, it

was no less impactful, as he taught the power of the crawl. This intimidating footwork style involves a steady and consistent control of space as one advances in a straight line towards the enemy, striking at the most opportune time during the advance. Psychological methods intended to induce failure to block by the opponent during such advancement were one tactic. I would obtain much of my psychological warfare training during these training sessions.

Congo Bara did not believe in mercy and often quarreled with me for not approaching the game with enough desire to hit and take out my enemy in front of me. Initially difficult to grasp in the early stages of my development, this would become a valuable strategy as I grew in the game and even in my life afterward.

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Stokely A lot of my style and tricky nature was learned from the “Thief,” a.k.a.

Stokely. Stokely was another older gentleman in his late 50s to early 60s, considered the best of the older heads. He was unanimously considered the best dancer, was very fast, and was equally deadly in delivering blows to his opponents.

Stokely based his teaching method on his “Thief ” footwork pattern.

Once you mastered it, you would hardly have to deliver blows, as your footwork was almost like a spider’s web. If you were good at it, you would inevitably be successful in seducing your opponent with a display of footwork that would eventually set them up for a busted head just by the way he would dance and place you into position for cutting.

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I must admit that, in my early days, learning the timing from Stokely was very difficult because I considered myself to have two left feet, but kalinda was able to improve my timing and footwork. Solo practice and time gave me the gifts I possess today, allowing me the ability to combine all of my learning from these masters I have been fortunate enough to meet. I am inevitably grateful for the meeting, training, and learning from these amazing fighters, as they each possessed unique skills and qualities necessary for success in the dangerous art of kalinda.

My work now is to sort out and understand the true nature of what I have learned and to be able to combine the skills imparted to me by these masters. More importantly, I have to truly understand what it means to me as a whole and assimilate the knowledge to combine with my own natural, in-built attributes. There have been many other teachers that I have learned from, with much of it being very indirect. Observing players fight against other players and listening to the many wonderful stories told within the fraternity were also quite educational. Observing

the game around the gayelle is also quite instrumental and a key element in learning as well. If all lessons had come from the gayelle or even the training grounds, I fear I may not have lasted this long to tell the tales on account of the danger of the game itself. Nevertheless, I remain grateful and open to the many lessons that the game has in store for me and the other methods and platforms that will continue to reveal themselves to me in my development in the Monastery of Kalinda.

Keegan Taylor @ keegan.taylor.96

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WARRIORHOOD A DEEP DISCUSSION

Mahipal Lunia Speaks with Keegan Taylor During their interview with Michael J. Ryan, Keegan Taylor and Mahipal Lunia discuss the dangers of digital forms of teaching martial arts and their play with live cutlasses during the Barbados expedition.

Keegan: Children are coming up with a different kind of thing now.

My son is a very good example of the average kid. The average kid is about our average when we were coming in. Looking at their minds, they can still play, they can still go outside, they can still have fun and interact with stuff outside. But they also have an almost as equally big or even bigger appetite for the digital world, digital space. That combination between the hungers for those two worlds is creating a new landscape for learning. I say that to say that games like stick fighting and some of these traditions: we have to find new ways of passing them on that can be applied in the real space. Real space is still fun. I was in a drum session two days ago and I was wondering, how can I digitize this? I can see digitizing almost every other experience, even the sexual experience. But I do not know how we are going to digitize what drumming and all that does.

Whereas you might hook up some neurons in your brain and feel excitement and your heart pounds, there is so much we do not know about drumming. You may be able to begin synthesizing that experience. In the same way, things like Kalinda and stick fighting and oth-

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er traditional stuff, what I know in terms of my culture. But there are other things as well that we think it is necessary to pass on as an art form.

I think things are being passed on in the real world in real time. Yet it is being affected by two things.

First is the current generation’s responsibility in instilling information and finding new ways to instill it. Secondly, the actual usefulness of that information to the next generation and how they think about that. According to my philosophy on that knowledge, a lot of the stuff that we are doing now is not going to get us to where we need to go. Children already know that. How do I give you Kalinda if you are starting to write your own script for the future? Do you think it is important for Kalinda to be there in your new digital, or whatever world that is coming? I think it is. But is it really? That is just my personal philosophy.

Mahipal: I hear you. Let me add a thing here. I think digitization is great. But as you know, when you go into the world of the digital, it is zeros and ones. There is something very primal and something really great about the analogue experience. Whether it is Kalinda,

[All photos in this article were taken from The Immersion Foundation’s first hoplological expedition to the Southern Caribbean. To access The Secret Fighting Arts of the America, a unique docu-instructional series based on the expedition, please visit: https://immersionfoundation.podia.com/ilf-caribbean-expedition]

or Shastravidya,1 or any other art, usefulness is important. But so is physical and ancestral archaeology, at least the way I think about it.

It is a way of connecting with the ancestors in such a rich way that when we lose that, we also lose who we are and where we are in time. The danger of digitization, 1 Shastravidiya is combative system from Northwest India. Written records mentioning this art go back to the 16th century. However, oral traditions give it a much earlier origin date.

Shastravidiya should not be confused with Gatka, a martial art from the Punjab and practiced by the Sikh.

and I say this as I am watching my little girl here. Like you said, the new generation is far smarter than we were. But the danger is that everything is digital, it is very easy to lose track of who we are and where we are. It is easy to get lost in everything else. Without a firm standing of - Boom! This is who I am, and - Boom! This is where I am, and Boom! When my head breaks open or when my skin is torn, and this blood comes out. It is real. There is something very human, very visceral; something very ancestral. It teaches you courage. Courage in

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the absence of challenge is not really courage. If we lose courage, I think something is lost. Those are my thoughts. I would love to hear what you think.

K: Yes, definitely. I think I appreciate that, Mahipal. As I told Michael earlier, when you asked me what my thoughts on the trip were before and then after: what do you guys get to nerd about martial arts at our level? I mean, Benji and I would go on for years. We would be driving to one place or another for three hours. We would talk about a range of things, including martial arts. He was the first person talking about the idea of Hoplology to me, about people going to places and studying warriorhood.

I was like, “That was an actual thing?” Having these kinds of discourses, it triggers other aspects of me. I do not get opportunities like this on a daily basis. Coming back to the point, I was in a drum session two nights ago. The things that happened to me there, I am telling you, there is no way that I could see that being digitized.

Not even the greatest ability of AI could reproduce what happened.

Not what I felt, but what happened to me. I was transformed in one night. The person talking to you - if we had spoken before that, it would be a different conversation.

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M: I hear you. Maybe you did not want to go here, but I am going to take you there anyway. Because in some ways when there is something visceral and blood comes in, I think it also wakes something else up. I am not sure that can be woken up digitally. Let us bring it down to earth. Look at even something as simple as a mass. You hear a mass on a television set or audio. You can feel something, but in the presence of somebody who actually is doing the mass, and they actually understand what the mass means, including the ritual murder, if you will. It evokes something entirely different. That understanding only comes very viscerally. I do not think it can come digitally. This is my thinking at this stage. Things may change 50 years from now. That visceral, that blood, that sweat, and that fear, the real fear that your stick may break and open your head. It does something else.

K: The direction that this is going is a question about what humanity is. Definitely, we exist in different states or forms. I am not even talking about crazy Star Wars things. I am talking about who I am as a person with my thought patterns. It is independent, but it is also subject to my physical flesh and the way that I feel. These

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things are opposing, because feelings and emotions are part of me as a being. You sit down in this flesh body, and there are things that are going to be there, even when you leave: the drive, the energy, and the emotions. I am marveling these days at how marijuana is amazing. It is interesting how, when you feel a particular way, a very definite amount of data can be correlated by a mind in one way.

When you are feeling another way, you can come up with a whole next equation with that same data. It is telling me something about what it means to be human in the flesh.

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M: I completely agree with you.

This is where I was going. When you get into the digital world, you are entirely in the realm of the neocortex. When we are actually dealing with physicality, we are getting into the cerebellum. This is where how I am, how my body proper is in space, how it is in this geography, changes. Just activating the frontal brain is great. It can give you interesting ideas, send you on trips, but if the body does not go along, then what the hell!

K: This is exactly where I am in my thought and in my research. Let me

bring it all back to the experience of the martial arts. For example, this is a big one for us: the advent of the Zoom sensei or the Zoom instructor. One of my colleagues seems to be doing a good job at excelling at Zoom by having a very simple setup with a thriving Taekwondo school. I think it is scary because that could become a norm.

This could mean that there is a lot to be lost in translation. These are the things that we are talking about right now. I feel like that is literally what we know we lost from 100 years ago because things always have to change. Things that benefited and maximized the human experience; some of it had to be let go. This is where I am coming to. Let us say, for example, COVID. Let us just say people stop shaking hands 100 years from now. What will be the reason for that? Because 100 years ago, people got COVID partly from shaking hands, but then what would be lost is that we know the feeling of an embrace when you come up from a party. People are going to be looking at us, my kid might be like after 50 years and be like, “Dad used to hug and get sweaty for Carnival.” “Oh, my God, eew!” It is like looking back at Woodstock and be like, “What’s going on there? All you free-love types.” But we know

things have been lost. It makes me think about what the Egyptians in the ancient times knew about that was so everyday and commonplace that it has been totally lost to us now. That is why I am saying the human experience. That is just where my mind is, it is not like I am finished with the thought process. This is where the ideas are bouncing around.

M: I agree with you. The way I see it, I think the danger is in everyone thinking they just have to look at video instruction. For example, you can get just about any art in the world for 20 bucks, you can get a tape on it, and you can, quote unquote, “Learn from a world-famous master.” If it is really that easy and that simple - that just activating the front of your brain with a digital thing gives you skills - then everyone would have improved tremendously. You do not find that to be the case. The reason for that is I think your frontal brain, which is doing the strategy, the tactics, the fantasies, if you will, it is living at one speed. If the body does not live with it, if that integration does not happen, you will not enter into a state of flow. If you are not happy with the flow, you are not going to fight; you are not going to be able to live.

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K: We can really get deep into some of these mythologies. For example, let us take two fictional ideas: the idea of the Jedi warrior and the idea of a supreme AI soldier of some sort, whose abilities have been enhanced by nanotechnology of some sort. Those two characters just came to mind because of our conversation. What is the lived experience I am having now? What if your whole memory is wiped like Jason Bourne, but your skills are still intact? We know this happens because the brain-body has started learning. There is an added advantage when it is time for the body to act, when the brain and body come together. I was meditating on this about two nights ago. There are things I learned from my teachers that they literally did not teach me. It is just the way they said, “Do this,” and then they would hold my leg a certain way, or they would touch me a certain place and say, “Do that” without saying it with their mouth. I learned from King Kali. But I learned from most of the people I was around. But why I say I learned from Kali is because we spent a lot of time together.

When we would go places, I would just retreat into myself and watch him like a movie, and then both

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knowingly and unknowingly started practicing his mannerisms. The way he spoke to people, the woman, the children, if he had to be upset before he was upset, what were his triggers. Being able to look at that informs literally everything I took away from a stick fight or that I was conscious of.

M: This is where the danger of people who are just thinking and making maps and models of everything is. They missed the meat of it. What happens is, they think they figured out what a map or a model is, but they do not understand the physicality and the intentionality involved.

K: In Barbados, we tested our martial arts. Could we now test what you are talking about? This body’s infused cerebral connection versus a skill-based connection? Could we test those two human beings: the person who is physically and mentally realized and the person who is absolutely mentally realized? It is the way I feel. What is the meat?

M: What I am saying is this is one of the reasons we started the Hoplology expeditions. There are way too many armchair experts, who basically can figure out and say, “Okay, this is what this art does,

or this is what that art does.” Or this is what this teacher can do, or that is what that teacher can do.

They are very good at criticizing, because their mental model only shows them a very small aspect of what they do. But like you said, part of learning is being with that ancestral knowledge, with those teachers. It is not what they show in a class or when they are fighting, but what you absorb from everything around them. That cannot be gotten from a videotape.

That cannot be gotten from trying to map out and say, “I have built a model of this.” You have to live it.

Everything that has light will also have darkness. Everything that has dark will also have light. The problem is the guys who build these models; they only want to model the light and not understand that the thing that builds, that light is coming from that place of deep darkness. The closer you get to light, the greater your shadow.

The moment they try to break it out, they start the process of judging: this is good, this is bad, or this is how it should be done. I will do this better, blah, blah, blah. They lose the whole structure of what made things come alive.

K: I agree with that 100% because it is just recently I realized that it is like asking yourself, “Keegan, do you know that you are a shitty person? You know that you are the bad guy in someone’s story? Do you know that you hurt people? Do you know that you have fucked up?

You have gone on stage and performed horribly. You did shit in a stick fight.” But you also did great in stick fight, you also did great on your stage, you are also amazing to people, you are also the hero in someone’s story. Where do I get off in changing or judging which version of Keegan I love? I can do that.

But I could also accept the totality of myself, and then understand the true power of it. Some of the things that I am able to do come from the so-called fucked-up-nature that I at times assume. Some may say, “Man, you are a bit too intense, bro. Why cannot you just take it down sometimes? Why do you always say things like that?”

But the way I would just say something very bluntly and not realize how hurtful it probably was is also my ability to run in front of something that someone else would not run in front of. In a verbal way, it is expressed as me being blunt. But in a physical situation, it is reflect-

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ed in how I might be a couple of ticks faster than the average person when it comes to being tactical or responsive. That is what I am. I accept that ugly, dark space.

Those ugly things that we do not like about ourselves, I think it all comes back to what we were saying about the teachers and absorbing things that make things work.

When we go deeper into what we are talking about, we are going to start understanding what really makes people tick, operate, and be able to execute certain types of martial arts. In your Hoplological journey, you have seen cultures, and not necessarily martial arts alone, am I right?

M: 100%; it is not just cultures. I also see what most of polite society might call the dark side. Everyone pisses on fighters until their village is attacked, then you are worshipped. In times of peace, you look down on them. But yes, you are right. You have to look at the culture. You have to look at the relationship with violence. I was talking to Michael one time, and I said that one of the most beautiful moments in Barbados was when you and I both played Gilpin. You did not know me, I did not know

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you. Here we are in some other bloody foreign country. We are like, okay, let us feel each other out. You remember that, Keegan?

K: That was an entire topic before you came online. But yes. You know, I would love to talk about that again with you.

M: I will tell you my experience of it. There were times when Keegan cut me. There were times that I cut him, and both times, we tasted the mythical blood. I do not know if Keegan remembers that. I remember it like yesterday. There was also both a respect, and a sense of, “Okay, this is interesting.” I think the game with Gilpin bonded Keegan and me more than anything else. That was very dark, because he was calling his gods and I was calling my gods, and he knows what I am talking about.

K: This is why I am saying, Michael, that there is only one way for you to really understand what happened there. That is for us to talk about it. Because the things that happened there were the beginnings of something else for me.

As I said before you came online, Mahipal, I was getting to know you just as much as I was getting to know me in that moment. It

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was closer to a sweet Capoeira game for me, and I have never had a sweet Capoeira game. Meaning my body and my physicality has never allowed me to express what I have been able to express in other art forms. What I see others get out of a really great Capoeira game in Brazil. That whole flow. I have been able to taste a few different alternate realities. Just simply marijuana and some mushrooms.

Both can be very extreme experiences. I am sure there are others.

But you see flow. The most difficult question to answer in stick fighting is, “Why do you play stick fight?” I have come to understand that is just like asking, “Why do you play blades? Why do you do that?” I think the primary feeling is because this is where my soul can access flow in the highest from.

You run to that drug, because of the places where you can have that unique flow, that unique thing, especially, if you are a warrior, or are interested in bloodline; this particular chemical concoction that is only found from the practice because my genes are spliced to react to this agent. That is why I receive a certain type of flow that draws me to play stick fight or draws me

to do Dambe boxing, or Laamb,2 or whatever. That is it. For me, on the beach - I need to think about that, because things are happening even now.

M: This is what I was saying. I think a part of that flow is also us being able to access what society calls a dark path, or a dark part of ourselves to bring that out, where you are cutting the guy’s neck and you are drinking that blood, so to speak. You cannot do that in normal society. Yet it is a part of who 2 Dambe is a recreational fist fighting competition of the Hausa people. Competitions are held regularly in Nigeria at present. Originally, Dambe was restricted to butchers and fishermen caste members but now are more open. Dambe matches at present consist of three rounds of no set time limit in duration. A round can end in a number of ways: if someone is too injured to continue; if there is a lack of activity; if a referee calls a halt to the round; or if a body part other than the feet touch the ground. Laamb from Senegal is a form of traditional West African wrestling permitting strikes with the hand. The goal of a bout is to lift the person up and dump the opponent outside a given area It is now considered a national sport and has garnered a large audience of fans who watch the bouts in person or through other forms of media.

we are going back tens of thousands of generations. We are proof that our ancestors survived. It was not all hugs and loves and singing Kumbaya. I assure you of that.

I think the more we access that memory, the more, by modern standards, people will say, these guys are unethical, or these guys are violent, or these guys are this, or these guys are that, but it is very special when you run into somebody else, who has also awoken that part of themselves and that part of that ancestral memory, and found a way to express it and honor everyone who came before. For me, that was magical. I was telling Dr. Ryan, I said, “Dr. Ryan, that was very special, that was very intense, it is not something that happens every day.”

K: To me, that was such an unscripted event. That moment was so significant in our lives. Yet it was so insignificant in terms of us not looking out for that. It is like it almost did not happen. It was powerful because we, you, and I, had an exchange the day before, in the ruins. We were sharing and we were talking a few things. We did lay hands on each other; we did a few things. You saw me and I saw

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you in our own ways. The following day was quite dangerous, I think. It was dangerous because it was two egos. By ego, I do not mean arrogance, but I mean it was two people who were really serious people in their own rights, and who did not know each other. There were a couple of human beings in terms of this intellect sitting encased in the flesh. The flesh in itself is seeing things while the intellect is seeing other things on that beach.

Now the beach is significant too.

Where we did this stuff is significant as well. What was happening, I know you mentioned calling on the gods and all of these things. I remember it happening physically in my head. But I knew for a fact that having the blades in my hand, and having that conversation with you, felt like a Capoeira dance that allowed me to reach a state of flow, that allowed me to just sit back and look at myself, that allowed something new to be accessed in me for the first time. I think other than in practice, and with Benji, that was the first time I had ever fought with anyone with blades, period.

What made it significant is that you are not just someone. Sure, it was not a fight to the death. But it was serious. I know it was serious because of what happened afterwards. I can tell you about some

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of the stuff that happened there.

There would be a time where I will be feeling myself. I will give you a cut. You will be like, “Oh,” and I feel myself again. I will be like, “Okay.” So, there was that. I came here to dominate. Then I was beautiful, not dominating. Then I got to dominate again. I know for me; I personally love excellent sportsmanship. I love to see beautiful warriorhood. That is what it was.

M: That is what it was. Because even though we both got into that place of dominating and saying, “I will live, and you will die,” there was still deep respect. I was telling Dr. Ryan why that moment was so significant. Michael was like, “Oh, I just remember a little bit of it.

Why was it so significant?” I said, “No, that was one of the highlights of the whole thing.” It was so much in the flesh.

K: To juxtapose, the scene with Benji3 did not happen the same way. I think Michael had asked me 3 Benji and Keegan played Gilpin on a parking lot the morning I arrived while most of the crew was scouting a location for the days filming. I was amazed and fascinated seeing the two men play with a pair of short machetes in each hand using what to me evoked a very African way of moving the body.

what had happened, and it was difficult to explain. But it makes sense, because it was when you are dealing with blades it is always more than blades. I think blades, sticks, and stones literally invoke some of the most primal emotions in someone. For the wielder as well as the person who is about to receive the threat. It kind of breaks it down to brass tacks. I do not want to seem like the guy who jumps off the building and says, “I do not believe in gravity,” but my brother, gravity believes in you. That principle I think is what martial arts does for us. It allows that visceral learning of this physical realm that you are in.

M: I think it also does one other thing. As I am thinking about that day on the beach, I think it is what separates men from boys.

K: Pretty much. In today’s PC culture, though, what is a man? Because there are different types of men, you know that, right? Mahipal, you have become a bit toxic there.

M: They can call me toxic; they will call me toxic until someone attacks them, then I will be their favorite friend. But you know what I mean, between men and boys. The boys,

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they become experts at telling you what they think you are doing.

But they can never do it. They will never put their skin in the game.

What men do is, they actually put the skin in the game first. The understanding comes after putting the skin in the game. What boys do is they want to understand, build maps of things. What they will also do is, “Oh, I already understood this, so I do not have to do it.” And they move on to the next thing. But if you are talking about warriorship, the warriorship will not exist until you have men. I know in this PC world, it is not good to say, “Be a man,” but I will say, “Hey, man, be a man and be a woman and be a whole man be a whole woman.” If you do not like that, do not listen to me.

K: That is simple. It is about the transmission of these energies in the new space that is being constructed. It is being constructed at a very quick rate. Teachers, and digital archivists like us need to find a way to preserve certain experiences. At least that is how I feel. I feel like I just want to create a nice way to feel the past, or the things that have been lost. I think virtual reality technology is something that is interesting. Now bear with me, you

guys, I do firearms training. That is an area I focus on. I had not been to the range for quite some time. I went over to a friend’s house, but I do my practice at home. We put on the VR, played this game. It is basically a shooting game where these robots are coming up to you and you have to be in weird positions. You open a room. It is not like you have this toy gun. That is physical. You are in a real scenario.

I was able to perform kind of good at the game, in the first go. He was like, “Wow, you did really well at that on the first time you did that, how come?” I was like, “Well, yeah, I kind of understand the game.”

But what I was more interested in is the fact that I was able to create a good score; while my brain knows it is not a real threat, VR has a way of being really, really real sometimes. How do I translate an art form like stick fighting or some kind of thing where the physical feeling can still be there? All the stuff we are talking about where we understand the physical spiritual penetration is still required. I am guessing, as I said before, the kids that I know are being exposed to the digital, yet they still want the physical realm. But the digital realm has to keep up.

M: But I think that the digital should follow the physical, not the other way around. If you just take the video game metaphor, what happens when you get shot?

You take stupid chances, you get shot, you die; you just reboot the game. You have not learned consequence. What happens if you and I fight, and you do a stupid mistake?

There is a consequence, there is going to be blood. What that blood will do, what that blood does, is it actually gets you thinking better.

This is the old brain and the new brain coming together. If we just train the new brain, it is very easy to get lost in the fantasy and lose touch with the body. I think the AR and the VR, they have a role to play. They are nice things to do skill enhancement. But skill acquisition has to be in flesh.

K: Is this something that you see as a breakdown that already exists? Or can we say that these are the elements for a white paper or thought study on this kind of digital-meets- physical-flesh type of thing in the whole training industry? Does this impact us? How? For me, it is a significant thing.

M: I think these are just thoughts that I have been developing since

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this COVID nonsense started. With a lot of the Zoom lessons happening, and people talking about, “Oh, we will study this over Zoom.”

I kept fighting it because I said, “What Zoom will not teach you is feel.” I think about it this way.

It is very simple. It is as simple as this. It is all adults listening too, so I will just say it. You can watch all the porn in the world, but it is still your right hand that is your best friend. When you are with a per-

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son, you actually feel that. There is an emotion. There is a touch, and you grow old together. You may not have the same bodies, but there is still something real. That is the difference.

K: That is the difference. Holding on to that wildly human experience and not forgetting that that has value, too.

M: I think a lot of people shun violence. A lot of people shun the war-

rior ethos. They just want the good part of it without the bad. What is good and what is bad is redefined in every generation.

K: I want to say something. I feel like I am a sub-average consumer of general world content. For example, I frequent Instagram, I am in touch with the so-called things.

My headspace in terms of entertainment and culture, I can really be average in terms of my thought.

I can tap in and, if I were to classify what you guys are seeing right now, I would say that is so not where the culture is going right now. To hear you say to me, as a warrior myself, who is functioning in our non-warrior world, it felt like a bit of a reminder even to myself. I would love to say, “Yeah, I know this already,” but when you hear it and it resonates a certain way, it means that you know it already. But did you? Are you guys putting that shit on the shelf too long?

At the end of the day, you are right.

Kids need to breathe and to feel.

Like my kid had an experience the other day with blood and being hurt. I realize that seeing your kid go under some kind of physical pressure is always difficult. There is no better feeling than seeing who they are. It does not mean that

they come out of it looking like a ninja versus them falling apart and crying like a kid would. Just seeing who they are in that moment is something in itself.

I was lucky to see my son deal with it when a curtain rod came down on his head and busted his head open. He did not know it was that serious. He was continuing to play and then the blood started running. When he realized what was going on, he shut down. He is trying to be this character that he was creating from watching Spider Man. I was like, “Son, you have to be strong.” Then, at that moment, he just cried out and went crazy for probably 45 to 50 seconds. For the rest of the time until they put the plasters on his head, that little kid was a soldier. I was like, “Yo,” I could not help the pride that I felt in him.

Just the other day, my friend lost his daughter. That kind of stuff. It really deals with you differently. It caused you to think of your own circumstance. Why is it that kids have to feel suffering? Why do they have to go through the things that they have to go through?

M: Because it reveals who they are: if we do not have shit done to us, if you do not know what deep betrayal is, you will never

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know what true love is. If you do not know what deep pain is, you will not know what deep pleasure is. If you do not know what it means to have your world broken down for you, or to you, you will not know how to reconstruct it. I think when the stuff happens 99% of the time, you have no control over what is happening to you or why it is being done or who is doing it. A kid dying; cannot have been through that, there is no logical explanation to it. But in that moment, something is revealed in you. I think we go through this period of intense madness, and that madness either extinguishes you, or you come out stronger. I think it serves a purpose. But then again, somebody else might not get it.

That is the way I see it.

K: That is an appreciated way. It does not help that I am also a subscriber to the warrior ethos. We are kind of encouraging each other’s ideas here. But I know for me, having a deep introduction like that to my son built my bond to him, knowingly or unknowingly to him.

Despite that moment being ugly, I met my son in a deeper way.

M: You got to know him beyond the mask.

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K: Yes. I have thought of him and the idea of him deeply, especially over this week. My son loves to play superheroes and dress up. I actually think he believes that he is heroic. He believes that he has to recover from a situation. When you see things happen, he cries, and he falls, and he gets up, he rubs, he goes back into like a super serum recharge. He is four going on five, but I have been seeing that coming up now. I wonder how much of it is nature versus nurture. Or is this the type of soul that has been downloaded into this body? There is definitely strength there.

M: Big Questions. Save that for a nice bottle, and when we come down to Trinidad, because that conversation will go on for a while.

K: This is real. And this is one of the best ways I have spent a Saturday evening in a long time. Needless to say, I miss you guys.

This converstaion was originally featured in Strands of Strife and Life Vol. 1 - South Caribbean Fighting Arts (2021)

by The Immersion Review.

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RECLAIMING THE MAGIC OF THE

CHINESE STAFF Scott Park Phillips

THE FIGHTING STICK IS the magical weapon of Sun Wukong, the wild-enchanted monkey of China’s religious theater tradition, worshipped and adored by people of all ages. Sun Wukong is an Indian yoga master much like Hanuman and a Buddhist initiate, who achieves enlightenment, and whose name implies opposites—a

dumb-vain personality and a sage emptiness. He is the model of an Iron Body Master, a form of training that makes the body impenetrable and indestructible.

Sun Wukong’s staff is the weapon of the fighting Chan Buddhist monks of Shaolin Monastery. Shaolin was an austere religious institution with a large orphanage and

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a public theater. Performing arts troupes regularly visited to perform at regional festivals and in hopes of acquiring a few trained “little monkeys” destined to become actor-acrobats. This explains why monks who took vows of non-violence also became experts in martial arts.

In the boring version, the staff was initially a walking stick with a bell at one end used for collecting alms, but there is a story—the staff was the first weapon wielded by the god Vajrapani, or Thunder Hands. He was secretly working in the kitchen at Shaolin when it came under attack by bandits; he grabbed a long hot poker from the hearth and joined the fight.

But more likely, the fighting stick came from comic theatrical performances of drunken, sex-loving, meat-eating monks who also happened to love fighting. This performance tradition predates Shaolin Monastery and is an apropos example of life imitating art.

Sun Wukong appears to be a characterization of such a monk. His fighting stick is a cosmic chaos-creating penis. His epic, Mon-

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key’s Journey to the West in Search of Enlightenment, under-shadows the improvised sexually explicit version, which troupes performed after midnight to crowds of men known as “bare sticks.” The term “bare sticks” (guanggun) refers to the penis of an unmarried man.

Unfortunately, before the 20th century, about 20% of the male population would never have an opportunity to marry because of burdensome dowry and concubinage obligations. Bare stick was a de facto legal category that included monks. By law, bare sticks received more severe punishments for comparable crimes. They were, as a rule, an unruly bunch. The word for stick/staff/cudgel (gun) also means “scoundrel” and is the likely origin of the American slang, “goon,” which is pronounced the same way and only came into use in the 1930s.1 Sun Wukong named his beloved gun “Needle” because it would 1 Although its etymology may simultaneously come from the Tamil goondas, which means the same thing and may have some distant connection to Chinese as well.

shrink to the size of a sewing needle when not in use and tuck nicely behind his ear. Before he stole it, it was a magical pillar holding up the Dragon King’s palace under the sea. When inspired, Needle can grow as large and hard as the pillar it once was. As the warrior-hero of bare sticks, Sun Wukong symbolically releases his sexual frustration by giving the Dragon King a good thrashing with his enlarged Needle. In China’s original theatrical-ritual-festival-fighting culture, dragons are responsible for keeping the weather regular and harmonious. Sun Wukong is one of many

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exorcist-gods who are called upon to give the Dragon King an educational beatdown when he causes a flood or a drought. In practice, Chinese communities would hire actor-acrobat-martial-artists to enact a theatrical exorcism by performing this story—as education for the gods.

Bare sticks, who often worked as porters, developed their own dark paths to enlightenment. The porter’s pole became a ubiquitous improvised weapon because it was illegal to bring weapons into the Chinese Capital, which had a pop-

ulation about one million for most of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. Porters carried a stick with a basket on each end. The baskets were two chaotic swinging pendulums that the porter would synchronize with his own center of mass by extending his mind out beyond his body. This is the basic training for the internal martial arts method of counterbalancing.

In this method, referred to in the tai chi classics as “be like a scale” and “go left to go right, go up to go down,” one constantly neutralizes all incoming forces.

Sun Wukong’s size-changing Needle has a profound martial-religious significance extending to all stick fighters. For example, a

martial artist may begin by changing the weight of his stick with his mind, enacting, imagining, and visualizing it as alternately heavy and then light. This type of practice leads to emptying one’s arm of all intent and desire so that it floats up and down effortlessly.

The stick is held such that it becomes empty along with the arm.

Following this, one attains complete emptiness of the entire body traveling through space. Finally, contact occurs with the enemy/ opponent, who is empty and exorcised of chaos-inducing desires.

The stick is the liminal pathway for passing emptiness back and forth.

Sun Wukong, the monkey, and his friend-enemy, Zhu Bajie (the Pig),

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become fire and water respectively when they fight, trading positions with the stick in between them.

They represent the creation of the Golden Elixir, a Daoist meditation technique associated with martial prowess in the theatrical convention.

Emptiness is the source of an exorcist’s potency. Sun Wukong’s body is made empty by his yogic cultivation, making his body as hard as a stone. His method of achieving emptiness is comparable to a similar approach used in the Japanese tea ceremony in which one picks up heavy objects as if they were light, and light objects as if they were heavy. Over time, the practice causes the imagination

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to become a source of whole-body integration. It pre-activates the muscles and bones, enlivens balance and perception, making fine adjustments at lightning speeds.

This is a top-secret way of training to fight into emptiness while in an adrenalized state which distorts one’s perception of size, weight, and resistance. Adrenalized states were associated with possession by the gods. These dark paths to enlightenment were transmitted through the theater and were sources of everyday encouragement for bare sticks.

For hundreds of years, massive theaters built of bamboo or bare sticks were a common sight during rural festivals. These same bare-sticks

construction techniques are still in use today. I watched a scaffolding made of bamboo and zip-ties go up on a five-story building in Hong Kong in a matter of minutes.

To watch it go up was to witness young men embodying the martial prowess of the swinging monkey, zip-ties in their teeth, tossing and spinning poles in the air. The destiny of such temporary constructions is to return to their potential state—a simple pile of sticks—in the same way Sun Wukong puts Needle back behind his ear.

A few years ago, I had a limited opportunity to study the Sun Wukong role with Paulie Zink. He does a form of daoyin, a Chinese yogic tradition I translate as “tun-

ing and emptying.” His particular daoyin comes from the nearly extinct Daoist animal-role acrobatic contortionists of Chinese opera. It includes some thirty animals and insects, both earthbound and astral. One notable thing about Paulie Zink’s exquisite monkey-stick fighting is ground fighting with a stick.

The Northern Shaolin movement patterns I learned as a child worked as stick fighting without the stick.

In such a manner, empty-hand forms are transposable to stick forms without significant changes to the movement. I learned a continuous two-man Shaolin stick fighting routine that repeats using an AB-BA interlocking loop. It is

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excellent martial training for timing and distance. It is equally suited for carrying on an improvised dialog about the nature of enlightenment or a comic lovers’ quarrel over a mutual affection. The martial arts of Shaolin Monastery developed as a case of life imitating art, performances of transgressive monks having sex, and getting in fights. At the monastery, the art was refined by the discipline of Chan Buddhism, becoming the basic training for Beijing opera.

Before the 20th century, Chinese martial arts were a form of performance intended to educate the gods. One of its purposes was to convince the gods to behave better by modeling disciplined, upright, and courageous conduct. The martial arts were an integral part of the festival culture—transgressive and full of comedy. After the Boxer Uprising (1898-1901) ended in national humiliation for China’s gods, martial artists, and people, Chinese society responded by adopting the West’s tragic view of history and religion. We can summarize this view as “a stick is nothing but a stick.” In the first forty years of the 20th century, martial arts were cut off from centuries of enlightenment and enchantment.

They were stripped of theatricality and sacred stories. The once glori-

ous laughter-and-war orientation of martial arts collapsed in its native context During the Boxer Uprising, tens of thousands of bare sticks converged on the Capital, wielding swords and magical sticks possessed by Sun Wukong and other gods. They believed they had attained his powers of invulnerability, only to be shot down by foreign guns. It is easy to see why Chinese society instituted mass anti-superstition campaigns in hindsight.

All was not lost. Thanks to Bruce Lee and the Shaw Brothers, the spark of original glory survived in the kung fu movies. Many martial arts geniuses were also preserved by modernizers who invented pure martial arts and then taught it alongside YMCA-style athletics.

This short cultural history of the stick in Chinese martial arts is a glimmer on the surface of a deep ocean.

Scott Park Phillips @ scott.p.phillips.7

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CUDGEL OF THE GREAT SAGE APPLICATION, HISTORY, & PERSONAL EVOLUTION OF THE MONKEY KUNG FU STAFF Damon Honeycutt

not seeing you fruitlessly grasp snarled teeth make for dangerous encounters for again and again I meet you in an unfriendly manner

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STORIES, ARCHETYPES, AND personal mythology informed my martial journey from a young age.

I read the Go Rin No Sho1 while studying danzan-ryu jujitsu at the Medford Judo Academy. Reading the Mahabharata inspired me when I learned yoga with Paul and Suzee Grilley, and even the role of Sun Wukong when I was an apprentice to Qi Jianguo of the Beijing Opera. These stories informed my idea of practice and launched my never-ending journey for answers that lay outside of rhetorical knowledge and theory. While I was a student of both dance and music at the California Institute of the Arts, I had the honor of studying with Paulie Zink. The training was in-depth, arduous, and always at night. His methods were unique and powerful, and he created a space in his garage in Burbank transcending the surrounding environment. The sense of place created an altered state of being that informed my training and thus 1 Published in the West as The Book of Five Rings, by Miyamoto Musashi.

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awakened me to ideas, skills, and methods that are difficult to arrive at without passing through a similar gate of knowledge and practice.

It is because of that time with Paulie Zink, and how it has continued to inform my martial arts up to this day, that I call myself a practitioner of da sheng pigua men (大聖劈掛 門), or more popularly, “monkey style kung fu.” I also believe, as did the celebrated Chinese general, Qi Jiguang, that, “although each one has its own specific proficiency, still as they are handed down, the traditions are incomplete, some missing the lower part, some missing the upper.” All the elements of my training come together as a synthesis of my choices, which has forged my passionate, personal relationship with tradition, research, embodiment, and conflict.

I feel these elements in me pushing me onward. And with this in mind, here is a partial and incomplete aspect of the ongoing journey of my evolution.

Monkey Style Kung Fu Monkey style kung fu, or da sheng pigua men, is named in honor of the Great Sage, Sun Wukong, also known as the Monkey King in the Ming Dynasty novel, Journey to the West. Nevertheless, I feel that this is a misnomer, much like the “monkey staff ” case discussed below. In this article, I will explore my findings, insights, and technique gleaned from years of training in the above art and following the myth of the Monkey King to other teachers that sparked ideas, clarified specific skills, and supported me in my evolution of this style.

This article is about my take on technique, tradition, and training

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methods. The skills and opinions I put forth are my own, informed by my direct experience with masters of martial arts and embodied research in performance as well as scholarly and mystical modalities.

My goals with this article are to: • Make more people aware of da sheng pigua men’s techniques, especially the weapon and fighting principles, and what makes it unique in skill and scope from my perspective; • Add to the body of work and contribute to the field of hoplology; • Create a dialogue about different trajectories of martial tradition.

What makes the monkey staff different? Is it a “staff,” or does it just have the shape of a staff? The answer is not apparent. The name of Sun Wukong’s famous weapon is ruyi jingu bang (如意金箍棒), or “do-as-you-will cudgel.” Monkey staff is hou gun (猴棍). The last character raises an important distinction between bang (棒—a cudgel) vs. gun (棍—a staff). Even though the weapon looks like a staff, its usage is dissimilar, as suggested by its name and its material. Usually, one works with staves made from wood, rattan, or, for the sake of argument, another organic compound.

Forged from metal, the monkey staff is different. Some are steel, most are aluminum, but mine is titanium. “In performing the staff form, the master uses a silver staff to honor the Great Sage, Sun Wukong / Monkey King of Chinese folklore.” Because of this, the techniques used for combat are different yet related to other forms of staff fighting. As noted by Zink and Matsuda (1999), “the monkey staff techniques are completely different from the conventional stick-fighting techniques found in other kung fu systems.” The monkey cudgel is incredibly strong and unforgiving. It cannot be cut with

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a blade and only bends under extreme weight. It is thus heavier, and flowing movements such as spinning and flourishes are minimal and generally slower. When used close to the body, the body becomes a series of resting shelves for positions, launch points for power, and sticking points for radial attacks and defense. Hand and foot placement on the weapon is modular. The monkey cudgel was tailor-made to the practitioner in the tradition I learned. Its height is to either the chin or eyebrow, and its diameter needs to be comfortable in the hand, not prescribed by systematic constraints.

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The emphasis on movement comes from the lower and middle dantian (丹田—“elixir field” or “field of qi”). How I first like to describe the dantian as it relates to movement is to imagine three spheres gliding on top of each other from the base of the pelvis up. We also need to look at the shape of the torso as a whole. The shoulder and pelvic girdle work as a pivot and stopping zones for targeting in conjunction with the limbs to guide and aim the weapon. This technique helps generate force and momentum.

However, it can limit the range of the engagement. There are basic movements like the one above

that are done thousands of times to make them second nature to develop this skill. Once done to one’s satisfaction in a static position, you can implement them while moving and then drop them down to monkey-style height. Eventually, it does help to do many of the static drills without seeing yourself in the mirror. Slowly take away the necessity to visually correct one’s movements and begin to bring a sense of self-awareness into the body, fully and kinesthetically experiencing one’s movements. This added awareness gives the practitioner the ability to “listen to” the flow of the weapon.

As far as fighting attitude with the da sheng pigua men goes, the system I learned develops and explores five virtues: • Stealth • Evasion • Intimidation • Destructiveness • Cruelty

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This applies to open hand as well as weapon work. In the open hand arena, I feel a lot of attention mistakenly focuses on the forms of da sheng pigua men (i.e., the five monkey forms or the Pigua Lifting and Cleaving style conjoined with it). I, however, am choosing to focus on the five virtues, as they are usually not addressed. When applying the five virtues with hand-to-hand fighting in the order listed above, I have found that the techniques, when distilled from the art, seem to be created to fight the same opponents repeatedly. The origin story of the da sheng art states that it was created in prison by Kou Si in the early part of the last century.

The name, Kou Si (寇四), translates to “bandit number four”. I would surmise that he had to fight and/ or deal with similar situations repeatedly. Looking at this environmental constraint, I can see how the above virtues would help one deal with a pecking order among the other individuals imprisoned with Kou Si. I would like to eventually do more in-depth research on this specific topic, for there are

many practitioners in the world that could help support or nullify this theory. It would also be helpful and very informative to look at other systems of combat developed or adapted to a permanently locked environment to see where, if, and how the methods and strategies would be similar or different.

Once out of prison, the question arises regarding the types of transmissions, whether full or partial, still existing and any modifications made over the years.

In these types of systems, fighting skills are often hidden in poetics.

While I withdrew to the mountains of Vermont to refine my skill through meditation, solitude, and training in nature, I composed the following poem based on my theory: not seeing you fruitlessly grasp snarled teeth make for dangerous encounters for again and again I meet you in an unfriendly manner

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Preparatory Skills - Grips, Stances, and Essential Basics When I lived in Connecticut and was studying under Hu Jianqiang, one time during class, he once told me, “Jibengong (基本功—essential basics) good, anything possible! Jibengong bad, be careful!”

He always quietly laughed when he said this. This moment sank into my conscience and continues to inform my practice. The weapon needs to be an extension of the body. This is an axiom expressed in many martial arts. In training to use the monkey cudgel, one must first feel comfortable with the essential basics of a typical staff. Then the practitioner applies and translates those skills to the heavier metal weapon. Unlike lighter weapons, the monkey

cudgel begins to have a mind and spirit of its own, and that mind/ spirit is directly related to gravity and inertia. The needs of the technique demand a slow cultivation of dynamic strength coupled with a high level of sensitivity and dexterity. Being strong alone to cause damage is not enough, nor is just having a supreme technique to flourish one’s skill. Both roads can lead to wielding the weapon. However, to understand it, you must be informed by both.

The fact that the cudgel is more or less tailored to the practitioner allows one to get in touch with the five virtues of combat. The following is my interpretation of these virtues. Stealth is the first. Stealth

is more than being unseen or invisible; for this reason, da sheng pigua men is an excellent art for such skills. Nevertheless, in this article, I want to address how to apply stealth while in a confrontation, specifically with the monkey cudgel. As I mentioned before, the cudgel is more or less tailored to the practitioner. This gives the weapon an individual relationship to the person wielding it. It is a long cylinder to easily carry and blend in with other types of pipe or metal tubing, and you can grab it anywhere, for it is not sharp.

Also, given the nature of da sheng pigua men and that it is low to the ground, the application of many techniques both for attack and defense are executed from a low horizon line, making it difficult and unusual to react to.

Evasion is next on the list. This can be dodging, rolling, and running.

However, to truly evade, one needs some creativity. A strategic withdrawal, or maneuvering of one’s opponent or opponents, is essential. This may entail luring them into uncomfortable situations, using objects or people around you to benefit your survival.

Intimidation is one of the most simian and primal aspects of our art. This quality is more than just showing off your skill or bashing something with your fists or a weapon. There is a silence within intimidation cultivated through practice, meditation, and knowing violence in oneself. If you look at animals when they return your gaze, there is a charge that puls-

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es through you. The monkey cudgel is an excellent tool for this. It is a frightening weapon to work with. All the damage you can do to your opponent, you also inflict on yourself if you are not well-practiced, lose control, or are careless.

Of course, this is true for any live weapon, which can cause lethal damage with the simplest of skills.

Destructiveness is causing havoc and disorder. It can be seen as an amalgam of the first three virtues woven into fluid strategy. A plethora of means can accomplish it: with direct confrontation, coercion, damaging of one's surrounding environment, or surprise attacks against your opponent, which does the most damage with the least effort. That is wholly different from cruelty, for when one reaches down into themselves to attack with cruel intentions, the damage is long-lasting, crippling, and, in my opinion, more of an intention to maim and disfigure your opponent rather than to finish or submit them.

2 Climbing the cudgel is not part of Paulie Zink’s system but is seen in other Chinese monkey systems (editor).

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Another advantage to the metal cudgel is that it cannot be easily cut or split with a blade. Not only that, but it can also cause damage to a blade edge upon contact, even in defense. The weight from an attack on the monkey cudgel, especially a full swing, can cause severe concussive bludgeoning damage more easily than a conventional wooden stick. The monkey cudgel is also very good at destroying objects, such as armor and weapons, and causing blunt trauma to whatever lies behind them. Its very density can allow the combatant to feel empowered to engage heavy list melee weapons such as hammers, axes, and pikes. Though the cudgel might not have the speed or range of a spear, it can more than make up for that disadvantage in the hands of the right user with its crushing gravitational power and formidable density.

Another often overlooked aspect of the cudgel is that you can climb it.2 This is famously demonstrated in several forms where a monkey stylist will perch in an iconic Monkey King pose. While super cool to do and a lot of fun, it is also harder than it looks, as there is more to climbing the cudgel than meets the eye. More practically, you can hang from it and do pull ups, create a bridge, lean it on a barrier, climb up it with confidence, and then pull it up and take it with you. Of course, metal weapons also have drawbacks—specifically, electricity and water. Like any long metal weapon, the cudgel might as well be a hand-held lightning rod.

Water makes the metal slippery and thus difficult to handle, and because it is metal can lead to rusting. A thin layer of cloth tape will help with the slipperiness if you choose to wrap it.

Damon Honeycutt @ damon.honeycutt.52

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SHAOLIN STAFF IN THE 21ST CENTURY A LOOK AT THE PRAGMATIC USE OF CHI FOR POWER GENERATION USING THE SHAOLIN STAFF

David Giomi

NOBODY KNOWS THE EXACT origins of men using a staff as a weapon. Somewhere long ago, one of our ancestors figured out that if they picked up a long stick instead of a rock to hit with, they could get more leverage and distance to hit from. As soon as a second person picked up a big stick to defend themselves, the art of staff fighting was born. It can be found in all cultures around the globe.

Brief History of Shaolin Temple As the story goes, when the Indian monk Bodhidharma (also known as Ta Mo in China) arrived at Shaolin Temple in approximately AD 520-527, he found the monks to be in such poor physical condition that they could not keep up with their spiritual studies and meditation. He then developed exercises to strengthen the monks’ mind, body, and spirit. This is often considered to be the beginning of the mind-body connection that many of the traditional Asian martial arts are famous for.

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Fundamental Staff Many traditional systems, particularly those of a Chinese, Okinawan, or Japanese origin, trace their lineage to Shaolin Temple, and most teach the staff as the first weapon introduced to beginning students.

The fundamental level of staff training will often focus on weapon familiarization and manipulation, coupled with a strong foundation in proper body mechanics, paths of motion, basic attack and defense. Traditional arts from the Chinese, Okinawan, and Japanese lineage will also generally have preset routines, or kata (forms) as well.

Staff training has long been considered the foundation for all the “long weapons” in traditional Chinese martial arts. With the large amount of long weapons available in the traditional martial arts arsenal, and the spear being considered the “king” of the weapons, it is easy to see why a strong foundation in staff fundamentals would be essential. Staves would also be inexpensive to make and readily

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available, as many tools used for farming or daily chores took the shape of a pole or staff.

In the modern era, there is a great deal of interest in “everyday carry,” or EDC items (a quick Google search showed “about 1,170,000,000 results). Everything from concealed carry firearms to knives, phones, and even chapstick, make the list. In earlier times, a walking stick or staff was a common accessory, making the staff the perfect EDC of its day.

As a side note, I currently reside near the Sierra-Nevada mountains, and walking sticks (staves) of various lengths are a relatively common sight, especially as one gets closer to, or into, the mountains.

Even here in town, they are not so uncommon as to draw attention.

Beyond the Basics While all of the fundamental training has great value and multiple benefits, nothing in this category is necessarily unique to Shaolin training. Many systems train the staff and use the same patterns of motion, and the same body mechanics. The foundation of Shaolin training, at least theoretically, is the integration of mind-body synergy for advanced martial arts and health cultivation. To truly look at staff from a Shaolin perspective, we need to look at the use of chi/ki in regards to staff training and usage. Tenured traditional martial artists will be familiar with the concept that the practitioner needs to focus the chi to the tip of the weapon. It stands to reason that if we have not yet learned to focus chi in and through our bodies, then we will not be able to move chi through a weapon. Before we can look at manifesting chi in weapon use, we first have to look at the use of chi without a weapon to enhance power generation.

Many excellent translations of ancient texts and “poems” on chi are currently available. Some describe the different types of chi and indepth methods for its cultivation.

Others translate “poems” which offer obscure insights that need to be pondered and discerned. While it is generally acknowledged in internal martial arts and chi kung circles that there are different types of chi, the focus of this article is in the pragmatic usage of chi as it relates to power generation and practical application, in a manner that can be utilized relatively quickly. When discussing the concept of chi in a pragmatic context, I often refer to the modern definition as “bioelectric energy.” However, even then, the concept of being able to manipulate bioelectric energy to use when striking in a combat situation brings to mind images of “using the Force” and cartoonish video game fireballs.

All of the chi—or energy—cultivation practices I have learned are accepted as being very longterm study. I have heard stories,

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seen demonstrations, and even felt chi being manifested; however, I have still yet to see it used in allout combat. To be clear, I am not saying it is not possible, just that I have yet to see it myself, which means, for me, there is quite a bit that is taken on faith in this training. That being said, I enjoy the trainings involved, and feel much more healthy and vibrant when practicing them, and find that this has value to me, whether I end up being able to manifest chi energy in a combat situation or not. However, our quest is to find an obtainable form of energy manifestation that martial artists can work on and use “in the now” while continuing to work on internal practices for health, vitality, and for the possibility of future martial application.

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Demystifying “Chi” If chi for martial arts application is the cultivation and manipulation of the body’s natural energy, then would not an advanced manipulation of the body’s kinetic energy be a form of using chi? If kinetic energy manipulation is a form of chi generation, and if the yi (the mind—specifically, the intention) leads the chi, then it stands to reason that developing a high level of manipulating the body’s kinetic energy would have value in the development of the skill of manipulating chi for health or martial arts purposes. All of the principles that tenured martial artists were taught still need to be in place.

Proper breath, body alignment, intent, timing, and so on are all still necessary. With these in place, we also need to look at kinetic linking and progressive or staggered vs. simultaneous application.

It is well known that kata/form training, empty hand or with weapons, are meant to develop a myriad of attributes, including power generation. In fact, most of us have heard on numerous occasions regarding forms that “that is where the secrets are hidden.”

Whether that is so or not is beyond the scope of this article. However, the development of focused power through forms/kata is often touted, and is fairly obvious, even to the casual observer.

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Timing is Everything Most master instructors of traditional martial arts emphasize that the key to maximum power is to synchronize the timing of the breath, the intent, body alignment, and a firm, deliberate step—similar to a stomp—with the strike, with great emphasis on the foot and the strike landing in a coordinated manner. This is well known, hardly a secret, or a very open “secret,” if one at all, and bare feet can be heard stomping on gymnasium floors in traditional martial arts tournaments around the world most weekends, usually with great flourish.

Most of us know this, and most of us teach this. It takes countless repetitions that turn weeks into months and months into years to perfect this timing, and most of us practice this for years on end. But what if this is wrong, or at least, not quite right? It is fairly well known that the old masters would hide knowledge. What better way to hide knowledge, than train stu-

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dents in a way that would make it so that all it would take is a small tweak, a slight adjustment in timing, to make it work? Or, what if they did not know? It is not uncommon for some masters to learn and impart some of the more subtle aspects of their arts almost by osmosis. Some students get it, some do not. Sometimes even the instructor is not exactly sure what they are doing or how they are doing it. Watch some of the older masters that are known to have an unusually high amount of power generation, and really observe their timing. Not their sparring timing—focus on the timing within their own bodies as they move.

Here Is the Key The true timing is that, rather than simultaneous, the foot lands a millisecond before the strike, transferring the kinetic energy generated by the body into the strike. This allows kinetic energy manifested in the body to transfer into the strike, be it empty-hand or weapon, and at a higher level into the opponent. When applying this to a weapon such as the staff, we need to take that kinetic energy and let it continue through the body so it can transfer in and through the weapon. This still requires years of diligent practice and a very highly developed sense of timing and energy manipulation; otherwise the strike turns into two strikes. In other words, instead of channelling all of the kinetic energy into the strike, it would cancel with the step, and the power would diminish greatly as it would require a new generation of energy.

Here is an exercise to demonstrate the point: take your staff and drop it on concrete so that it lands flat— i.e., both ends land as close to simultaneously as possible. What

happens? Nothing. When the ends of the staff land at the same time, the kinetic energy discharges at the same time and has nowhere to go, so it cancels itself out.

Next, take your staff and slam one end down well before the other (but let it go) and watch what happens; the staff will bounce back and forth, jumping from end to end. If you watch closely, you can often see the staff vibrating in the air as it bounces.

One more exercise with the staff: take the staff by one end and slam it violently against a concrete floor and hold on to it. We all know what will happen—an incredibly uncomfortable sensation as the staff vibrates violently in our hand. Extremely uncomfortable.

What just happened? We created a dynamic surge of kinetic energy by slamming it on the ground, and that energy has to go somewhere.

Since you are holding on to it, the kinetic energy has nowhere to go except back up the staff and into your skeletal structure.

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It is understood in internal martial arts circles that the chi (kinetic energy?) travels through the body through the bones, in a spiraling manner. It is interesting how the old internal masters were supposed to be able to transfer chi to their opponents’ bodies. Was it “magic,” or just science and great body mechanics, with a proper understanding of how to use their kinetic energy?

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With all the details in place, including proper skeletal alignment, the body reacts similarly to the staff in the exercise. A dynamic surge of energy can be created and directed through a weapon, or into an opponent. This is not easy. It still takes years of practice, and there are many details that need to be in place, such as breath, intent, alignment, timing, and many more, but it is achievable.

The Real Secret The bottom line truth is that all of this has very little value if it cannot be applied in all-out combat. If it cannot, it remains in the realm of martial arts parlor tricks, and a quick search on YouTube shows “martial arts” parlor trick artists being exposed more and more.

The good news is that those of us interested in traditional martial arts, even esoteric martial arts, can bring these martial arts into the new millennium to a higher level than have ever been achieved. The key is in the training method.

Here is the most valuable martial arts “secret” taught to me by Burton Richardson: The JKD Unlimited training method. The key is in progressive resistance. You can take all of your techniques from combat arts ancient or modern,

and run them through the JKD Unlimited filter. What does that mean? Sparring with progressive resistance. Start off light, keep it safe and fun, and you can functionalize almost anything! It may not look exactly like it did in the traditional kata, but it is not supposed to!

The amount of information available today in the martial arts world is unprecedented. Along with that, the advances in training equipment allow us to make everything from free sparring to staff sparring fun, safe, and functional. Those of us with a love for traditional as well as modern arts can bring these arts to new heights, as long as we test our theories in the “lab” of live, safe sparring.

David Giomi @ david.giomi

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DOCUMENTARY ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF THE

JUEGO DE PALO CANARIO Alejandro Rodriguez Buenafuente

Translated by Michael J. Ryan, Ph.D. Generational Transmission: Ángel González Torres (1949), Tomás Deniz Hernández (19001983), Nicolás Morales Martín (1865- 1944), José Morales Martín (1854-1935), Pedro Pestana Gevara (1832-1905)

THE JUEGO DE PALO OR THE juego de garrote is a tradition stretching back centuries. On the Canary Islands, when two people demonstrate their skills of the juego de palo in private, or more often in front of an appreciative public, the intensity of these matches can vary. Matches can range from a performance-oriented exhibition during celebrations to a match with a more severe intent that might occur during a more private duel.

In the Canary Islands, beginning around the middle of the 1970s, there have been several ongoing disagreements over the terminology and techniques of the juego de palo canario. These disagreements have, thanks to the internet, even turned into transnational debates.

As a result, there is a broad range of opinions about the art ranging from the introduction of “invent-

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ed” techniques derived from selfstyled “traditional” family schools to the increasing acknowledgment of several recently invented “Canarian martial arts” including lucha del palo, lucha del garrote, lucha del tolete, arte del palo, or mano’ canario.

At present, the situation can be especially confusing. Those who wish to know more about this art can contact the two officially recognized organizations: The Federación de Juego del Palo Canario or the Federación de Lucha del Garrote Canario.

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We can date this confusion back to 1975 when the first association dedicated solely to the juego de palo canario was set up to promote and teach the art of Canarian stick fighting. To be clear, Canary Island wrestling, or lucha canario, was also part of this movement, although there had been formal clubs dedicated to this art since the 1940s. It turned out this was a radical change as it meant these once local and semi-secretive family-based arts would open up to train outsiders. The results of this move turned out to be analogous to a baseball player not only hit-

ting the ball and running the bases, but also to being in charge of scoring the game. In other words, the newfound efforts to promote, teach, and create an infrastructure for the juego de palo canario led to several competing and conflicting opinions. One major drawback, seen by long-time practitioners, was the eagerness that new practitioners promoted themselves as masters of the art, thus offering their unique training and interpretations of it, without really understanding the art at all.

By the end of the decade, one could observe the coexistence of a traditional folkloric point of view of the art, as seen in the earliest publications devoted to the juego de palo.

On the other hand, there was an alternate point of view that sought to treat it purely as a sport, as seen with the 1978 publication of a set of rules to guide its activity. This move to promote the art as a sport began a new phase where some interested parties sought to substitute the original name, “juego de palo,” for another one that was supposed to be more acceptable to everyone. For a while, this group tried to substitute juego de palo for banot, the name of an ancient wooden weapon used by the indigenous Canarian warriors.

In 1982, a new association, the Palo Canario Association (ASPAC), exerted a significant influence on this debate, calling for the elimination of the word, “juego” (game). Instead, in 1984, the leader of this group suggested changing the name of juego de palo canario to some variation of juego de palo. Beginning on the island of Gran Canaria, some practitioners started using the term, “lucha de garrote” (stick fighting). They felt substituting lucha de garrote for the juego de palo brought out the original war-like intent of this art that was once hidden by the villagers by using the term, “juego de garrote,” in the face of a hypothetical, and never proven persecution of practitioners by local authorities.

In 1985, another new association emerged on the island of Tenerife.

The Association of the Juego de Palo (AJUPAL) came up with a new definition of the term, “styles.”

This proposal tried to safeguard the traditional lines of the transmission of the art, which customarily had been passed down through families with their own sticks of various sizes, and with their own ways of holding and manipulating the stick. In this way, they kept the tradition alive, so the younger

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generation of those families could claim its heritage. Although the AJUPAL contributed to the protection of these family styles, it also placed too much effort in institutionalizing ways of holding and moving the sticks, resulting in severe problems between competing branches of one family. Specific methods of grasping and manipulating the stick were considered to be the sole property of a branch of a family, so it was felt that another branch of the same family had no right to use them.

Towards the end of the 1980s, the government recognized nine separate styles of the juego de palo canario. Seven of these styles used a medium-length stick (appx. 4 feet high, or level with the individual’s heart), and two styles used a long stick (appx. 6 to 12 feet in length).

Other groups have taken to re-introducing the palo chico, or “small stick” (the size of a walking stick), which had disappeared by the 20th century.

In 1993, the government of the Canary Islands extended its jurisdiction over the juego de palo with the law of Canarian Sports, creating two regulating organizations: the Federación de Juego del Palo Canario and the Federación de Lucha del Garrote Canario. Following their lead on this, the Fed-

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eración de Juego del Palo Canario embraced the AJUPAL’s proposal regarding the definition of “styles” that considered the juego de palo a folkloric tradition with competitive fencing having no role in the tradition. However, opposing this viewpoint, the Federación Lucha del Garrote Canario promoted a sports-oriented type of juego de palo canario where all those interested could compete under a set of unified techniques. While the debate has continued, competitive events under the auspices of the Federación de Lucha del Garrote Canario began in 1997.

Regarding the continuation of traditional practices, both federations have had problems in representing everybody. In fact, more than half of the actual known practitioners have declined to join both groups.

On one side, the Federación del Juego del Palo Canario has restricted the number of official styles to what they have already recognized. The refusal to acknowledge any other style than those already included in the federation shows how difficult it can be to try to promote traditional styles or lineages.

Moreover, it may be especially true when attempted through an officially sanctioned institution dedicated to exclusively promoting the art of the juego de palo as a sport.

On the other hand, the Federación de Lucha del Garrote Canario proposed a singular technical interpretation, officially distancing themselves entirely from any connection with practitioners of older, more traditional schools, including those representatives who were present when the idea first arose for convoking the federation. Such is the case of the traditional school of Francisco San-

tana who was initially present as an original member of the ASPAC association and ended up turning his traditional school into a sporting club as an affiliate of the Federación de Lucha del Garrote Canario. But what is remarkable about this man’s actions is the attention he put into writing up a description of technical statutes to expressly exclude the use of the palo chico (walking stick). What

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made this such a strange attempt was that the palo chico was long held to be part of the repertoire of traditional Canarian weapons.

Moreover, the Federation Juego de Palo has recognized the palo chico as a traditional Canarian weapon.

In 2003, after a series of failed attempts, the original promoters of the lucha del garrote and its corresponding federation succeeded in forming an association specifically to recover the “lost” traditions of the palo chico. The newly formed National Association of Tolete Canario (ANTC) lobbied for the elimination of the earlier, more traditional use of the phrase, “juego de,” or “game of,” commonly used to describe combative traditions in Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Italian, as well as many other languages. Instead, they sought to promote the term, “lucha del tolete,” meaning “cudgeling” or a “fight with cudgels,” and towards the end of 2010, sought the assent of the Commission of Sports and Indigenous Sports, an organized body under the General Director of Sport. This group also unsuccessfully lobbied for the official recognition of a third federation with the title of “juego de palos cortos,” or the “game of the short stick / walking stick.”

Finally, we must review how in 2010, a process of promoting the coining of the term, “Artes Marciales Canarias” came about with the convocation of the First International Congress of Canarian Martial Arts. A surprising result of the conference was the number of groups which, with the explicit collaboration of the Federación de Lucha del Garrote Canario, enthusiastically supported this exaggeratedly traditional martial art conference. The president of the Federación de Lucha del Garrote Canario was also a board member of the Tagore de las Artes Marciales Canario. Noticeable in the proceeding of the conference was a proposal asserting the status of now-extinct traditional combative art of juego de la mano, or juego de mano, as a type of ancient fist-fighting, and that it had definite links with other forms of documented Canarian combative traditions.

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The Situation Previous to the Associations and the Institutional Intervention: the Historical Story We have tried to summarize the confusing situation that occurred to Canarian combative traditions from 1975 until the present moment. There is a clear historical chain of evidence to support the existence of Canarian martial arts with written documents describing these traditions dating back to the beginning of the 18th century. Here, in these writings, we can find the specific use of the term, “juego del palo,” and a description of the art.

The origins of the juego de palo canario probably lie in the indigenous culture of the Guanches, as documents from the 16th century suggest when writing of “Canarian challenge matches.” Written records by Spanish administrators, bureaucrats, travelers, priests, and others show that there were regularly held competitions among the Guanches (indigenous Canarians)

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who dueled in a highly regulated way. Opponents threw stones at each other, belabored each other with sticks, lunged at each other with obsidian knives, and finally engaged in the form of standing belted grappling with each other.

Men gathered in specific areas delineated as competition grounds where judges and juries kept the competitors safe and the action going. All of this points to the intent not to hurt each other, but to show off their courage and skills.

A possible link in these public challenge types of matches to the medieval European world, suggests the presence of Spanish influence on the practice of public dueling.

One problem in making this link is the fact that dueling and jousting among the Spanish were not very common at the time of the conquest and settlement of the Canary Islands.

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In conclusion, though, there is no evidence of a tradition of public stick fighting in the Iberian peninsula between the 15th and 20th centuries, except in the case of Northern Portugal, the Azores Islands, and the island of Madeira, where stick fighting is documented only from the end of the 19th century. A link between the Canarian traditions and the Portuguese-colonized Atlantic Islands, including the indigenous Canarian inhabitants, may exist. Still, more evidence is needed before we arrive at a firm conclusion. On the other hand, there is evidence of the existence of another possible link, this time to West Africa, where there is a great deal of historical and ethnographic evidence pointing to the existence of regularly held public stick fighting matches.

The expression, “juego del palo” or “juego de palo garrote / lata / vara / tolete / chola / mano,” points to several Spanish language terms relating to the handling of a palo in both an offensive and defensive manner. The word, “jugar,” or “to play,” has a meaning that is little used today but still is defined in current dictionaries as “the handling or manipulating of a weapon.” In the more specific case of the Canary Islands, what is interesting, for example, is when the

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poet Viana regularly speaks in his epic of the conquest, of those “who ‘jugar’ with sticks, maces, swords, two-handed longswords, or pikes.”

These weapons were not only restricted to the Canary Islands at the time, but were common throughout Western Europe, as can be seen in any pre-20th century Spanish manual of arms.

From a merely practical point of view, the juego de palo (de garrote, etc.) indicates an ability or knowledge allowing one to subdue another in a violent situation. The way these combative traditions took place, as with many other useful skills, is that the juego de palo has come to be developed more as a recreational pastime than a method of self-defense or dueling, both in the Canary Islands and many other sites. Besides, if we stick strictly to the Spanish or Portuguese languages, the term, “juego,” appears repeatedly to identify and describe popular traditions of fencing, as well as other stick fighting traditions, that currently exist in Venezuela, Colombia, and the Philippines.

Source Documents As previously cited sources show, indigenous stick dueling matches were first explicitly recorded as juego del palo as early as the 18th century, describing it as a “dangerous game that can end in the death of one of the practitioners.”

Reading this, one must keep in mind that this chronicler is describing a type of popular public demonstration without specifying an exact location where these

types of events took place. Due to the lack of specificity regarding where these matches took place, the scanty evidence suggests they could have occurred anywhere in the island chain.

The second mention of the juego de palo in the Canary Islands that we can track down dates to 1750, in the town of La Laguna. In this document, a chronicler describes the demonstration of fights usually during village festivals, but also

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as a technically sophisticated warfare-oriented practice, from which we can understand from the account one can even “take lessons.”

Besides, he continues, it possesses a practical use in situations such as when facing an armed bandit, where one’s knowledge of the juego de palo can not only provide a means of defense, but be a method that could result in the death of the aggressor. The terminology used to describe such an aggressive, combative system in these documents is the “juego del palo.”

Other terms found in existing documents include the terms, “jugar el palo” and “jugar el garrote.”

From a document dating from 1820, we find a third citation with an account of these kinds of events, which is of interest for us, not so much for the appearance of the expression, “juego de palo” or “juego de garrote,” as these terms are often not used; what we find instead is a passage describing several challenge matches with sticks by men on the island of Fuerteventura, and a description of the best way of gripping what is called a “garrote,” which is a unique Castilian term at the time.

In an old illustration, we can see two men fighting at a little distance from each other with two

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palos a little taller than themselves. What is especially interesting in this illustration is the fact that there exists a third party that appears to be interacting with the two combatants. One could hypothesize the existence of a fight between three contenders, but this would be counter to all we know of how the art developed on the island. This is unlike the stickfighting art of jogo do pau of Portugal, where adherents regularly trained against multiple opponents and for being ambushed from behind.

More likely, this illustration points to the existence of a judge/referee who is responsible for seeing to it that both contestants hew to the already agreed-upon terms of a clean match. The figure of a judge/ referee is without a doubt known to exist in the later times, not only in the juego del palo, but also in the lucha canaria (Canarian wrestling), as a “fair man.” It would be safe to say, this man was a direct predecessor of the actual referees of the lucha canaria at present.

The presence of a judge-referee character is also widely mentioned in the 20th century, both in the written records, and oral histories of the challenge matches of the jugadores del palo. Written records describe these types of personages “who were employed with great ea-

gerness” by those involved in these types of duels. From this source, we get the impression that men did not go off to a secluded place to settle conclusions, but are more interested in demonstrating their skill and courage with a modicum of rules, in a way that to modern eyes appears like a sport. The account only dates to the beginning of the 19th century, a time when such words as “judge” or “referee” were not in general use in our language.

In 1900, a short story by the local author, Benito Pérez Armas, described in detail many of the social aspects and customs of this tradition. This story takes place in the city of Tenerife during the middle of the 19th century, in a place called San Miguel de Abona, and in the cañadas (ravines) near the active volcano of Mount Teide.

Here, a famous jugador del palo from the northeast of the island was looking to challenge someone to a public duel without being too concerned about having any rules to guide the match. Also included in this story are accounts of an allout type of fight between a jugador and three adversaries, and, finally, a private duel. Some notable aspects of this account include what seems to be the arbitrarily interchangeable use of the words, “palo”

and “garrote,” as the reference to the weapon used. Also, the author of the document even takes note of how these weapons were subject to regulation, noting how the “regulated” dimensions of these weapons should be checked to ensure they reach from the ground to the shoulder of the person holding the them. Finally, the author uses the term, “arte de jugar el palo,” or the “art of stick fighting,” to identify the number of different events he has written about, suggesting a shared understanding of what this art was among the islanders.

Also relevant is the identification of two distinct “schools” of the juego de palo existing at the time.

One of these schools uses a type of grip very close to what Diston reported 80 years earlier, where the operator would hold the stick around a third of the way from the end on both sides and strike with both ends of the stick in what is known as the juego de trozos y punta, or “slash and thrust style.” The other school called for the stick to be held with both hands towards the butt-end of the weapon. If the operator sought to switch up his attacks or blocks, it would first be necessary to determine which end of the stick he would use to strike. Then, the operator would swing the stick in a circular mo-

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tion to grip it by the other end. In what seems to be a contradiction, this school is known as the Escuela Majoera, or the “Goat School,” referencing a local species of goat native to the island of Fuerteventura.

From 1910 until now, the ethnographer and anthropologist, Juan Bentencourt Alfonso (1847-1913), would include the most up-to-date information available at the time in his exhaustive and unfinished multi-volume, “History of the Guanche People” (1995). In Chapters 13 and 17 of his book, entitled “Juegos Beñesmares Gimnástica,” the author draws on ethnographic data collected in his investigations of the pastimes of the indigenous inhabitants of Tenerife. In these

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chapters, he based his evidence primarily on creating links from the ethnographic data collected in his investigations in the countryside to the historical data from old documents. In the case of the juego de palo o garrote, as he called it, he also mentions two distinguished schools of garrote.

Juan Betencourt goes on to talk of the two great schools of trozo y punto, or “slash and thrust,” and the palo largo, or the “long stick.”

In detail, he carefully describes the technical characteristics of a variety of the second (palo largo) school—what he identifies as a mano fija, or “fixed grip,” and the juego cerrado, or “closed game”— while including the stances and

footwork patterns. He goes on to explain how they should be used at specific times to produce particular results during a match. Finally, he goes so far as to point out the regions of the island where the other school predominates.

The attention to detail shown in the writings makes one think that Juan Betencourt had a teacher, and that he was an active participant in this art. It might have been the same person of whom it was said: “in our youth, we were well acquainted with this manly sport.” Finally, we need to address that which was previously written above regarding the whirlpool of confusion resulting from the innumerable debates over the cor-

rect terms to use to describe the juego de palo, that began back in the 1970s. As regards proper terminology, let the reader be reminded that Juan Betencourt used the terms, “juego del palo” or “juego del garrote,” as well as “juego de palo o garrote,” interchangeably with no problem. In fact, he would often include these terms in the same sentence as he would use the terms, “palo,” “garrote,” or “estaca.”

An interview in the newspaper, Today, tells the story of a 76-yearold jugador by the name of José Morales Martín from the village of San Andrés, and his exhibition of the juego de palo the following day in the bull ring in the capital

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city, Santa Cruz de Tenerife. In this appearance, he showcased at least three of the lines of transmission best known from the northeast of Tenerife, appearing very competent, like a maestro. This was not the first time that it was recognized that he displayed the skills of a master. A photograph dated from 1920 shows him with a palo in his hand. A handwritten note on the picture from one of his students says, “Nicolás Morales, Master.” Overall, this ended up being a well-done interview that illustrat-

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ed some of the technical aspects of the juego de palo. In the conversation of this man, we see a master who does not resemble those stereotypical business-oriented teachers of East Asian martial arts that we often see. Instead, we see a master teaching solely out of the passion he has for his art, and the appreciation his students show him.

In this passage, D. José is clear: “. . . my students never failed to show me a lack of respect.” Continuing, he answers, “yes, sir; I still call myself a man from the countryside . . . because it costs a lot less,” and talks about how he doesn’t charge a lot for classes: “two or three pesetas for a class.” Furthermore, he affirms that, in the past, he had learned from women and had lived in Cuba during two periods of his life, totaling at least 20 years in all.

His teaching method is of interest to us, as it is conceptualized and taught in a systematic pedagogical manner. Each lesson builds on the previous in such a way that, as a student, one could gain a good level of skill in minimal time: “I explained that the juego is like one lesson from a book. You do not need much more than one month of training, and then you are ready.”

and make an inventory of his skills and abilities and then make a decision of what to do.”

Continuing to elaborate on this train of thought, José Morales Martín recounts how one time when he was fighting against four jugadores de palo at the same time, “I was only hit one time in the head.

Me alone, against four men fighting with my head cracked open during the fight.” The emphasis on the necessity of a practically oriented knowledge adaptable to any situation is also present in his views on the different lengths of palos. When speaking on the use of various lengths of palos, he advised students thus:

As to the content of his teaching, he says:

“Do the same things with a short stick what you would do with a long stick. However, with a palo largo (tall stick), you can hit a man anywhere, but the palo corto (short stick) is best to defend any attack. A bastoncito (walking stick) is all you need.”

“I want it to be clear that we teach a practical, useful type of knowledge, which can be called ‘self-defense.’ But that what I teach, I can tell you I go wherever I wish to go and go whenever I want to go. So, every jugador I come across must himself look deep down in himself

Finally, one realizes that, when one has a true understanding of the juego, “one can even defend oneself from a palo of any length with only a penknife in their hand.”

Then one comes to understand that they do not even need a weapon—“. . . that the juego de palo

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(fighting with sticks) or the juego de mano (fighting with the hands), it’s all the same.” Towards the end of the interview, he suggests that one eventually reaches the point where their understanding deepens to such a degree that they can knock down an aggressor without causing him any injury, in this way attaining a pure victory. “If you do not believe me, I tell you to strike me any way you want without holding back, and I will throw you to the ground, so you end up with your belly facing the sky.”

Notwithstanding everything above, the interviewer made clear that he did not need a demonstration from the old man to believe his claims of what he can do to the interviewer. Furthermore, the interviewer understands the great respect he has for his art when he refers to the juego de palo as an “honorable art”—“I believe that the juego de palo is an ancient and honorable art, from the time of the Guanches.”

The fact of the public exhibition of the following day led to the interview and many mentions recognizing the many semi-public demonstrations of his skills, as he continues to regale the interviewer of his many adventures:

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“One time in Cuba as I was saying, I saw four black men sparring with machetes. I stopped to watch them, and they came up on both sides of me and said to me, ‘what are you looking at, Isleño (somebody from the Canary Islands)?’ And I answered them, ‘I stopped to look because I enjoyed it.’ They responded, ‘The art of the Isleños only works for the garrote and does not work with the machetes.’ I became enraged and responded by yelling, ‘The art of the Isleños works with whatever comes to hand.’ Then they began to smile, and we ended up all becoming friends.”

Between 1935 and 1975, many registered documents pointed to the regular performance of a considerable number of public demonstrations or exhibitions. Of these the most interesting here is the one from Puerto de la Cruz, dated 1938, between the jugadores, Tomás Déniz Hernández and Domingo Gutiérrez Martín. We also have the good fortune to have footage of Tomás recorded with a Super 8 camera. In this footage, one can clearly see an example of the juego de palo largo, which corresponds to other sources already mentioned in this article. Moreover, there is also a short recording of him shot in 1953, with one of his brothers.

We only have written documentation from one of the only public competitions put on in 1955—although oral sources usually mention the semi-private character of these affairs at this time that often took place at the Plaza de Toros, or the bull ring in Santa Cruz de Tenerife. The lucha canaria competitions are often associated with such towns as Güímar and La Orotava, and featured, among others, a few women who gave public demonstrations of their skill in the juego de palo, such as Doña Luciana Díaz Rodríguez. A chronicler writing of this has this to say: “The impending combat had aroused a great expectation in the sportswriters of Tenerife as being the first time that a woman hailing from Tenerife who has stepped into the marked boundaries to engage in the juego de garrote.”

To conclude this brief review of source documents of the juego del palo, we feel compelled to remark on an interview done in the late 1950s conducted by the journalist, Luis Álvarex Cruz, with a wellknown female jugadora. With her, we hear a phrase that thoroughly summarizes the real sense of the sometimes-reviled name, “juego,” and why there is another reason for the misunderstanding of the name.

“The maestros do not teach anything but the ‘science’ behind the art, anything else, no . . . so there is an element of the art that cannot be learned. Each teacher has an edge, an intuitive realization.

It cannot be taught and cannot be learned. So, everyone must discover it through their own means.”

Conclusion We believe that one especially significant result emerging from a review of the available documents is a clear image of the juego del palo from the mid-1970s, drawing exclusively from available information during this time. There is a conviction that this image is hardly affected by what is subsequently known about the tradition, to the date which I have taken as a reference, so we propose it is valid to describe the principal characteristics of the juego del palo of the Canary Islands in the following manner—namely: 1) The juego del palo canario is a pre-literate systemized repertoire of tactics for operating a weapon; in other words, a “juego,” and, in this case, with a “stick” with aggressive intent.

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2) The technical systemization of the art does not restrict itself to the handling of a variety of wooden sticks, but also relies on a more fundamental set of combative-oriented concepts implemented with, or without, a range of different weapons. These concepts integral to combat form the basis both for fencing (juego de palo) and pugilism (juego de mano); in other words, leaving out, in general, the grabs and holds that would best correspond with its Canarian cultural counterpoint, the Canary wrestling. These concepts form a part of a technical repertoire that affects both offensive and defensive tactics.

3) In contrast to the widespread idea regarding the general secrecy surrounding the practice, the documents show that teaching was open to the public, and evidence advertising paid classes is documented as far back as the 17th century, so that any traditions of secrecy could have been seen an exception to the generally held view of the transmission of the art.

4) There is a pattern of public demonstrations in Canarian society beginning from pre-European times until the present in the form of exhibitions, festivals, challenges, or public competitions that were

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not intentionally hidden, and, at times, held quite open to the public. Clearly, the term, “juego,” was merely a descriptive term and later given a cultural meaning. The sources demonstrate that, without a doubt, the popular idea that the juego de palo came out of some remote past and subsequently became a quaint sport, is absolutely false. There is a history of public demonstrations showcasing its practicality and usefulness for self-defense.

5) Several documents show that regulated competitions were an institutionalized aspect of a traditional juego del palo from at least the middle of the 19th century.

There is no reason we cannot assume these types of regulated contests did not exist even earlier. In fact, we believe it should be a manifestation of the indigenous inhabitants. These two aspects go back as far as the 16th century.

6) From a strictly technical point of view, and central to stick fencing, the documentation shows the existence of two broad tendencies.

One involves the firm grasp of the stick at, or near, the center of the stick, while the other hand grasps towards one the ends. If one seeks to grip the other end of the stick, one simply slips the one hand up to

the center while the second slides to the other end. This is called the “juego of two ends” (juego de dos puntas) or the “game of strikes” (juego de trozos). One may also firmly grab the stick about a third of the way up in a way that both hands are gripping one end of the stick. The hand toward the end remains stable. If one seeks to switch to a completely different grip, though, the stable hand can move, and the other hand can take the role of the stable or fixed one.

These ways of gripping the stick are known as the juego por una punta, juego de palo largo, juego de mano firme, or the juego de recogidos.

terreno (“juego of continuous moving”), also known as a juego abierto (“open juego”). The first examples seem to correspond more with the juego de palo largo y mano fija (“juego of the long stick and fixed hand”) of the first group,m while the second appears more typical of the juego de puntos y trozos.

7) The available sources also tell of two other strategic ranges of seemingly lesser importance.

One involves maintaining fixed postures and moving the palo to either the outside or inside of one’s body depending on the opponent’s movements. This game is known as the juego de cuadras firmes (“juego of strong stances”) or alternately as the juego cerrado (“closed juego”). Finally, there is another juego that avoids meeting force with unmovable force, with a tendency to launch attacks at unpredictable times or unfamiliar angles—known as the juego sin cumplir con las cuadras sobre el

Alejandro Rodriguez Buenafuente @alejandro.rodriguezbuenafuente

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LA CANNE DE COMBAT Nicole Holzmann

DUELING WITH SHARP weapons was an upper-class phenomenon from as early as the modern age until the end of the 18th century and often resulted in severe injuries or fatalities. It was also customary to carry an epée to defend oneself against assaults in cities like Paris. The French Revolution put an end to that, banning all swords and other fencing weapons from the streets of France. And anyone caught dueling was severely dealt with by a judge.

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At that time, criminal gangs had already established kicking techniques that they called "savate" after a designation for “old shoe” and utilized canes as weapons. For the upper class, being stripped of their sharp weapons but used to carrying canes as walking aids or as a fashion statement, the idea of adopting the kicking and cane techniques as a self-defensive alternative was not far-fetched.

And so, savate and la canne found their way into France’s gymnasiums

and fencing halls. While the techniques of English boxing had been incorporated into savate and had become known as boxe française around 1830, la canne became part of the standard repertoire of weapons taught by fencing teachers. They further developed la canne techniques based on sabre fencing. Different styles and directions shaped by different masters emerged, and soldiers in the French army learned savate and la

canne. These defensive weapons were unified in 1843 by Louis Leboucher in his work, Théorie pour apprendre tirer la canne en vingtcinq leçons (“The theory behind learning how to fight with la canne in twenty-five lessons”).

Towards the end of the 19th century, the streets of Paris became safer, and the self-defensive aspect of la canne became less important.

In 1899, Joseph Charlemont pub-

lished his textbook, L’art de la boxe française et de la canne: nouveau traité théorique et pratique (“The art of la boxe française and la canne: new theoretical and practical essays”). In this book, Charlemont championed the shifting of savate and la canne to a more sporting-oriented event. His method was employed when la canne was a demonstration sport in the Paris Olympic Games of 1900 and 1924.

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With World War I came the decline of the two arts; the era of the Belle Époque was over, and walking canes became unpopular. Many practitioners and masters had fallen in battle. After World War II, it took some time until savate and la canne recovered.

In the 1950s, Roger Lafond established a unique method. The attacking strikes became more circular with an extended forearm mainly out of the wrist, still strongly resembling sabre fencing techniques. Attempts to further develop la canne towards a dynamic and modern competition sport, setting up rules and eliminating dangerous strikes, followed in the years. A repertoire of techniques became standardized and described in Maurice Sarry’s book, La Canne: Arme de defense, sport de combat (“The walking stick: defensive weapon, combat sport”) from the late 1970s, which is the basis for the sport that we today know under the name, “la canne de combat.”

In the same time frame, savate underwent a similar development from a mainly self-defensive art towards a competitive sport. From 1965, French savateurs organized themselves in a national commission called Comité National de Boxe Française, and ten years later, the French Savate Federation was founded, uniting both la boxe française and la canne de combat under one roof. The first la canne de combat competitions took place in 1979 and saw the establishment of the first French championship one year later.

Another ten years later, in 1985, the International Savate Federations, or FISav, was founded.

World championships in la canne de combat were first realized in the French overseas department of Ile de la Réunion in 2004, initially as a separate event and with a four-year frequency. Since 2016, la canne de combat world championships joined with savate assaut, the light-contact variant of boxe française, and a two-year cycle.

Today, national federations from more than 60 countries and all five continents belong to the International Federation. The FISav is a member federation of the GAISF (Global Association of International Sports Federations) and was featured in the 2013 World Combat Games in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Currently, the FISav is applying for recognition as an Olympic sport.

Alongside la canne de combat, several associated cane and staff disciplines were developed with or parallel to la canne—for instance, the addition of savate kicks to the la canne strikes known as la canne chausson (“cane with slipper”), or the variant with two sticks, double la canne, which is based on la canne techniques to a great degree but using two hands and carried out with either 140 or 120 cm staves.

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Historically, up to the shoulder height is the batôn fédérale. A longer staff of between 160 and 180 cm, traditionally up to nose height and used with a different gripping technique, is common for batôn de joinville. Their unique swinging techniques distinguish it from other methods.

Several different groups in France have experimented with competition formats for several of the associated disciplines. So far, only la canne de combat has established itself as an international competitive sport.

World Combat Games 2013 in St. Petersburg, Russia.

[Photo courtesy of Ollie Batts]

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TECHNIQUES OF LA CANNE

With its development towards a competitive sport, most self-defensive elements of la canne de combat were deemed too dangerous and no longer practiced. Some of its techniques, movements, and tactical rules might appear counterintuitive to practitioners of other martial arts. Overall, la canne’s techniques are more fluid and spacious than short and effective. The proper execution of the strike is as important as the target hit itself. Consequently, la canne is an elegant and stylish sport that is very appealing for spectators.

Before we get into more detail about the specifics of la canne de combat, we would like to note that, as the sport is relatively young, the rules regarding the competition setup and the techniques are in

flux and have been subject to various changes over the years. Regulations may also differ between different national and international federations. Our explanations aim to take this into account.

The weapon used in competition is a straight and slightly conical 95-cm-long cane weighing between 100 and 120 grams, made of chestnut wood and wielded with one hand. The lower quarter on the thicker end is designated as the grip area and may be wrapped with tape to reduce slipping. The “upper quarter” or quart supérieur is the hitting area. While it is allowed to use the entire cane length to parry incoming strikes, only the upper quarter is a valid area to hit your opponent’s target areas.

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There are three designated target areas: the head (from the sides, the front, and the top, but not the back), the torso (the area below the breast and above the pelvic bone, depending on the rule set either only front and sides or all way around) and the lower legs (below the knee and above the ankle, and all way around). The protective equipment consists of a padded jacket, trousers and gloves, a padded fencing mask, shin pads, and a breast guard for female athletes or a cup for male athletes.

The fighting area is a circle with a diameter of nine meters, denoted by markings on the floor.

Unlike classical fencing, where the athletes only move forward and backward, cannists are free to move in every direction within this area and leave the fighting axis by moving to the side, which is called décalage or débordement.

Consequently, the footwork and movements in la canne somewhat resemble martial arts like boxing or savate rather than the classical fencing disciplines.

La Canne de Combat World Championship 2014 in Budapest, Hungary.

[Photo courtesy of Ollie Batts]

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In la canne, there are six striking techniques. Each strike needs to fulfill six technical criteria for a hit to be valid. We will only describe two of the strikes in more detail.

The techniques are distinguishable by their trajectory plane, whether the attacker executes the strike on the exterior side of the body (i.e., the side of the weapon-holding hand) or the interior side of the body (i.e., the side opposite the weapon-holding hand), and for the

vertical strikes, whether they target the high or the low target areas. The techniques are: the latéral extérieur (horizontal exterior), the latéral croisé (horizontal interior), the brisé (vertical exterior, high line), the croisé haut / croisé tête (vertical interior, high line), the enlevé (vertical exterior, low line) and the croisé bas / croisé jambe (vertical interior, low line). The horizontal strikes can target all three areas, while the vertical ones are limited to either the head or the legs.

La Canne de Combat World Championship 2014 in Budapest, Hungary.

[Photo courtesy of Ollie Batts]

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SIX TECHNICAL CRITERIA FOR LA CANNE DE COMBAT STRIKES The cannist has an obligation to:

1) Prepare a strike with an armé 2) Carry out a lunge/fente when attacking the legs 3) Respect the horizontal or vertical plane of the strike 4) Carry out the cane rotation behind the spine 5) Engage an open >90°, shoulder-arm angle in the moment of target contact 6) Fully extend the arm with the cane in prolongation of the arm at the moment of target contact

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The initial position for the strikes is usually the so-called garde normale, where the foot corresponding to your weapon hand is slightly in front, and the cane is pointing upwards in a neutral where it is not endangering your opponent’s position. It is, however, also allowed to carry out strikes from the garde opposée, with the foot opposite of the weapon hand leading.

However, for most people, the execution of the techniques seems to

be easier from the normal guard position. It is allowed and customary to change both the guard position and the weapon hand as one sees fit. The ability to change one’s guard position and weapon hand is an important feature in la canne de combat. It ensures that you can attack from every position and out of every situation, no matter how and where you or your opponent have moved within the circular fighting area.

Evolution of latéral extérieur, including guard (far left) and armé (third from left) position

Here, we would like to illustrate the technical rules for the la canne de combat strikes with the example of the latéral extérieur (horizontal exterior) strike. Like every strike, the latéral extérieur begins with a preparation movement. First, the armé: the body is rotated by 90° into the direction of your weapon hand (i.e., exterior), so clockwise if you are holding the cane in your right hand. With this rotation, you place your weapon hand

behind your spinal cord and bring the cane into a horizontal position over your head, the tip of the cane pointing toward your opponent.

In the execution of the strike, the cane has to fulfill a full circle until it reaches the target. The largest part of the circular movement of the cane has to occur behind your spine. At the same time, the horizontal plane of the strike maintains its integrity. Practically this means that, from the armé position, you

first only move the cane in your hand. When, during the rotation, the cane passes behind your body, you extend and straighten your arm and start your delayed body rotation. The cane is supposed to finish its rotation together with your body, hitting your target from the side. During the last quarter of the strike, the weapon arm is fully extended and elongated until contact. If your opponent is not your size or if you attack the torso, it is, of course, not possible to carry out the strike with the cane perfectly

The fente arrière (backward lunge).

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horizontal. Thus, it is allowed to deviate from horizontality slightly.

However, there must be no kinks or waves in the overall trajectory.

And the cane point must not drop or rise out of the modified plane.

One must carry out a lunge or fente when attacking the legs to avoid a diagonal trajectory. Due to the fente, the cannist’s body and thus the cane’s trajectory is lowered, facilitating the horizontal plane of the strike. In a fente, one leg has to be bent (while rules differ on the extent of the flexion), and one

needs to stretch out. In la canne, we distinguish between two kinds of lunges: the fente avant (forward lunge) where the front leg flexes— this is basically the same lunge as utilized in classical fencing—and the fente arrière (backward lunge), where the front leg stretches out and the back leg is bent. During an exchange, the cannists often change their relative position to each other. It is not unusual to see both lunges carried out to the side rather than strictly forward or backward. The fente avant and the fente arriére can still visually be easily distinguished, as, in the former, both legs are parallel, while in the latter, the bent leg is orthogonal to the straight leg.

The horizontal interior strike (latéral croisé) is carried out in the same way as the latéral extérieur, only the direction of body and the cane rotation reverses.

Target areas in la canne de combat: head, torso, and lower leg with fente avant.

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Likewise, vertical strikes work after the same principle. For example, let us look at the vertical exterior strike (brisé) that is aiming at the top of the opponent’s head. First, you take to the armé position by turning your body 90° clockwise, as this is again an exterior strike, and move your hand behind your spine, roughly at hip height. The cane lies on the plane along the fighting axis, which runs through you and your target. As for the vertical strikes, it is not always feasible to point the cane tip perfectly at your opponent. In these cases,

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the circular movement of the cane is reducible to about three quarters of a circle. In the brisé, you rotate the cane behind your spine, at first keeping your hand fixed at hip height. Only when the cane is in the rising phase of its trajectory behind your body do you start extending your arm and rotating your body. The cane is then supposed to hit your opponent’s head from the top while your arm is fully extended and elongated at the moment of contact. Ensure neither your hand nor the cane leave the vertical plane at any time during your strike.

Evolution of brisé, including guard (far left) and armé (third from left) position.

“The fact that la canne excludes close-distance combat is in contrast to most other martial arts and adds the challenge of correct distance-setting in every situation of the dynamic exchange during a bout.”

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Apart from the six technical criteria that all have to be met for a strike to be valid and score points, four more criteria come into play in the interaction with the opponent. The first is the obligation to abide by the parade/esquive-riposte (parry/evasion-riposte) rule found in foil and sabre fencing, where the first cannist initiating an attack has the right to complete it.

The opponent can only overtake this right of way when the defender avoids the hit by either a parry or by dodging the strike and answering with a riposte right away. This avoids situations where both cannists hit a target at the same time, disregarding the objective of hitting without being hit.

The second additional criterion states that only the last quarter of the cane can make contact with the opponent. This narrowly defines the distance at which you are allowed to hit. The fact that la canne excludes close-distance combat is in contrast to most other martial arts and adds the challenge of correct distance-setting in every situation of the dynamic exchange during a bout. This was established when la canne moved away from self-defense towards a competitive sport, and close-range techniques like strangleholds or two-handed parries were discard-

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ed. Classical fencing does possess close-range techniques like the attack out of the neuvième parry, or pulling your weapon arm high and behind your back close to the rear shoulder. However, it is customary to pause the bout if the fencer’s bodies touch or if the exchange gets too unclear for the judge to follow. However, in fencing, you usually want to close the distance to your opponent when attacking, while backward movements are normally for evasion. In la canne, it is also sometimes necessary to open the distance when attacking.

This is achieved mainly by footwork, but specific techniques like the fente arrière (backward lunge) can be used to open the distance to your opponent during your strike.

This particular lunge does not, for example, exist in classical fencing.

The third criterion is about the impact of the hits, which are supposed only to be a touch and without force. La canne de combat is a light-contact sport that does not focus on the strike’s effectiveness or harming an opponent, but rather it is about technique and scoring points. The last criterion covers the designated target areas: the head except the back, the torso between the breast and pelvic bone, and the thighs between the knee and the ankle.

Esquive-riposte Top: Left cannist partially dodges by lifting her front leg while preparing her own strike.

Bottom: Right cannist dodges by jumping while striking.

Later, additional rules came into play to prevent dangerous or destructive play. For instance, it is prohibited to destroy your opponent’s distance by advancing into an ongoing strike—the anti-jeu rule.

In competition, a referee is present in the fighting area who is responsible for the correct proceeding of the bout for the safety of the fighters, such as remarking on rule violations. There are three scoring judges, one sitting at every 120° around the nine-meter-diameter circle, to cover every viewing angle. They have the complex task of evaluating whether hits were carried out according to the criteria— as the fight is not stopped after

each hit as in fencing, and the judges only have a very short time window to do so. Rather than mentally ticking off boxes for one criterion after another, the judges assess the “global image,” or l’image globale, and whether the techniques are free from dissonances. They then score by hits, either done openly by lifting a blue or yellow colored flag associated with the fighter who scored a hit or using concealed clickers. An alternative scoring system similar to the one used in savate or boxing is currently in trial. Here, the judges evaluate which fighter is predominating according to their observations and then assign a score for each round. A bout consists of three to five rounds

“La canne de combat is a light-contact sport that does not focus on the strike’s effectiveness or harming an opponent, but rather it is about technique and scoring points.”

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[Photo courtesy of Svetlana Drobinskaya]

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of one and a half or two minutes.

Another more casual competition format is where teams of two or three cannists take turns in a bout of up to nine minutes. This method of scoring is employed in three well-established and annually held friendly team competitions in France: the Titis Parisiens in Paris, the Miladiou in Toulouse, and the Bazhataeg in Quimper.

As you might have remarked, la canne is a very technical sport, and the technical rules for the validity of the strikes might appear daunting for the la canne novice at first. Having previous knowledge in other martial arts, especially savate, will surely facilitate your entry. Although it visually is not necessarily recognizable, the principle of body rotation with a punch or kick is an element in numerous martial arts. And once you tackle the techniques, la canne leaves a lot of liberty around the sole techniques and gives room to develop your own style. Also, the limited number of six striking techniques and two lunges might appear quite restrictive at first glance, but combinations and variations, such as secondary techniques like feints, jumps, turns, or cane manipula-

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tions, are allowed as long as they are not violating any rules. Some of the latter have been developed recently by athletes, but others have a historical background. Charlemont, for instance, described in 1899 already that voltes or “turns” can be employed when fighting against several opponents and should be used to move towards free space.

Lately, there have been attempts to emphasize the stylistic aspects of la canne de combat by modifying the competition rules. These trends aim towards awarding points for style and a broad variety of applied techniques rather than solely focusing on hits.

La canne de combat has a lot to offer: on the one hand, it is a dynamic and tactical competitive sport; on the other hand, it is quite technical but elegant at the same time.

As a young sport, there is a lot of room for creative development and contribution to shaping it in the future. If you have the opportunity to try it out, grab it!

[All photos in this article were provided by courtesy of Henti Smith, unless otherwise indicated.]

Nicole Holzmann @ nicole.holzmann.980

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THE EUROPEAN QUARTERSTAFF A HISTORICAL REVIEW Steaphen Fick

THE QUARTERSTAFF IS AN iconic weapon used in history and fiction for self-defense and war.

Staff weapons are some of the oldest weapons of war and defense, and every culture has staff work and uses a long staff for combat.

In the European tradition, we do the same, and it is used as a training tool for other weapons as well.

The staff was most commonly cut from ash, oak, or some other hard

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wood. Higher quality staves were also often tipped with metal on either end to add to the force of the strike.

We have all seen the picture or video of Robin Hood fighting Little John with a quarterstaff on a bridge over a creek, but how did they use the staff weapons? In the European tradition, the staff weapon is taught as a staple in the mar-

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tial tradition. The “quarterstaff” is called so because you hold onto one quarter of the staff and hold three quarters of the staff between you and the opponent (Figure 1).

The use of the staff changed in Europe when the staff moved from self-defense usage to more sporting usage. In war settings, the staff was held with a long part extended forward more like a two-handed sword. Once the staff was being used more for sports, the practitioners started to rely more on methods and techniques of “halfstaff (Figure 2).”

When using the staff in the “halfstaff” grip, the practitioner is closer to the opponent and therefore not as much force is developed in the strike. When you are using the staff in the “quarterstaff” grip, you hold the staff to your measurements; the back hand is the length of your forearm from the butt of the staff, and your lead hand is the length of your forearm above that.

When holding the staff like this, you are using your staff as you would hold and use a two-handed sword.

Figure 1

Figure 2

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The quarterstaff

Le Jeu de la Hache is a French manuscript that translates to “The Play of the Axe,” written around 1400 by an anonymous Milanese fencing master who was in service to Phillip II, “the Bold,” the Duke of Burgundy. The poleaxe is a knightly weapon that was used for warfare and for dueling. The poleaxe is a staff weapon that has a dague (dagger) at one end and a queue on the other end that often has a butt spike. The poleaxe has a hammer and a spike right below the dague.

The poleaxe is a crushing weapon with thrusting points at every angle. When the word “pole” is used in the word “poleaxe,” it is not talking about the haft of the weapon; the hammer is called a “pole” or “poll.” The poleaxe is also another name for the battle axe.

The halberd

The author of Le Jeu de la Hache says that you should hold the poleaxe so that you have space behind your back hand; that you can use the queue to defend with and you can start with either the dague or the queue forward. When you are holding onto your weapon, you cannot cross your arms against your body because of the weight of the weapon. When you have your right foot forward, you should have your right shoulder forward.

If your left foot is forward, your left shoulder should be, too. You can shift your grip so either hand is leading, but you need to transfer your hands so that you do not take one hand off the weapon and are able to keep contact with both hands on the haft of your weapon.

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The poleaxe (left), bardiche (middle), and partisan (right)

The bec di corbin

When you hold the poleaxe in the middle of the haft, they call it demi hache. Because of the weight of the weapon he also says that you can “. . . give him a hard blow with all your strength, simply to see whether you can hurl him on the ground.”

Almost all the footwork in Le Jeu de la Hache are passing steps when you use the dague or the queue so that you are moving the ends of your weapon with your footwork.

In 1410, there was a manuscript called Fior di Battaglia (The Flower of Battle) written by Fiore de’i Liberi. He was a master in the Bolognese style. In his manuscript, he shows techniques for the spear, the poleaxe, and the club. He uses the spear in the fashion of the longsword. Many of his guards for the spear are the same as we see in the longsword. His spear work includes thrusting and cutting techniques. You will even see some of the techniques in the mounted combat section when he is using the lance from horseback. Fiore also teaches actions with the pole-

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The lochaber

The spear

axe and says that many of his techniques come from the longsword section. He uses footwork to his advantage that allows the player to move off the line, so that he can control the center line and dominate the line of the adversary’s attack. With his footwork, he uses steps called Accressere (the advance), Discressere (the retire), Mezza Volta (the passing step), and Tutta Volta (the complete turn where you move your body around the staff weapon as opposed to moving the weapon around your body).

In the 1540s, Paulus Hector Mair published a two-volume collection of German fencing manuscripts1 that included every fencing treatise that he could obtain. In his manuscript, he has instructions on the use of the short staff which he calls the spiess (spear), the lance which he calls langen spiess (long spear), the poleaxe which he calls the mordagst (murder axe), the halberd, and what he calls the peasant stick, a tree branch around three and a half feet long.

1 David James Knight and Brian Hunt, The Polearms of Paulus Hector Mair (Paladin Press, 2008).

The Swedish axe

Figure 3

Figure 4

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The short staff is a thrusting spear just over six feet long. Mair states that “the short staff is the base of all long weapons.” Mair uses the Latin name hastula, which is a diminutive form of the word hasta, meaning spear. He suggests that the fencer should stand in a linear stance and use linear footwork (Figure 3), and use the short staff as a training tool for the spear. In his section on the short spear, he tells the reader to hold the staff with the back hand at the end of the staff and with the lead hand around the middle of the staff (Figure 4). He also describes techniques that hold the staff in “half-staff,” in which you hold your hands about shoulder width apart and with an even amount of staff extending out on either side of your hands.

When he teaches the students about the long staff (the pike), he is using a staff that is 12 feet to 16 feet long. With this long staff, he holds the staff with his back hand at the base of the staff and his lead hand at arm’s length with a slight bend in the elbow, or alternatively, with both hands held together at the end of the staff when you are pushing your staff through your lead hand so that your hands come together in a thrust. This grip gives you the greatest reach possible with your long staff. He also uses the long staff by moving the staff in his hands so that he is in the middle of the staff with his hands a little wider than shoulder width. He uses this half-staff grip for closing in on his opponent.

staff weapon, you can use any staff weapon. At the beginning of his section on staff weapons, he says that: “. . . foreasmuch as I am of opinion that all of them may be handled in manner after one waye, it shall not be amisse if I declare the reason thereof . . . holding and maintaining always for my conclusion that the skill of handling of them helpeth a man to the knowledge of all the rest, for as much as concerneth true Arte.”

He also gives instructions on the use of the bill, the halberd, the partisan, and the javelin. Because these weapons have thrusting points as well as cutting edges, he suggests that you can thrust and cut with

The poleaxe and the halberd are used in the same way as the short staff. The movement of your hands from the end of the staff to the middle of the staff also means that the practitioner can use the staff to enter range to grapple with his opponent (Figure 5).

In a manuscript called His True Arte of Defence written by Giacomo di Grassi in 1570 and translated into English in 1594, di Grassi gives instructions for using the staff as a defensive and offensive weapon. He says that if you can use one Figure 5

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this tool, and points to the dangers of each of these techniques. With these tools he suggests that you take a low guard with the hands somewhat distant and the point of the weapon directly towards the enemy. Copies of this manuscript can be found online at: https:// wiktenauer.com/wiki/Giacomo_ di_Grassi In Joachim Meyer’s manuscript called Gründtliche Beschreibung der Kunst des Fechtens (Thorough Descriptions of the Art of Fencing)2 first published in 1570, he teaches the use of a variety of weapons and says all of them find their fundamentals in the dussack. His quarterstaff is also used to teach his techniques for the two-handed sword and the halberd. Meyer says that if you are right-handed, you should hold the staff with your left hand on top and with your right hand at the base of the staff. In this grip, your right hand should be about a hand’s width from the end of the staff while the other hand should be at arm’s length (Figure 6), but slightly bent. He says that this grip gives you more options for thrusting and one-handed strikes. Meyer 2 Joachim Meyer, The Art of Combat: A German Martial Arts Treatise of 1570, trans. Jeffrey L. Forgeng (Frontline Books, 2020).

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The dussack

Figure 6

says that you can also hold the staff in the middle with your hands just a little wider than your shoulders; however, the most common grip in his treatise is with your hands closer to the end of the staff (Figure 7).

Meyer says that you should stand in a narrow stance with your left foot in front and your right foot behind at 90 degrees, with your weight more to the front leg (Figure 8). Your stance is in a profiled position whereas in Swetnam and Silver the stance is more of a wider stance so that your body is at about 45 degrees to the opponent.

In his 1599 book, Paradoxes of Defense3, George Silver talks about the use of two types of staves—the short staff and the quarterstaff.

When discussing the length of the short staff, he says: “ . . . the perfect length is measured by standing upright, holding the staff upright close by your body, with your left hand, reaching with your right hand your staff as high as you can and then allow (add) to that length a space to set both your hands (approximately the width of your shoulders) . . . these lengths will commonly fall out to be eight or nine foot long.”

Figure 7 (top) & Figure 8 (bottom)

The boarding pike (half-pike)

ger, or rapier and poignard. Silver has four guards with the short staff: two high guards and two low guards, two with the point up and two with the point down.

He also says:3 “ . . . (and) if a blow be first made, a thrust followeth; & if a thrust be first made, a blow followeth; and in doing of any of them, the one breedeth the other.”

Silver says that the short staff has the advantage against the battle axe (this is the poleaxe), the bill, or the halberd because of its nimbleness and length. The short staff is also known as the half-pike and was a common weapon on the sailing ships of the day that were used to protect against boarding actions from other ships. He says that the short staff will have the advantage against opponents with two swords, sword and dag3 George Silver, The Works Of George Silver: Comprising Paradoxes Of Defense And Bref Instructions Vpo My Pradoxes Of Defense (1898), ed. C.G.R Matthey (Kessinger Publishing, 2010).

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The grip that George Silver suggests is that you should have about a foot of length behind your rear hand on any weapon in which the hands may be removed and be at liberty to make the weapon longer or shorter in a fight at your pleasure.

The long staff could be up to 12 feet long and the pike could reach up to 16-18 feet long. Some of the other weapons that the short staff may come up against on the battlefield could be things like the battle axe. The bill, the battle axe, and the halberd were usually around five to six feet long.

In his 1617 manual The Noble and Worthy Science of Defence, Master Joseph Swetnam also talks about the use of the quarterstaff. He has two guards that he suggests for the staff: the high guard and the low guard.

Figure 10 (top) & Figure 11 (bottom)

In the “low guard” (Figure 10), Swetnam says that: “ . . . you should keep the point of your staff aimed at the face of your opponent with one hand at the very butt end of the staff, and the other a foot and a half distant.

Looking over your staff with both

your eyes. In this guard the hands are low, and the point of the staff is high, but not so high that you cannot look over the point at your opponent’s face.”

Swetnam’s other guard is the “high guard” (Figure 11). In the high guard your hands are high, and your point is low towards the

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ground. Swetnam says that you use this guard if the opponent attacks you with a blow or thrust to a low target below your “girdle-stead.”

This would be around the navel.

He says it is very important that, when you use the high guard to defend against a low attack, you should swing your staff in a circular movement to strike the attack away. He also says: “ . . . (by) turning the point of your Staffe towards the ground, but be sure to strike it with that large compasse, that the point of your Staffe towards the ground, but be sure to strike it with that large compasse, that the point of your Staffe may pitch not in the ground.”

When you defend against a thrust or blow in this fashion, he suggests that you should let go with your forehand so that the adversary cannot hit your hand, and the back of your staff will still protect the upper part of your body. Most of Swetnam’s defenses are done with blows, and his offenses are completed with thrusts, which we see as the predominant style of fencing in the 17th century.

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In both systems by Silver and Swetnam, the stance is such that you match the like foot to like foot. If the adversary has his right foot forward, then you should have your right foot forward. When you are standing in your guard, you should not cross your arms in your grip. If you have your right foot forward, your right hand should be on the top of your grip. Swetnam calls this the “true carriage of your Staffe,” and Silver calls this grip the “true grip” of the short staff. Silver says that if you are using a long staff, over eight feet long, it is important to keep your hands close together.

In the 19th century, we see a resurgence of the “Grand Baton” used as a training tool in savate, and Alfred Hutton taught the Grand Baton in the form of the Italian two-handed sword called the spadone, which was a popular two-handed sword of the 16th and 17th centuries. In the 19th century, we see the first renaissance of HEMA (Historic European Martial Arts).

At Davenriche European Martial Artes School, the quarterstaff is taught in the Italian tradition. We use the staff with the rear hand about one and a half feet from the end of the staff (or the length of your forearm from your wrist to your elbow; this is also the length of the medieval thrusting dagger) and the lead hand the same distance from the rear hand as shown in the pictures here. The stance we use puts your body at a 45-degree angle to your opponent, to facilitate both thrusting and cutting techniques. We do not cross our arms in our movements because we do the same techniques with

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the spear, the staff, and the poleaxe. When we move from one side of our body to the other side, we do our transfer without taking the hand off the staff. The way we do this is by opening all the fingers on the lead hand except for the thumb and ring finger (Figure 12). We slide the rear hand up to connect with the encircling fingers of the lead hand (Figure 13). Once the rear hand has contacted the lead hand, we slide the

Figure 12

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lead hand down over the new lead hand without taking it off the staff (Figure 14). As you bring your rear hand to your lead hand, your staff should be straight up and down, thus maintaining your defense in the transfer. Do not step forward until you have your staff upright in front of your body so that you are moving behind your weapon.

This allows you to develop power in your strike without ever taking your hands off the staff.

Figure 13

Figure 14

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Figure 15(a)

When you are moving your staff in circular motions, your lead hand stays in place at full extension (but not locked) and the rear hand moves the point using your lead hand as a fulcrum (Figure 15(a)(d)). This is the kind of action that allows you to do beating attacks to the opponent’s staff without moving your defense away from the front of your body.

There are many techniques in the use of staff weapons in various manuscripts. There are several German manuscripts that show the spear used alone as well as with a sword or buckler, as shown

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Figure 15(b)

in Gladiatoria, MS KK5013.4 Whether it is a staff alone, one that has end caps to add to the weight of the strike, or one that has complex ends such as the spear, the poleaxe, the bill, and the partisan, the techniques and movements of the staff are similar. There is another master who wrote in the Bolognese tradition that takes the teachings of Fiore de’i Liberi and teaches the reader the same kind of techniques for dueling rather than usage on the battlefield. The author is Philippo di Vadi Pisano, 4 The MS KK5013 is a German fencing manual from circa 1430 that is currently in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, Austria.

Figure 15(c)

Figure 15(d)

who wrote his manuscript called De Arte Gladiatoria Dimicandi (On the Art of Swordsmanship).5 I will end this article with a verse from Vadi’s manuscript in the poleaxe section: “Knowing how cunning human nature is, and for everyone who is practiced in the art can understand all the actions depicted and shown in this, my little work, mainly of the sword, the axe, the spear and the dagger.”

5 Philippo di Vadi, De Arte Gladiatoria Dimicandi (lulu.com, 2019).

Steaphen Fick @ steaphen.fick

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THE USE OF POLEARMS:

JOACHIM MEYER, THE 16TH-CENTURY FENCING MASTER Roger Norling

JOACHIM MEYER WAS BORN in 1537 in Basel of today’s Switzerland. His father, Jakob, was likely a papermaker and a cutler and may have moved to nearby Straßburg sometime before 1560. Joachim Meyer was noted as a burger and cutler in Straßburg in 1560 when he married a widow named Appolonia Ruhlman.

In his short, 34-year life, he became a renowned fencing master, teaching burgers, dukes, and princes and authoring five or six extensive fencing treatises, three

Portrait of Joachim Meyer, from Gründtliche Beschreibung der . . . Kunst des Fechtens (1570), public domain.

[Courtesy of Wiktenauer by HEMA Alliance]

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preserved, two of which are translated into modern English by Dr. Jeffrey Forgeng. Meyer wrote one treatise specifically for Duke Otto von Solms-Sonnewalde, who likely received Meyer in 1568. His second treatise, Gründtliche Beschreibung der Freyen, Ritterlichen und Adeligen Kunst des Fechtens (A Thorough Description of the Free, Knightly and Noble Art of Combat), was printed and written with both young boys and experienced soldiers in mind.

This was an exceptionally innovative and even revolutionary treatise in its pedagogical approach to teaching martial arts, teaching not just how to fight but also how to

learn how to fight. His third treatise was never completed or published and is a collection of older fencing treatises by earlier fencing masters, as well as a section of his own—on the rapier—bringing together his own learnings, having studied under Italian, Spanish, Neapolitan, French and German fencing masters.

All three treatises are directly attached to predominantly protestant dukes and princes. The second was the printed treatise dedicated to Johann Casimir—Count Palatine of the Rhine—a powerful man serving directly under the emperor.

Source: Gründtliche Beschreibung der . . . Kunst des Fechtens (1570), public domain .[Courtesy of Wiktenauer by HEMA Alliance]

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In 1571, a year after publishing his printed treatise, Meyer had taken an appointment as fencing master at the court of Duke Johann Albrecht of Mecklenburg. He was the same duke who gave the Freifechter von der Feder their first official recognition in Schwerin but seemingly caught ill while traveling to Schwerin and died two weeks later.

The Early Years Meyer’s time was an intense period of violent conflict, primarily between Catholics and protestants, various protestant groups, and infrequent mass murders of jews.

Mass slaughter was frequent on the battlefields and in city streets.

Of course, the Ottoman Wars in Europe were also in constant awareness, with the Battle of Lepanto in 1571—the very same year that Meyer died. Strasburg, where Meyer lived, was right in the middle of the conflict areas. Just five years after Meyer’s death, we see Count Palatine Johann Casimir, to whom Meyer had dedicated his printed 1570 fencing treatise, leading protestant troops outside of Straßburg.

Source: Gründtliche Beschreibung der . . . Kunst des Fechtens (1570), public domain.

[Courtesy of Wiktenauer by HEMA Alliance]

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Contemporary Weapons of War Common weapons of war were the Reitschwert (a cut-and-thrust rapier), an early saber named with a Czech word as dusack, the Schlachtschwert or the great two-handed war sword, the halberd, and the pike. Of course, dagger and grappling were also necessary skills, as was fighting in half or full armor and on horseback for some burghers and nobles.

Treatises on group combat in this time are scarce, with most (e.g., Machiavelli with his L’arte della Guerra of 1521) referring to Vegetius’s De Rei Militari, and Roman warfare at military commanders rather than troops. Individual combat practice occurred in the fencing guilds, at university or in private, with hired fencing masters or relatives.

Contexts for Combat War was, of course, a ubiquitous context, but far from the only one.

The pike and the halberd were vital weapons. Elaborate artwork

by Frans Hogenberg or the treatises on war by Johann Jacobi von Wallhausen give us an idea of how intricately designed such warfare could be, at least on the planning stage, before both opposing sides clashed together. Complex forma-

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tions were designed to be adaptable to different circumstances, with three front layers of pikes always able to reach the enemy and troops placed in such a way as to enable both easy retreats for exhausted fighters and advancement of others to face new threats.

The battlefield was not the only place for war, though. Just as important was urban warfare, with town militia fighting to protect a city from mercenary soldiers, either outside of or on the city walls, or in the streets, sometimes with pike combat on a narrow street, under a hail of roof tiles thrown by the townsfolk, and shots from arquebusier or crossbows raining down. Every household had to provide a man who would serve in the town militia and as a town guard, keeping the city streets in order.

Apart from the clergy and Jews, men were required to be armed, and since drunken brawls and even the occasional riot were common, this was no small task. Conflicts between university students, who lived under church law, and burgers, who lived under town law, were also widespread.

Naturally, self-defense was another important context for combat, not least when traveling. Likewise, dueling was a risk most men would

Source: Gründtliche Beschreibung der . . . Kunst des Fechtens (1570), public domain.

[Courtesy of Wiktenauer by HEMA Alliance]

have to consider and accept under certain circumstances. These contexts were regulated by different laws and customs, restricting what one was allowed, expected, and required to do, with actions that sometimes would surprise us because they might seem dishonorable. In other cases, they might appear stupid as we don’t understand the historical mindset. For this reason, to truly understand these martial arts, it is not enough to just study the weapons or techniques, but we also have to look at history, the customs, how people thought

and behaved in these contexts, and why. Otherwise, it will just lead to empty mimicking of movements, with no understanding of why an action is performed in a particular manner, thereby risking us to, over time, start executing it in a lacking manner.

Law and Customs A brief note on laws and customs before I get deeper into the martial arts that I study and teach is in order. Laws regulated all behavior, but it was not uncommon for custom to supersede the law. It

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was especially true for violent conflicts where the defense of honor, body, or family was concerned.

Important, however, was to be able to prove that you sought not to escalate the conflict yourself.

Witnesses were important, as was your own behavior and conduct.

Learning first to strike the opponent with the flat of the blade was crucial to avoid thrusting, which was held in deep contempt if used against one’s own fellow citizens, both in a civilian and military context. Proper and honorable behavior was also important in the

numerous Fechtschulen, the rather bloody fencing tournaments where the fighters won by scoring the highest bleeding wound on the opponent. While unusual, fencers sometimes received fatal injuries in such tournaments. Such incidents were closely examined similarly to any lethal incident in society to determine whether the behavior was criminal.

Characteristics Meyer himself wrestled with the same issue I now face, stating:

“First, because this knightly art is grasped with the fist and practiced with the application of the entire body, and so must be learned more through experience than out of books . . . . The other cause is that this knightly art of combat hardly allows itself to be written in books, or composed in writing since it must be executed through the practice of the entire body in the work. Since I have experienced this cause myself, I hold it, as intelligent people can judge, for the greatest and most weighty, but as with the first, I must again acknowledge (as I have said), that every art can be shown with less trouble, and may also be more readily grasped by the learner with the hand through the practice of the body when it is presented in good order.”

Translated by Dr. Jeffrey Forgeng, The Art of Combat, 2008).

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Source: Gründtliche Beschreibung der . . . Kunst des Fechtens (1570), public domain.

[Courtesy of Wiktenauer by HEMA Alliance]

I will still try to describe some of the aspects that I have found of particular note, and have focused in particular on, in my studies of Meyer’s combat art.

Earlier Masters As already touched upon, Meyer was part of a tradition, a lineage of masters, extending back to Johannes Liechtenauer, seemingly, in Meyer’s case, via masters and treatise authors like Hans Talhoffer, Hans Lekuchner, Martin Syber, and Jörg Wilhalm. Upon reading these texts, it is possible to see influences and inspiration from Austrian Freifechter and Trabant

(bodyguard) Andre Paurñfeyndt and his printed 1516 Ergrundung Ritterlicher Kunst der Fechterey, which format-wise bears a distinct resemblance to Meyer’s printed treatise. Likewise, the dagger section of the same Meyer treatise bears a striking resemblance to the dagger teachings of Achille Marozzo and his treatise of 1536, the Opera Nova, with a statistically significant percentage of overlap between the two. Finally, his last, unfinished fencing treatise contained copies of fencing treatises by Martin Syber and Sigmund Ringeck, Martin Huntfeltz, Jud Lew, and Andre Liegniczer, all of whom he must have known.

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Versatility

Weapon Another

The intent behind the combat art that Meyer taught was to create versatile fighters. It was one system, working with particular principles, but applied to many different weapons, with techniques and principles that often, but not always, extended over all of them.

The “weapons” were:

The structure in his second treatise is likely the same as what the fencing guilds followed in their teaching progression. And roughly the same treatise by Austrian fencing master Paurñfeyndt layous out: longsword, dusack, rapier, rapier & dagger, grappling, dagger, quarterstaff, halberd, and pike. The longsword lays the foundation for everything, especially the dusack.

The dusack, in turn, lays the foundation for the rapier, and the rapier then ties it all together. The quarterstaff, in turn, lays the foundation for the halberd and the pike.

1. unarmed 2. dagger, dusack, or early saber 3. two-handed longsword 4. cut & thrust rapier, rapier, and dagger 5. quarterstaff 6. halberd and pike In conjunction with the above, one learned to fight with all contemporary weapon categories, including large knives, swords, spears, and more. Essentially, one learned to fight with any weapon at hand, or just their own body, including what today would be considered “dirty” tricks, like attacking the testicles or breaking fingers.

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Groups—One

Teaches

All of them are, of course, also weapons in their own right, used both in civilian and military context, 100 years after Meyer’s time.

The longsword became more specialized, taking on the shape of the Schlachtschwert, the great two-handed sword. These types of weapons served asymmetrically numbered scenarios to protect dignitaries, banners, and cannons.

Longswords saw service as late as in the late 17th century by town guards and were carried by ship captains fighting as the last man on deck.

Differences Between the Three Polearms The use of individual weapons occurs according to shared principles. Yet they are also all different, requiring different handling. And the principles are embodied differently in other techniques. At least at higher levels, underneath it all lies a core understanding of what connects it all and what parameters are at play when working with the principles. Here, core terms like vor (before), indes (meanwhile), nach (after), nachreissen (traveling after), fühlen (feeling), sterck (strong) & sweche (weak), hert (hard), and wech (soft) are central to the understanding of leverage, feeling with the weapon, and timing. These terms are also elusive and hard to grasp for the beginner.

The quarterstaff is clean and straightforward and teaches you how to move, thrust, strike, parry, wrench, shift your weight, and time your steps with the motions. However, the halberd makes things far

more complicated, as the halberd blade is for cutting and slicing soft targets, the point for thrusting, and the hook useful for punching through armor. The whole halberd can hook and wrench both the opponent and his halberd and block and parry incoming strikes. Finally, the pike magnifies everything by many orders, with 9 pounds and 18 feet, requiring both strength and stamina, alongside fit body mechanics. Naturally, you can also not swing around a pike in circular or cross-cutting patterns the same way you do with quarterstaff and halberd. Like all polearms, it requires good judgment, both in training and certainly in combat, as Meyer and Giacomo di Grassi stated explicitly.

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ANATOMY OF WEAPONS

The Parts of the Quarterstaff The staff has four divisions in use. First, the forward part, about a hand’s length from the point, is handy for striking and deflecting incoming strikes and thrusts. The part near the leading hand is used for greater leverage when the weapons are bound together. Finally, the part between the hands can sometimes block a strike, and the back end is used for striking or wrenching.

The Parts of the Halberd The parts of the halberd are essentially the same, with the addition of a point for thrusting, a blade for cutting at soft targets, and a hook for reversed strikes against helmets or hooking and controlling the opponent’s halberd. The halberd head also commonly has semi-circular areas in the top part, sized and used for controlling the opponent’s weapon, be it a pike, a halberd, or a sword.

The Parts of the Pike The parts of the pike are the same as those of the staff, only with the size of the areas considerably greater and used somewhat differently.

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BODY & WEAPON MECHANICS While starting out with the longsword, as taught in the treatise

by Sigmund Ringeck, and the early longsword treatise named Hs.3227a—the so-called Döbringer treatise—I soon threw myself headfirst into the study of Joachim Meyer and in particular his halben stangen—the quarterstaff. Ten years later, I consider myself lucky, having started at the end of the treatise with one of the most challenging and most dangerous weapon categories to learn and master, i.e., the polearms. While the operator can use muscular force to manipulate bladed weapons, this is not true for the polearms. You have to use proper body mechanics, using posture and what I refer to as “crossroads,” but which are key stances for changing the weapon’s motion. I soon also realized that this particular way of moving runs underneath all of the treatise

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teachings, not just the polearms.

It is a single, cohesive system and way of moving in combat, regardless of weapon, meaning you move more or less the same way with the longsword as you do with the halberd.

It is quite possible that earlier masters also taught this similarly. Still, few earlier sources are as explicit or pedagogical as Meyer is with his treatises, so we can’t tell as clearly with those. However, looking at certain sources, like the treatises of Hans Talhofer and Albrecht Dürer, would seem to indicate strong similarities even in this particular area.

I will now try to describe this way of moving in more detail. Let’s begin with the most central thing of all, namely . . .

1. Weight Shifting, Footwork, and Extension Central to learning how to move this way is to learn to use weight shifting. This is similar to moving when you shovel snow, reach back, and then scrape forward, and push the shovel full of snow over your shoulder and side. It is similar to moving with a scythe, shifting the weight between the left and right foot. With Meyer, you do this in a low stance, going front to back, with the feet commonly kept in an L-shape at 90 degrees.

This weight shifting is also part of the footwork, where the rear leg straightens out. The foot is kept on the ground, accelerating the whole body for as long as possible before the foot leaves the ground, much like motocross riders sometimes break just before the jump, as once in the air, acceleration is no longer possible.

2. Core Rotation To move in a controlled fashion, you need to be able to move in balance, and this is where the concept of core rotation comes in. The torso rotates around your core as if a pole ran through your skull and torso when you step. Doing this allows you to fight in any direction of the compass, even spinning 180 or 360 degrees.

3. Twisting Another central aspect to the body mechanics is twisting, where the leading foot twists outward as the rear heel rises, leaving the toes in the ground. This twisting lets you extend the rear shoulder forward by several inches, compared to when leaving the foot straight ahead. Twisting allows a more extended reach towards your opponent while liberating your whole torso for more unrestricted move-

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ment with the weapon as you pass through, though, and to the various stances. This also prepares for the step, as the twisting of the leading foot provides better stability, setting it near the angle it should have at the end of the passing step done with the rear foot.

4. Leaning & Tilting At the end of the various steps you make, you can complete the weight shifting by leaning your whole torso forward to reach farther to the back or the side to get a better angle—or to protect your upper body, but always only as far as you

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can with maintained body control.

Never go lower than you can manage in actual combat, but train to go as low as needed in real combat.

This is advised explicitly by Meyer. The head, in turn, can also be tilted away from the opponent’s weapon, as it is a common target and, therefore, should be kept as safe as possible.

5. Grips & Grip Shifting Another fundamental skill taught in the system is “varied gripping” and “grip shifts.” The leading hand can grip the quarterstaff or halberd with the thumbs forward or

toward yourself, and the same is true for the rear hand, although it is usually held with the thumb forward. Holding the quarterstaff is primarily done at the end, the backhand mostly at the chest, at the flank or heart, and the left— leading hand—almost, but not fully, extended, high, forward, or back by the hip.

The leading hand slides and shifts positions as you work with the staff, with a wide grip when you need stability and structure—for example, in parries or in wrenching—but a close grip, with hands

together at the end of thrusts, when striking the opponent or the opponent’s weapon. Single hand strikes and thrusts are also frequent, even with the pike in a few techniques. In a few techniques, the rear hand also slides toward the leading hand—toward the center of the staff—so you can use the back end for wrenching and controlling your opponent’s staff while striking with the forward end, all in circular, wheeling motions.

To shift your grip to reorient the thumb direction of your leading

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hand, rotate the staff back, with the hand roughly at head height, just behind you on the left, opening up the grip to a “hello” before regripping.

To switch to a reversed grip, ensure the rear maintains a “bind” with the opponent’s weapon. One keeps the pressure on but lets the rear hand rotate over the butt, never letting go—then, lifting the back end while throwing the forward end down, rotating it for a complete vertical strike from above.

6. Striking & Striking Lines The most fundamental movement and exercise to practice is “cross-cutting,” or cutting in the shape of an “X,” where, if you use a halberd, you cut from your left, with the left hand and blade high, cutting diagonally down toward your right, first shifting your weight forward. Still, as the halberd comes down by your side, shifting your weight back, pressing the rear end down, the halberd is held diagonally behind you. The point comes forward to a good

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thrusting position, with the leading hand held right by your head, slightly above, and the rear hand extended fully behind you. Shifting your weight forward again, you extend the halberd, cutting down diagonally toward your left with the hook. Extend it, so it is stretched out somewhat diagonally in front of you, and with your rear leg, upper body, rear arm, and the halberd together forming a perfect triangle. Let the halberd fly back with the leading hand resting by your left hip and the rear hand at shoulder height, extended crooked before you on your right side.

Complete the whole sequence by letting the halberd go up behind you, recentering your rear hand over your heart, with the halberd extended high behind you on your left.

This is a basic exercise that includes several of the key stances of the quarterstaff and halberd: the Oberhut (high guard on the left), Mittelhut (middle guard), Unterhut (low guard), Wechselhut (chang-

ing guard), Oberhut on the right, Steürhut (rudder guard), and Nebenhut (side guard). All of these stances serve as starting and ending points, but more importantly, as points of transition, where you can choose to change the motion and direction of the weapon. And as Meyer notes, it is on the way there that you observe the opponent and decide where to go once you reach the stance, the “crossroads.”

Of course, you can also just as well cut diagonally from below, or just high-low, low-high, again like shoveling snow. You can also strike horizontally, along the middle line, vertically, along the centerline, or at any necessary angle. All of this should naturally be practiced with the simple quarterstaff first, then doing so the same way, as if you had a halberd head attached, minding the blade and hook as you strike from left and right.

You can strike in two different ways. You can use a wide grip, commonly done with hands together,

or just a single hand holding the staff. In the latter case, the dominant, strong hand is best for control. In the odd technique, striking with the back end is also done, but for the most part, striking is done with the forward part, about a hand’s length from the point. The same is true for deflecting a strike or thrust from your opponent.

The quarterstaff is most effective when used with large, circular strikes, combining weight shifting with extension to add more power to the strikes. But regardless of whether you attack, defend, or aim to provoke your opponent, all the strikes pass through the guards as you keep in constant movement, resting in guard only briefly.

7. Stances & Guards Regardless of weapon, there are several stances and guards available. You learn to perform different techniques so that you can respond to an attack wherever you find yourself in your movement between attack and defense. The

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polearms, in particular, are distinctly asymmetric in the use of guards, meaning the left and right stances can be distinctly different despite having the same name.

For the staff, you have five (plus one) named, “primary” stances: there is Oberhut (high guard) on the left with the point up, Mittelhut (middle guard) straight forward, Unterhut (low guard) on the left, middle, and right, Wechselhut (changing guard) which isn’t named, but exists with other weapons, is shown in the art, and is necessary for the entire movement, Oberhut on

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the right with the point forward, Steürhut (rudder guard) extended hanging diagonally to the side before you, and Nebenhut (side guard) with the back end forward on the right and the staff diagonally back by your left hip. The Nebenhut and the Steürhut also come in variants that involve looking directly opposite, behind you, just making minor adjustments with the body to enable that, without moving the weapon.

The halberd, in turn, uses the same stances as the staff. Interestingly, two more stances used with

the staff and halberd, and other similar polearms, are shown in the art but not mentioned in the text—here borrowing a term from the 14th century Italian fencing master Fiore de’i Liberi, Meyer also shows a stance reminiscent of Fiore’s Tuta Porta di Ferro (“Full Iron Gate”). It is like the Steürhut, only with the weapon not extended in front, but held closer to the chest, still diagonally forward, and with the rear hand reversed, with the thumb aimed at the end of the staff. Meyer also shows something reminiscent of the German Zornhut (guard), but exaggerated, with

the halberd held above your head, point hanging down behind you.

Meyer never names or mentions any but they are shown together in Image L in his treatise of 1570.

The pike, finally, also has eight named guards: Oberhut on the left, Mittelhut, also called Gerader Versatzung (straight parrying), Feldhut (field guard), which is the same as Mittelhut but holding the pike in the middle, Unterhut (Alber / the “fool”), Oberhut on the right, Dempffhut (suppressing guard).

Nebenhut, and Wechselhut, but the names are in part used somewhat

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differently. The weapon’s weight sometimes necessitates letting it rest on your body while threatening your opponent; for example, the Oberhut on the right has the pike resting on the left shoulder.

Nebenhut has here taken the place of Unterhut with other weapons and has the point extended forward and down. In contrast, Unterhut, in turn, now has the point up, with the back end by the forward knee, close to the Alber stance, which Meyer mentions as one of the main guards for the pike but never describes. Finally, the Dempffhut is unique to the pike, with the point aimed forward and up and the back end resting on the rear thigh, using a very wide stance, ready to suppress incoming pike thrusts.

8. Targeting Also closely related to striking lines is targeting. First, you divide the enemy into four quarters: left and right, high and low, with the horizontal line placed roughly at heart height. These are called the “Four Openings.” Similarly, the

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head is also divided the same way, with the horizontal line placed below the eyes, right where the neck starts.

Much of the targeting taught by Meyer with bladed weapons aims at three weakly protected areas— the neck, the flank below the ribs, and above the knee. Naturally, the power of the polearms means that even with armor, the impact of a strike or thrust will be massive. Common for foot soldiers in his time was half armor, where the lower legs were unprotected and therefore good targets. The face and the hands, too, were commonly unprotected for practical reasons, and consequently, the two were important targets.

However, halberds, staves, and spears found use both on the battlefield and in civilian context by burgers, bodyguards, and town militia—therefore, also used against opponents not wearing armor, allowing for more free targeting and breaking of bone and joints.

9. Thrusting & Durchwechseln (“Changing Under”) Equally important to the striking is the thrusting, and most commonly, they are of the “pool cue” kind, with the weapon sliding through your leading hand to a brief, close grip. Thrusts mostly come from a horizontal position—the Mittelhut—which Meyer makes up for half the fighting, with the rear hand starting at the right flank, and the leading hand extended.

Commonly, it requires a “gathering step” first, where the rear foot moves toward the leading foot, as you move up or down to the horizontal thrusting stance—the Mittelhut—and then complete with a wide step with the leading foot, landing the foot as the thrust hits at full extension. At times, extend both arms up, thrusting in from above or outside an opponent’s parry.

Very common with the thrust is feinting, provoking your opponent to move toward a particular direction, but disallowing the enemy a

bind by dropping your weapon underneath, letting the opponent’s weapon fly over, so you can thrust in on the other side. This can transform into a complex game of trickery, where you only pretend to go underneath, and as the opponent takes the opportunity to thrust straight in, as you let your point drop, you strike it away and counterthrust—and so on . . . .

10. Wrenching & Hooking The back end of the quarterstaff or halberd is also perfect for wrenching the opponent’s neck, wrist, or forearms, causing the opponent to let go of the weapon. The halberd head can also be pressed against the opponent’s throat, forearms, or shins. Likewise, the halberd head comes in handy for hooking both the head of the opponent’s halberd, neck, arms, behind the knee, or the lower legs.—preferably at the Achilles tendons, which causes immense pain, forcing the opponent to step and lose balance.

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11. Economy of Movement The economy of movement is quite characteristic of the system and often misunderstood by students of earlier masters within the Liechtenauer tradition. While particular strikes can appear wide, they are economical and fast. Furthermore, all predefined and named stances connect through actions such as cuts, strikes, thrusts. In fact, different edges of bladed weapons, and all actions, in turn, are con-

nected through the stances. As you attack, defend, deflect, or have your own attack deflected, you should commonly strive to return to the closest stance, letting the weapon move by itself toward it.

This preserves your stamina and strength while saving you time for a counter.

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12. Deceiving, Provoking, Taking, Hitting Quite central to Meyer’s style of combat are the words, Reitzen, Nehmen, Treffen (provoking, taking, hitting). Simply put, this means that you can provoke your opponent with an attack using your weapon against an opening or body language to force your opponent to move in a specific direction, opening himself for a strike. Other strikes and thrusts

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displace the opponent’s weapon, using power, structure, angle, or leverage to gain an advantage. Yet other strikes hit the opponent. A strike may also do several of these simultaneously, displacing the opponent’s weapon and hitting the opponent in the same motion. And a feint that the opponent doesn’t aim to defend is, of course, completed as a hitter.

13. Tactics & Psychology Unlike Pietro Monte and his late 15th century fencing treatise, Collectanea, where he divides combatants and their mental and spiritual natures by the four humors—blood (sanguine, active, enthusiastic), yellow bile (choleric, uncontrolled, anger), black bile (melancholic), and phlegm (apathy)—Meyer defines combatants by a seemingly more practical list of characteristics, roughly here translated as:

“overly aggressive and a bit stupid fencers,” “inexperienced but artful opportunity-seeking fencers,” “safety-first fencers” who only take a target when they are sure to have it and know they can retreat safely, and “passive and apathetic fencers” who just wait for the opponent to act.

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Meyer favors the third style in his own fencing, however, also stating that: “[t]he third will only cut to the opening when they not only have it for certain, but have also taken heed whether they can also recover from the extension of the cut back into a secure parrying, or to the Defence Strokes; I also mostly hold with these, although it depends on what my opponent is like.”

Translated by Dr. Jeffrey Forgeng, Art of Combat, 2008).

Source: Gründtliche Beschreibung der . . . Kunst des Fechtens (1570), public domain.

[Courtesy of Wiktenauer by HEMA Alliance]

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Now, Meyer teaches us what approaches and methods to use against all these types of fencers, but not only that; he also tells us that we should learn to appear to belong to all four to deceive our opponent and depend on the opponent’s particular nature:

“Now as the first ones are violent and somewhat stupid, and as they say, cultivate frenzy; the second artful and sharp; the third judicious and deceitful; the fourth like fools; so you must assume and adopt all four of them, so that you can deceive the opponent sometimes with violence, sometimes with cunning, sometimes with judicious observation, or else use foolish comportment to incite him, deceive him, and thus not only betray him concerning his intended device, but also make yourself room and space for the opening, so that you can hit him that much more surely.”

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A general guiding principle for all combat is to go with your weapon from the opponent’s body to the weapon, controlling it, so you are kept safe from harm. Likewise, you move from the weapon to the body, applying pressure to your opponent so you can exploit a given or created opening. Finally, you should retreat safely with a threat, like a strike.

Another guiding principle is to go from a strike to a thrust and a thrust to a strike, again sticking to the economy of movement, going a short and fast route to your target.

Studying, Teaching & Sparring with Polearms Luckily, when studying the combat art of Joachim Meyer, we have both quite detailed text descriptions regarding the use of our bodies and the mechanical manipulation of weapons and the body of the opponent, and advice on how to think, on psychology, character types, and how to manipulate them, and much more. The use of terminology is fairly restricted, instead of aiming to let students learn well from a book, without the use of personal eye-to-eye instruction.

We also have magnificent artwork from the studio of Tobias Stimmer.

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Carefully designed scenes, complete with square floor tiles, help us understand the angles of the feet and the relative position and angle of the opponents. The artist carefully illustrates the angle of the weapons, teaching us how to use the weapons in various applications of techniques. And with actions caught in mid-motion, we can even learn quite specifically how to move from the artwork. It is quite stunning, and little, if anything, ever exceeds it in quality, earlier or later.

Over the more than ten years that I have studied and taught this art, I have tried many different approaches. I have even learned a little bit of jogo do pau and naginata.

I have closely examined recordings of and literature on staff traditions worldwide—in Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe. Training with polearms is dangerous as we use “sharp” weapons, and no protection outside of actual armor protects you. Of course, in history, people didn’t typically practice in armor, instead mostly just wearing regular clothing, using control to keep the fencers safe. It is also the approach I finally made a choice to adopt, having gone through padded protection and padded or flexible

staves, only to end up frustrated with the severely restricted movement or the artifacts that inevitably come with padded and flexible weapons as many techniques are impossible to perform as intended.

Good control is the only practical and reasonable solution.

Naturally, such control doesn’t come quickly or easily, especially with such powerful weapons, which is likely why it was the last weapon category fencers learned to master on their path to mastership. For this reason, the staff became the very symbol of the fencing master. These men also used the same staff to separate the fencers in the tournaments going back to the summa rudis, or the judges and ex-gladiators of ancient Rome.

So, my advice is to let students wait on sparring with polearms until they have established reasonable control over their bodies and the weapons, which usually takes several years. Furthermore, no modern protection will ever keep your partner or student safe from even a medium-powered blow from a quarterstaff or halberd or any thrust with a nine-pound pike centered on a dollar-sized point.

Therefore, we have developed a unique form of sparring, which we

call “free fencing.” In this format, you are allowed to use all techniques, even the most dangerous ones, striking with full power, but under the condition that you can break your attack if you notice that your partner is incapable of defending. It might seem too restrictive, but it makes you even more observant of your opponent’s intentions and openings in their defense, all of which are essential to all close-quarters combat.

I hope this brief article on Renaissance polearms combat in the Meyer school has provided some interesting insights into what I find a genuinely fascinating and forgotten part of history. I sincerely hope it will inspire you to pick up the staff and start swinging it to see how it feels. It’s a truly wonderful feeling once your body works in unison with the movements of the staff, and vice versa, with the both of you moving together in a flow with little thought.

Roger Norling @ roger.norling.7

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GREEK STAFF/ STICK FIGHTING George E. Georgas

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STAFF/STICK FIGHTING HAS deep roots in Greece; it found a use for military training and for civilians to defend themselves. The staff was easy to make as a weapon, so even a person of the lower classes could own and use it easily.

For example, since ancient times, the staff served as a weapon for shepherds to protect their flocks against predators and thieves.

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Vardoukion: The Staves and Maces of the Medieval Greek Period Teenagers underwent preparatory training before serving in the Imperial or Thematic army in the Byzantine era. Training at this time was known as skrimides by medieval Greeks. During the major feast days of our saints, several physical competitions took place in front of the church as men vied with each other in stick fighting, wrestling, pankration, pammachon, running archery, etc.

The mace was one of the favorite weapons used by the Roman or Byzantine army. Various names for the mace are found in contemporary sources, describing multiple types—the apelatikion, bardoukion, matzoukion, koryni, ropalon, ravdion, and sidiroravdion are just some of these terms. Humble soldiers carried the mace-like apelatai and akritai. The elite Tagmata mounted cataphracts, the nobility, and the emperor himself.

Armed with staves and sword staves,1 the Acrites, a kind of frontier guardsmen unit, battled against those threatening the empire’s eastern borders. The Acrites were armed with weapons known 1 A type of wooden sword used in battle and not for training.

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Note the stance of the executioners in the top & bottom photos. [Source: Menologion of Basil II]

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as vardoukia, which was a general term that encompassed clubs, staves, and maces. According to the military manual, The Tatika, written by the emperor, Leon the Wise of Macedon, all units of the imperial army would train with wooden staves/sticks/clubs. Overall, the reconstruction of Roman Hoplomachia or Byzantine Hoplomachia is a challenging task. No fencing manuals have come down to us as they have in Germany or Italy. So, we borrowed from the methodology of experimental archaeology to resurrect these arts. We also study Byzantine literature and art to understand ancient Greek combative traditions.

One of our sources is the Acritic Epic of Basilios Digenis Acritas. Digenis was a semi-mythical person.

He was once known as a Byzantine warrior protecting the empire’s borders. Researchers unearthed a great deal of helpful information about medieval Greeks’ equipment and martial arts from this epic.

Here is a description of a technique with mace and staff. Because the texts come from two different books, the authors describe it as a strike to the head or scalp. The Germans call it Oberhau—a strike from above:

“. . . and emerging from the dark forest, a great wolf, and almost all felt agitated when they saw him. However, Basilios charged against the wolf, and bringing back his great mace, he struck the beast’s head in the middle, and he chopped it in half.”

Theophanous, Basileiou 14:4-8.

In another book, Basilios has a duel with an apelati. Apelates were regular warbands. These warriors did not serve anyone, neither the empire nor the Saracens. Here is a description of a duel between Basilios Acritas and Filopappos the Apelati:

“He [Filopappos] wants to lift his sword to strike me, I step back with a small jump. With my staff or stick I strike at his head from above, and if he did not protect his head with his shield, my strike would have crushed his entire skull.”

Digenis Acritas wins over Filopappos the Apelati, Epic of Basilios Digenis Acritas.

Both events give the same strike with a blunt weapon. In the first chapter, Basilios kills the great wolf with his mace, and in the second, he uses a staff. Basilios strikes on single fencing time without hesitation in the first event. He takes the initiative—the vor for those who follow the German fencing tradition—and he strikes the wolf on his head. It is logical because he fought a beast.

In the second situation, Basilio duels with a savvy fighter. The author describes the event from a literary point of view, but a fencer can understand the author’s intent. Attempting to understand the type of blow struck, we can deduce it resulted from three possible tactics using the same strike to the head.

The first situation is that Filopappos begins his attack striking from above. Still, Basilios reacts with a

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backward jump to avoid the attack and counters with an attack, but Filopappos parries Basilios’s attack with his shield. The second way is the following: Filopappos begins his attack with a strike to the head; Basilios jumps backward to evade Filopappos’s attack and counters as Filopappos tries to regain his balance, but Filopappos manages to parry the counter; finally, Filopappos steps forward and chambers his sword to strike; but Basilios jumps forward and, taking advantage of the opening, delivers a counter strike. So, we have an attack on the preparation of the opponent’s attack, but again Filo-

pappos parries the strike. We can observe the fundamentals of fencing in this description. At times, Basilios opens up the distance to set up his attack. He evades the attack and counters or attacks on the preparation of the attack. From the point of view of Filopappos, we see him both launch and parry attacks.

In the period of Latin occupation, both medieval Greeks and Latin trained with a type of sticks/staves called bastons. It was a popular type of training equally for the knights and the Greek nobles. Some of these bastons looked like rods, and others like wooden swords.

The Pammachoi working from the high guard with the matzoukion.

Left: Pammachos Dimitrios Bogris; Right: Instructor George E. Georgas.

Both fighters closing into melee distance.

Fighter on the right taking control of his opponent’s elbow, breaking the balance and hitting to the head with an upper strike from the left.

A Note about Basilios Digenis Acritas: He was a legendary Medieval Greek hero. The nickname, Digenis, means “he who has two origins.” His mother was a Greek princess of the Byzantine Empire, and his father was an Arab prince.

After the Arab prince became a Christian and a citizen of the empire, the two were married. With their marriage, they had a son named Basilios. From an early age, he committed many brave acts; he killed a lion with bare hands when he was a child, and there were many other such deeds. His most outstanding achievement was that he had a duel with Death in the Marble Halls at the gates of Hades. In this duel, he faced Death with his sword at hand and won, but soon after died from a disease. His last name, as it has come down to us, was Acritas; however, this was not his real last name but the name of a frontier guards’ unit. Of course, Basilios Digenis Acritas was not an actual person. Still, we learn of the spirit and the bravery of all Acrites of the empire, and the way they protected villagers from bandits and the borders from foreign invasion.

They were always a small unit, which forced them to eschew head-on battles but rely on hit-and-run tactics to delay and harass the enemy until the Byzantine emperor could order his generals to mobilize and march the Imperial Armies to the threatened regions.

Katsouna, Hourhouda, and Glitsa: the Staves of the Ottoman Occupation During the Ottoman occupation, staves and sword-staves were the weapons of the poor people and the Christians. The Ottomans allowed Christians to have metal weapons if they were armatoloi, or men at arms who acted as local police or as the personal bodyguard units of provincial rulers. In the early and mid-19th century, clan leaders or the protopalikaro (champion) of the clan acted as martial art instructors to other clan members.

They taught staff/stick fighting to relatives and villagers, so there

were slight stylistic differences because most of them were initially trained by the Ottomans when they served as armatoloi. Hiding in the mountains of Peloponnese were those clans that never accepted Ottoman rule, and they, in many cases, retained the style of their ancestors. The Cretan revolt against the Ottomans in the 19th century was notable in how Greek men attacked the Ottomans with staves and sword-staves at the onset of the rebellion.

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Junior High School students in 1902 practicing the “setting aside” staff movement in Heracleion, Crete, Greece.

[Photo courtesy of Grand Master of Pammachon Martial Education Costas Dervenis]

The Staves of the Late 19th to 20th Centuries in Greece In the late 19th and 20th centuries, the staff was a weapon of self-defense for rural and urban populations, especially elite urban men. The popularity among Greeks carrying wooden sticks in public arose from a ban on duels and the carrying of swords. Due to the ban, many masters of arms switched from fencing with blades to fencing with sticks and canes.

The beginning of the 20th century saw many fencing styles where the master at arms had undertaken an apprenticeship.

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The most popular style in Greece was the French, then the Italian schools. Most Greek fencing masters of arms also served as military instructors for the Royal Hellenic Army. Justifying the teaching of foil fencing at this time to the soldiers, they claimed fencing practice would better prepare soldiers for bayonet use. An example of someone who used his cane to save his cousin’s life comes out of an assassination attempt by the Japanese police officer, Tsuda Sanzō—a

member of the samurai class who, armed with a katana, ended up battling with the cane-wielding Prince George of Greece. Before I get to this story, though, let us go over the life and training of both men before this fateful clash took place.

Pammachon staff lesson, from the Greek students of Trebizonte School around 1911.

[Photo courtesy of Grand Master of Pammachon Martial Education Costas Dervenis]

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Quick bind of the opponent’s staff.

After the bind, the strike comes in tempo before the opponent can react. The attacker is also stepping inward, changing the fencing line.

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Pammachos and Fencer of the Hellenic Fencing Federation, Filipe Faisal Waddington de Mattos-Parreira, parrying a strike from top left fencing line using one of the parries to the head, which puts him in a position to riposte easily as the opponent tries to get back or strike quickly to the opening.

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The Tale of Tsuda Sanzō and Prince George of Greece Tsuda Sanzō was born in 1855 to a family that could claim samurai status and whose ancestors served as doctors to the royal family of Iga province. After receiving the martial training accorded to the samurai of his class, Tsuda joined the army in 1872. He took part in the Satsuma revolution against the new government of Emperor Meiji in 1877. Tsuda served under the Last Samurai, Saigō Takamori (Takanaga). Young Tsudo was a great admirer of the teachings of Saigō Takamori, a living legend who followed the old traditional ways of Japan. After the devastating defeat of Takamori and his samurai army, Tsuda Sanzō surrendered, received a pardon, and joined the Kyoto police force in 1882. He appeared to be an example of a reformed samurai, but the law of bushido held steady in his heart.

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Tsuda Sanzo

On the other hand, Prince George of Greece and Denmark was born in Korfu in 1869. He was the second son of King George I of Greece, from the House of Glücksburg and the Grand Duchess Olga Constantinovna of Russia. Growing up, Prince George had a series of English and Greek tutors. Thanks to his mother, he grew up a devout Orthodox Christian. His education later continued under the Prussian Otto Lynders. An athletic young man, George loved swimming and rowing. At the age of 13, he enrolled in the Hellenic Military Academy in Piraeus, where he saw fencing for the first time, which was taught daily to the cadets. As part of his education, he learned Danish and, in 1885, enrolled in the Royal Danish Naval Academy in Copenhagen. After four years of study, he returned as a different man. Despite his outward serious mien, George, at his core, remained spontaneous, a bit unruly, and a free spirit.

Prince George of Greece

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Returning to Greece, George joined the Royal Navy and became an adjutant to King George I. Prince George was also a cousin to Nicholas Romanov, later Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. Nicholas’s father had sent him on a trip throughout Europe and Asia to meet various leaders and prepare him for the throne. After visiting the House

of Habsburg in Vienna, he came to Greece, at which time George joined his cousin for his trip. The royal fleet docked at the port of Nagasaki in 1891. The Japanese emperor honored the two princes with appropriate pomp and display. Prince Nicholas and his escort then decided to visit Kyoto.

Outside the Oriental Hotel, where

Naval Cadets in fencing lesson (Class of 1890).

[Source: Museum of Naval Academy, Piraeus, Greece]

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they were staying, an unruly crowd had gathered, spurred to anger by a recent letter written in blood and made available to the public threatening the Russian diplomatic mission.

On April 29th, the Princes Nicholas and George, escorted by Prince Arisugawa-no-miya, traveled by rickshaws from Kyoto to Ōtsu.

A police escort accompanied the 40 rickshaws used to transport the princes and their companions through the narrow streets of Ōtsu. Tsuda Sanzō was part of this detail. A few days earlier, this group had visited an off-limits Japanese temple. Overriding this injunction against foreigners and polluting the sacred space with their presence to curry favor with Westerners greatly angered some fanatics.

Tsuda Sanzō, a secret bushido fol-

lower, was among them. While the visiting royal entourage was riding in rickshaws through Ōtsu, Tsuda saw an opportunity and took it. Throwing back his coat, he unsheathed his katana, the carrying of which the emperor had banned.

Attacking suddenly and fiercely, Tsuda struck Nicholas in the back of the head. Re-chambering his katana, he prepared to finish him off with a second blow when George, sitting next to Nicholas, threw himself in front of his cousin, parried Tsuda’s second cut with his cane, then disarmed the assassin. Surprised and dismayed at his failure, Tsuda turned and tried to make his escape, but two Japanese drivers took off after him, tackled him, and delivered their prisoner Prince Arisugawa-no-miya.

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The Japanese Emperor Meiji was greatly shocked when he learned of the attack, to the point where he took an overnight train to meet his guest as soon as possible and offer his apologies. He was worried that the incident could be the start of a war with Russia. The two henchmen were given medals for chasing and capturing the perpetrator.

Prince George was very disappointed by the blame he received from the Russian government for putting the crown prince, Nicholas, at risk by encouraging him to visit dangerous places and desecrate a temple, thereby earning the enmity of a people.

Tsuda Sanzō, during his trial, claimed that he wanted to kill the prince because he believed him to be a Russian spy. In May of 1891, he was sentenced to life in a Hokkaido prison called “Japanese Siberia,” but he died on September 30th of

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the same year from pneumonia or hunger as the right to take his own life to atone for his mistakes had been denied him. After his death, the emperor himself forbade the bestowing of the name “Tsuda” to newborn children from Tsuda’s province, and his whole family was dishonored and exiled. There were even thoughts of renaming the city of Ōtsu.

Even though he wasn’t allowed to return to Greece with Nicholas, Tsar Alexander III awarded George the rank of Admiral in the Russian navy. The cane with which he defended Nicholas’s life was engraved with the imperial symbols of Russia and displayed at the Benaki Museum in Athens. Even though Tsuda Sanzō trained in a martial tradition superior to that of Prince George, and despite his life-long immersion in the study of bushido, he failed to avenge a perceived in-

sult to the Japanese people. Then to compound his error, he tried to flee the scene as if he was afraid for his life or somehow ashamed of what he had done. Adding further shame to his already tarnished reputation, he allowed two commoners to tackle and arrest him—altogether a shoddy, pitiful, and amateurish attempt to emulate the feats of those samurai who came before him.

ation. Years later, in Crete during the Nazi invasion of the island, while other family members were cowering in a shelter from the shots and bombs, George, now much older, remained in the back of the roofless car wearing a military helmet, unwilling to hide.

On the other side, we have a mediocre fencer, George, who acted immediately, overcame the fear caused by the attack and parried Tsuda’s second cut with a parry on the first of the head—or a parry on the fifth if referring to modern terms—and then disarming his opponent. Indeed, his reaction resulted from training in the military academies, and it wasn’t the first time he revealed a sang-froid demeanor in a life-or-death situ-

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A Cretan striking a Nazi with his staff during the battle of Crete, as depicted in a WWII newspaper.

The last official use of staves or sword-staves in a battle in the 20th century took place during the invasion of Crete. At this time, villagers determined to protect their land, homes, and families set upon the Nazi paratroopers with farm instruments, staves, and swordstaves, then ripping the weapons out of the hands of the bludgeoned Nazis and turning their fire on those still fighting.

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Pammachon staff training in Athens with Instructor Stamatis Stamatoglou and Grand Master Costas Dervenis.

Stick/Staff Fighting in Greece in the 21st Century Now in the 21st century, we still treasure the fighting stick, following our country’s long tradition.

The method of training today has three fundamental pillars: 1. The logic, the principles, and the tactics emerge out of European fencing. The staff and sword-staff movements all derive from European fencing traditions, which themselves go back to the Bronze Age. Although there have been changes and improvements in the tactics and strategy, the same fundamentals still apply.

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2. The Hellenic traditional martial education method of Pammachon and its training through war dances—the pyrichios, or the “dance of fire.” These war dances have their origins deep in the past, and there is still a living tradition of these dances being used to train young warriors. These dances prepare young men both physically and emotionally to wage war.

An example of this would be the Pontian Pyrichios, the pre-battle dance ritual of the Pontian Greeks who lived around the Black Sea, 2 in what is today Northern Anatolia, Southern Russia, and Ukraine.

From those dances still performed today, martial art enthusiasts of ancient Greek warfare can extrapolate ideas of the footwork, tempo, and basic moves that Greek warriors would have once used.

2 Pontus is the ancient Greek word for “-sea.”

3. The historical sources from the manuscripts, manuals-at-arms, and extant paintings give us more clues to how Greek warriors once fought.

Today, the Greek stick/staff fighting is a complete system of fighting. A student begins training footwork and the gymnasio of handwork, which are physically intensive games where students learn to unlock their bodies. From this point, a student will learn the basic guards and attacks, followed by wrestling, disarms, locks, counters, and counters attacks.

Training does not occur indoors exclusively; outdoor training on different kinds of ground and inclement weather conditions are encouraged.

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Staff training for the local children in Chalki island, Dodecanese, Greece, 2016-2017.

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SELECTED REFERENCES

Αυτοκράτορος Λέοντος του Σοφού, Τακτικά, εκδόσεις ελεύθερη σκέψις. Βασιλεύς Κωνσταντίνος τόμος Α, εκδόσεις ‘το Βήμα’.

Gordon, Andrew. A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present. Oxford University Press, 2003.

H Ελληνική Επανάσταση, του Δ. Κόκκινου, Τόμοι 1-5, εκδόσεις Μέλισσα.

Keene, Donald. Emperor of Japan: Meiji And His World, 1852-1912. Columbia University Press, 2005. Οι Βυζαντινοί ξιφομάχοι στο Μηνολόγιο του Βασιλείου Β’, Δημήτρης Σκουρτέλης.

Perrin, Noel. Giving Up the Gun. Boston: David R. Godine, 1979.

Ravina, Mark. The Last Samurai: The Life and Battles of Saigō Takamori. Wiley, 2004. Τρύφωνος Ε. Ευαγγελίδου (1898). Τα μετά τον Όθωνα: ήτοι ιστορία της μεσοβασιλείας και της βασιλείας Γεωργίου του Α΄. (1862-1898) Εν Αθήναις: Εκδοτικόν Κατάστημα Γεωργίου Δ. Φέξη, σελ. 644.

Yates, Charles. Saigo Takamori: The Man Behind the Myth. New York, NY: Kegan Paul International, 1995.

George E. Georgas https://medievalswordmanship. wordpress.com

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STICK FIGHTING IN NORTH AFRICA THE FUNDAMENTALS OF COMBAT

Adam H. C. Myrie

IT WOULD BE AN UNDERstatement to say that there are a plethora of martial arts the world over that almost every culture possesses a fighting system. Through dance, dueling, self-defense, or warfare, swords, knives, spears, axes, cudgels, and even bare hands and feet are tools for inflicting or simulating violence. The stick is one tool in the vast array of options available to the aspiring and practiced martial artist that is almost universal across all systems.

A simple, usually straight piece of wood in varying dimensions acts as a weapon or a safer analog for other weapon systems. The stick is among the most versatile training tools for weapon-based martial arts, as the limits of what it can represent are bound only by the practitioner’s imagination. The stick is ubiquitous in North Africa, where over 5,000 years’ worth of traditions involve using the stick to train for other weapons of war, settle personal grievances, and carry into battle. Two of the most well-known and ancient forms of stick fighting in North Africa are tahtib and el matreg. As mentioned above, from Egypt and through the Maghreb, these two ancient arts have served in all three ca-

pacities. Among the tombs dating back to the days of the pharaohs are wall paintings representing different forms of Egyptian stick fighting. Tahtib, or Egyptian stick fighting, served as one of the three core disciplines in ancient military training. Here in this article, we will cover the use of Egyptian and Maghrebi stick fighting as training tools for other weapon systems through exploring their history, basic techniques, and current place in the modern world.

A Point about Sources Before delving further into the topic at hand, there is an elephant in the room to be addressed: sources.

While Africa’s continent’s history and martial traditions are ancient, these communities did not rely on the written word to transmit knowledge to future generations.

While North Africa has an admirable record of keeping written accounts through scrolls, manuscripts, and stone tablets, this was not the principal method to transmit this type of knowledge. Oral history is still an essential aspect of culture throughout the continent through direct lineages of training, poetry, historical epics, song, and dance. Written accounts

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of battles by both Africans and Europeans can also serve as sources of information. There are, however, a multitude of efforts currently underway to preserve Africa’s martial arts and ensure that they do not become forgotten relics of an ancient past.

For example, Dr. Adel Boulad has started the modern tahtib movement. To bring tahtib into the modern world, he traveled throughout Egypt, working extensively with living masters and experts on Egypt’s history. A renewed fighting system and a martial arts manual came from his efforts: Modern Tahtib: Egyptian Baton Martial and Festive Art. Dr. Boulad’s efforts have resulted in the successful enshrinement of tahtib on UNESCO’s intangible world heritage list (UNESCO 2013).

In Algeria, the Fédération Algérienne du Sport Traditionnel took shape in 1992 to bring the ancient art of el matreg into the modern era, complete with formalized progressive class structure, leagues, and tournaments. Currently, the federation oversees over 17 leagues and 8,300 practitioners (El Watan 2011). Instructors have begun to write treatises and instructional manuals to record their knowledge for future generations.

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The History of the Arts While it is nearly impossible to determine precisely how long formalized stick fighting has been present in North Africa, existing depictions provide clues to the age of these arts. Starting with tahtib, the full name of the art is fan a’nazaha was-tahtib, meaning “the art of being straight and honest with the stick.” “Tahtib” is the word for “stick” in the Egyptian dialect of Arabic. The earliest known depiction of tahtib lies on the walls of the Abusir Necropolis in Egypt, dating back to Egypt’s 5th Dynasty, approximately 2,800 BC (Boulad 2014). On the tomb walls are representations of the three core disciplines of Egypt’s military at the time: archery, wrestling, and stick fighting. It was through these three disciplines that soldiers prepared for battle. Also inscribed on the necropolis walls are the four principles of tahtib, which form the backbone of its practice today: attacking from the rear, movement, protecting the head, and striking past the opponent’s weapon. Despite the modern love affair with the iconic khopesh, a sickle-shaped sword, the bow, axe, mace, spear, or knife were the principal armaments of the Egyptian soldier (Mark 2017). These weapons were inexpensive to produce, and the

techniques and principles of tahtib were transferable to almost all of them. Given that most common soldiers were levies from the peasant class and could afford neither armor nor formal instruction beyond basic training before being sent off to war, this is an important factor (Mark 2017). Over time as Egyptian empire-building dreams died down, tahtib eventually became something only the common folk would do during inter-village disputes, honor contests, or as a

performance art during holidays until finally becoming a recreational activity among peasants in Upper Egypt.

The 1960s experienced a revival of tahtib as a dance and performance art on the stage with the Reda Dance Troupe (Bissada 2017).

Tahtib appeared at weddings, cultural events, and entertainment for tourists. And so, it remained until early 2000 when Dr. Adel Boulad began his journey across Egypt to return tahtib to its martial roots.

Figure 1- Engravings from the Abusir Necropolis [Source - Wikimedia Commons]

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During his research, he found that the entire art never survived completely intact in one location or another. One village practiced one set of techniques, while another stressed another set of moves. After several years of research and intensive study, Dr. Boulad compiled the knowledge and techniques from the various practitioners, formalized them, and developed a pedagogical approach to teach this art. He called this new rebirth modern tahtib. Dr. Boulad also pioneered some changes to the art; among the most notable was opening the study of the art to women, once banned from learning or practicing the art for the length of its known history (Bissada 2017).

El Matreg El Matreg has a different story.

“Matreg” is the Maghrebi Arabic word for stick or baton. Historically, stick fighting served as a safer training tool for teaching sword fighting to young boys. Besides, it served as a training tool for soldiers during the Mamluk sultanate (AD 1250 -1517). Scholars support the idea that el matreg originated in Algeria’s Orania region as an art of the original North African Imazighen, or Berber peoples and Arabs. For centuries el matreg served as the primary training tool

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Figure 2 - Training with sticks and daggers [Source: Kitāb al-makhzūn jāmi’ al-funūn (~1470)]

for elite soldiers and among the common folk. Some of the oldest depictions available appear in medieval Mamluk manuscripts showing training with the stick in place of the sword—at times with a sword alone and at other times with a buckler or other off-hand weapon. From this, its origins appear in an easily recognizable form at some point in the early to high Middle Ages, though it may be older. Among the Mamluks, stick fighting served as a substitute for the various single and two-handed weapons such as the spear, saif (sword), and the tabar (axe/mace).

Long after the practice had diminished as a tool for formal military training, el matreg remained a staple component of learning standard fencing. As swords and other medieval melee weapons became obsolete, el matreg transformed into a leisure activity.

In 1984, the Ligue Oranaise du Sport Tradition came together, and among its objectives was the preservation of traditional sports for future generations, el matreg being among them (El Watan 2011).

Over time, the efforts of this organization inspired further investment from the Algerian government in the art’s preservation as a vital part of local culture, leading to the birth of the Fédération Algérienne du Sport Traditionnel.

Techniques First, it is important to review several components such as the size and dimensions of the stick, martial context, movement, offensive techniques, defensive techniques, and pedagogical approach to understand the thinking and the conditions that led to the development of the art. While used in dueling historically, these stick fighting forms were primarily for training soldiers for the battlefield. This truth impacts how one learns to properly move one’s body in conjunction with the proper use of the weapon, protecting one’s vital areas while attacking the opponents. Without understanding these factors, the value of specific techniques and the ritualistic aspects elude the observer. Given that both of the arts discussed in this article are complex and have centuries of history behind them, the focus will be on the foundational elements of the training methods, basic techniques, and what they seek to accomplish with some brief overview of the process and rituals involved in a sparring engagement.

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Modern Tahtib The weapon used in modern tahtib is the rattan staff roughly 1.3 meters long and 2.5 centimeters thick.

Rattan is preferable for its durability, flexibility, and light weight. In ancient Egypt, soldiers would train with rolled papyrus reeds (Riddle 2007). For combat, men armed themselves with a harder wood called naboot (Riddle 2007), equivalent to using oak or ironwood.

Competitions are called duels or jousts and take place in a circle roughly three meters in diameter.

During formal jousts, musicians playing a saidi rhythm on the doumbek, daf, mizmar, and thavol accompany the duelists. The music signals the beginning and end of a match. The pace of the music also dictates or reflects the pace of the action. Victory occurs when one combatant succeeds in landing one strike on the head on any one of the five target points (forehead, top of the head, the rear of the head, and each side of the head) or three blows to the torso for the safety of the combatants; there are no thrusts allowed. However, it is permitted to target areas such as the knees in training. Jousts take place in four stages: the bow and retreat, the gage, the codified joust, and free joust. The bow is a salute where one takes the khalfeya pose,

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symbolically obstructing the path of lateral strikes to the head from the opponent’s right arm. The gage refers to the practice of performing a rasha or sprinkling motion when the stick is swung over the head in unison by the two fighters. It allows a person to calibrate the distance and timing needed in the actual free joust. The codified joust is a run-through of rehearsed attacks and defenses, which helps build the free joust energy, which is the actual martial contest between the two fighters to determine the victor. Upon one of the competitors winning, the two fighters salute each other in the khalfeya and then retreat to the circle’s edge.

Modern Tahtib’s foundations are rooted in four principles. These are engraved in stone at the Abusir necropolis in the second of four lines depicting ancient Egyptian military training basics.

Figure 3 - Saluting an opponent in the khalfeya pose [Source: HAMA Association]

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1

Starting with the first principle, striking from the rear serves three purposes. First, it helps to generate power in the attack. Like a boxer’s punch, the kinetic chain begins at the legs. The entire body is engaged in the attack, adding power and reducing the stress on the arms and shoulders of the fighter. Secondly, it hides the intention of the attack.

A fighter can deceive the opponent by broadcasting an attack from one direction by leaning to one side and following up with an attack from the other while still engaging the core. Third, if fighting in a formation with several other comrades, chambering all strikes behind the back increases control and reduces the likelihood of the fighter from accidentally striking their comrades in a combat unit.

Because this art developed at a time when most common soldiers did not wear armor, accidentally striking one’s comrades with a battle-axe or mace could prove disastrous.

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2

The second principle refers to the protection of the head. Common soldiers in ancient Egypt did not commonly wear head protection. Helmets were not common, and even in later periods, turbans were often worn in duels or on the battlefield. Otherwise, guards such as the sada, the khalfeya, and amameya were used to protect the head. In modern tahtib, the head is the prime target, as touching one’s opponent on the head during a joust is an immediate victory. As a result, strikes are almost always followed up with a defensive posture that protects the head.

Figure 4 - The Sada guard [Source: HAMA Association]

3

The third principle—movement— emphasizes footwork as an offensive and defensive tool. When a fighter is unarmoured, one of the best tools for guarding against being hit is to avoid the blow entirely and position oneself to return it in kind. On the ancient battlefield, when the lines would break down and combat would devolve into a chaotic melee, spatial awareness, sure footing, and constant movement became as essential as the weapon in the warrior’s hands. To train for this, practitioners of modern tahtib learn their footwork and develop their agility through a series of dance steps.

One prime example of this in action is the small horse, a small step that shifts the fighter’s weight from one foot to the other. When used defensively, a fighter can strike a guard while simultaneously stepping out of the centerline of the attack. Staying in one place is discouraged. Further extrapolated, in a multiple-attacker scenario, paying attention to one’s position assists in choosing the appropriate footwork to avoid getting trapped between opponents, how many attackers there are, and where to attack them.

Figure 5 - Stepping off line in the small horse under the pyramid guard [Source: HAMA Association]

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4

The fourth and final principle focuses on the opponent and not the opponent’s weapon. Necessarily, if the execution of the prior three elements is strong enough, a fighter should be sufficiently protected from the opponent. The objective of each attack should be a target area on the opponent. Watching the opponent’s movements will better indicate the direction of the attack than watching the weapon itself. Focusing on the weapon rather than the fighter reduces the response time needed. The priority changes from threat management to becoming the threat, pressing the opponent to focus on defense instead of offense.

The proper striking technique in modern tahtib uses a push-pull movement of the hands, like cutting with a Japanese katana. The practitioner places the bottom of the stick in the center of their right palm. The left hand is positioned approximately one and a

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half hands above the lower hand.

Taking this position is ideal for controlling the stick without compromising much of the potential power and speed. There are several exercises to assist in developing this skill. The most basic method is the use of power and control exercises. Because modern tahtib does not use protective gear, practitioners must regularly practice restraint in sparring and training.

The exercise typically requires two people, but as a solo exercise, it is also beneficial. Person A takes the role of attacker, person B is the defender. Person B will hold the stick in one of five defensive positions (either side of the torso, either clavicle, or the top of the head).

Person A will strike with the weapon at the target area covered by the defender.

First, the sticks will make contact, then person A repeats the attack but stops just shy of touching the stick of person B. Person B removes

Figure 6 - Performing a power and control exercise with a lateral strike [Source: HAMA Association]

the stick from the guard position for the third strike and exposes the target area. Person A then attacks the exposed area but stops short of touching it. One achieves this by reversing the push-pull movement to a pull-push. Successfully executing the action during the power and control exercise turns a strike at full speed to a light strike to avoid contact. Performing power and control exercises trains the fighters to exercise speed, proper striking mechanics, and control.

Additionally, it promotes proper technique, safety, and familiarity with the strikes. Beginners stand in one position while striking and blocking. More advanced practitioners practice moving around while practicing power and control exercises.

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El Matreg There are various forms of el matreg—for the street, for league competition, and as a reconstructed art for the battlefield. Variations include a single-handed stick, a single two-handed stick, two single-handed sticks, or canes.

Some forms of the art allow for kicks to the legs or midsection. For this article, the focus will be on el matreg as a method for training in swordsmanship with both one single-handed stick and two single-handed sticks.

A duel in el matreg takes place in a space agreed upon by the fighters. Contests begin with a salute, which is a slight bow and touching the tip of the stick to the ground.

After the salute, the fighters will exchange blows, where first one person will attack with four pre-arranged blows while the other defends, then they will switch roles, and the other person will deliver four pre-arranged attacks before beginning the contest. Winning occurs by contacting one of the target areas, at which point the fighters will salute each other and then end the match. El matreg is a fast-paced contest of wits, where the two fighters will try to outwit each other with feints, redirection of an opponent’s blows, and quick footwork.

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The stick used in el matreg is traditionally cut from an olivewood tree and measures roughly 1 to 1.3 meters in length and between 1.5 and 2 cm in thickness. Rattan or oak are reasonable alternatives in the absence of olivewood. Though wrappings are not necessary, a stick can have corded or leather wrappings that cover up to 1/3 of its length. The stick is gripped at roughly a forearm’s length away from the bottom. This allows for better balance and reduces the likelihood of it slipping from the hand. The proper grip for el matreg changes based on what the fighter seeks to accomplish with the stick.

There are two basic grips associated with el matreg: The defensive grip—customarily used in parries and concert with the knuckles, it can be used as an analog for practicing edge alignment. This grip reduces the give in the stick when receiving a blow.

The hammer grip—the most common grip which can be used both offensively and defensively. The benefit of this grip is that it increases the reach to the angle of an attack at mid-strike and during weapon recovery.

The last is the handshake grip.

Figure 7 - The defensive, hammer, and handshake grips [Source: HAMA Association]

Strikes in el matreg are done in an arc motion, drawing the point of percussion on a curved trajectory and drawing the hand back.

When using swords against an unarmoured opponent, this has several functions. First, the strike makes contact and draws the blade against the target area, increasing the blade contact. Second, this motion assists in recovery and guards against partially pulling the weapon back or following through and leaving the weapon out too far due to lack of control. Instead, this controlled motion pulls the weapon back and immediately chambers it for another attack without slowing, stopping, or awkwardly changing the direction. Third, it is a defensive maneuver to keep the hand and forearm safe from attacks. Most of the swords in North Africa, save a few exceptions like the nimcha, are absent a knuckle bow, and some of them, such as the common saif, do not have cross guards at all. Other weapons for which this system is applicable, like the tabar/battle-axe or mace, have no hand protection. For this reason, the lower arm is an especially vulnerable target area. To

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keep the hands and forearms of the fighter safe from injury, taking guard positions that expose the hand and arm or full extension of the arm when not in mid-strike are discouraged.

The empty hand is kept in two positions, as seen in Figure 2. Most commonly, one holds it at the chest with the elbow tucked, chambering it for defensively deflecting thrusts to the face, initiating grappling at close quarters, or disarming an opponent. The hand to the chest also holds off-hand weapons, such as a separ (buckler) or a knife. The other position for the off-hand is on the rear hip. Defensively, this provides fewer options for a fighter, but it is far safer for the off-hand, as a missed parry might mean a landed blow to the off-hand if held at the chest.

The basic footwork in el matreg is not the same as one would expect from a single-handed fencing art.

Instead, the foundational footwork is more simplistic and mostly walks towards, around, or away from the opponent while avoiding crossing the legs.

Unlike modern tahtib, el matreg has 14 targets: – A cut to the left and right temples – A cut to the chin – A cut to the top of the head – A cut to the left and right clavicle or shoulder – A cut to the left and right elbow – A cut to the left or right sides of the torso – A cut to the left or right knee or thigh – A thrust to the center chest – A thrust to the neck or under the chin Despite there being 14 targets, there are only 5 main categories of attack: tarcha barrania – a strike from the outside (the side holding the weapon) tarcha dekhlaniya – a strike from the inside (the off-hand side) lahiya – a strike from above ras – a strike from below d’aefarr – a thrust The parries and guard positions all cover the target areas of each attack.

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The same parries can be static or active, depending on the movement’s objective. Attacks can also blur the line between categories.

For example, strikes to the clavicle are a blend of the tarcha and lahiya categories and apply to both single and double sticks. With two sticks, there is an additional defensive technique in which the two sticks cross each other to catch heavy blows or bind and control the opponent’s weapon. This cross-blocking technique effectively redirects thrusts, adding leverage against heavier weapons, and clearing the opponent’s weapon from the line of attack to open for a riposte.

When using el matreg as a training method for battlefield weapons, ambidexterity is encouraged and often referred to in treatises and accounts of battles. A practitioner trains attacking and defending with both the right and left hands in training. During Mamluk Egyp-

Figure 8 - A Mamluk on horseback carrying a tabar battle axe [Source: Kitāb al-makhzūn jāmi' al-funūn (~1470)]

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tian times, this was common as warriors on horseback needed to be proficient from both sides of the horse. If, for example, the dominant hand suffers any injury, skill in a weapon’s use with the other hand becomes necessary for survival.

The most basic and effective exercise to train proper mechanics and accuracy is to run through the 14 attacks and parries with a partner, both making and at times not making stick-to-stick contact. Depending on the practitioner’s skill, this is dome standing in one position and with more dynamic footwork. Other exercises include flow and strike drills that focus on recovering the stick after hitting or missing a target and memorizing various patterns, similar in theory to a boxer’s combinations.

Figure 9 - Mamluks training for ambidexterity [Source: Kitāb al-makhzūn jāmi' al-funūn (~1470)]

Stick fighting in North Africa is a dynamic, versatile, and ancient practice. It links modern-day prac-

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Figure 11 - Cutting practice on wet clay [Source: Kitāb al-makhzūn jāmi' al-funūn (~1470)]

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titioners to thousands of years of martial tradition, stretching back to the birth of humanity’s great civilizations. On ancient battlefields, mastery of these techniques prepared warriors to protect themselves and their comrades with various tools. They learned footwork, defensive postures, and targeting and developed the muscle memory to make this practiced knowledge second nature. Tahtib has survived the thousands of years of conflict that rocked ancient Egypt, from its unification, through many invasions, and colonization. Today, its legacy is carved in stone and in the soul of the drum that beats as staves clash in a friendly contest.

El matreg has also stood the test of time, long after the sword and battle-axe gave way to the pistol and rifle. Once a battlefield art, now

Figure 10 - Cross Blocking in El Matreg double stick applied [Source: HAMA Association]

the victor shakes the hand of the vanquished at the end of the joust, and each goes their separate ways.

Time will only tell what the future of these arts will be as they become more organized and grow in popularity. For now, at least, let the players play as they continue the legacy of those forgotten beneath the sands of time.

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REFERENCES

Bissada, Anne-Marie. “Egypt’s 5,000-Year-Old Secret Art - Tahtib.” AllAfrica. May 27, 2017 (accessed January 5, 2019). https://allafrica.com/stories/201705290170.html.

Boulad, Dr. Adel. Modern Tahtib: Egyptian Baton Martial and Festive Art. Shanghai: Budo Editions, 2014.

El Watan. “Sports traditionnels: Une caravane pour la promotion d’El Matrag.” El Watan.com. January 30, 2011 (accessed January 3, 2019). https:// www.elwatan.com/archives/sports-archives/sports-traditionnels-une-caravane-pour-la-promotion-del-matrag-30-01-2011.

Mark, Joshua J. “Weapons in Ancient Egypt.” World History Encyclopedia.

March 22, 2017 (accessed January 1, 2019). https://www.ancient.eu/article/1035/weapons-in-ancient-egypt/.

Riddle, Jonathan Wayne. “Ancient Egyptian Stick Fighting.” Electronic Journals of Martial Arts and Sciences. August 2007 (accessed January 6, 2019). https://ejmas.com/jcs/2007jcs/jcsart_riddle_0807.html.

UNESCO. “Tahtib, jeu du bâton.” UNESCO Multimedia Video & Sound Collections. 2013 (accessed January 6, 2019). http://www.unesco.org/archives/ multimedia/?pg=33&s=films_details&id=4360.

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Adam H. C. Myrie @ ahc.myrie.7

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Ethan Minor

THE BANDO STAFF HISTORY AND APPLICATIONS:

PAST & PRESENT SURVIVAL! SURVIVAL IS THE mother of necessity. The internal drive to survive has been an instinctual imperative for both humans and animals throughout history. Through the gift of instinct, humans have discovered myriad ways to ensure their survival and that of their clan. This quest for survival led humans to utilize the natural resources available to

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them to their advantage. The staff, which is just a very nice stick, has been an essential tool for survival since early Homo descended from the trees to the savannas. The ubiquitous stick can dig up roots, finish off wounded animals, and threaten those seeking to harm them.

The stick underwent a re-purposing and discovery of new purposes as early Homo evolved into

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big-game hunters, agriculturalists, and empire builders. As far back as the 6th century, people began migrating from the Tibetan-Burmese highlands down into the Ayeyarwady, or as it was known, the Irrawaddy River valley that flows through Myanmar or what used to be called Burma. Here among the farming communities, staves are used today as in the past to dig seed holes. Longer staves had lanyards attached to thresh harvested grain or to take part in innumerable tasks a farmer must do.

The Staff as a Multipurpose Tool Staff use has also been documented on and off the battlefield to serve multiple duties. After a battle, rigging a pair of poles together served as stretchers. Or a pair of staves tied together could act as a travois to transport large amounts of gear. Long poles proved helpful in extending one’s reach. Staves help one ascend or descend steep ravines or traverse chasms or canals by walking on top of the poles or vaulting across them. The modern-day ladder combines parallel poles with multiple smaller dowels connecting them perpendicularly at regular intervals. The ladder, though complex, is still a form of the staff at heart. The use of the staff for walking was once a common sight across the

globe throughout many centuries.

Monks, priests, pilgrims, and other solitary or devout individuals have kept the staff as one of their few possessions during their pilgrimages and travels. These traveling aids served them well against bandits, highwaymen, or wild animals.

Healthcare is an essential piece of any person’s life, ancient or modern. Whether farmer or soldier, the ability to heal oneself or others and return is critical on or off the battlefield. Many cultures worldwide have viewed the staff as a symbol of healing. The first well-documented staff symbolizing a healing tool was representations of the Greek god Hermes.

Hermes carried a staff with two snakes wrapped around it. However, the Caduceus, some claim, goes back to the images of the Sumerian god Ningshizida from the ancient city-state of Lugash. Now it is familiar to all as the symbol of modern Western medicine. The staff ’s practical medical uses include acting as a massage tool to increase blood flow to weary muscles and taxed organs. Traditional massage with a staff strokes such as effleurage, percussion, and kneading, are all improved.

The hardness of the tool allows for deeper penetration and more even weight distribution. The leverage

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provided eases the strain on the person providing the treatment.

Additionally, an arm-sized staff can be used as a roller or poker to help dig into hypertonic muscles and agitated joints, relieving ligament adhesions. When employed in the form of bando yoga known as dhanda, the staff acts as a guide and support to help align the spine and stretch the limbs and trunk of the body beyond their usual capacity. On a more esoteric level, the dhanda represents the spine and is used as a visualization aid to channel prana or ch’i. With all these applications, be they in military or medical contexts, the integration of breath through the staff is essential for allowing the staff to become part of the individual.

Traditional Burmese thought believed everything was alive with a spirit, so removing an object from its habitat removed its connection to its spirit. For this reason, bando practitioners commonly infuse their staves with some of their spirit using breathing patterns, heartbeat synchronization, and other meditation techniques. In this way, the staff becomes a living extension of the person’s body instead of an inanimate object wielded by the practitioner.

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Martial Uses of the Staff The origin of the bando staff lies in the Kingdom of Pagan, the first kingdom to unify the regions that would later constitute modern-day Burma (Myanmar). Originally the kingdom was founded by a collection of Tibeto-Burman-speaking warrior tribes who came down the Irrawaddy River valley alongside soldiers of the Nanzhao Empire that reigned North of the valley in present-day Yunnan. Settling at a place they called Pagan in the 9th century, the small fortified town expanded into one of the major kingdoms of the region.

Over the next two centuries, the Kingdom of Pagan spread and assured the dominance of Burmese ethnicity, language, and culture in the region. As a ruling military elite, the warrior-citizens of Pagan had to maintain their military skills to ensure obedience from the conquered populations. Although the Pagan army relied on swords, spears, and bows and arrows, the staff was also part of their armaments. The staves used by warriors from this part of the world had to be strong and durable when fending off soldiers mounted on horses or elephants, or attacks by trained war dogs.

Choosing the Type and Length of Staff It was essential for soldiers and warriors of ancient times to expertly use the available tools. The versatile, convenient, and readily accessible staff was an obvious choice. Traditionally, each individual had to choose their staff. If one’s life hinged upon a preferred weapon, it must be of sturdy material, something nearly unbreakable and able to bear a considerable weight without losing structural integrity. For this reason, in the United States, the American ironwood tree is a common choice for the bando staff practitioner. Ironwood makes a good staff due to its fibrous nature and dense cellular structure; it tends to fray instead of cracking or splitting. Choosing a staff length is done relative to the size and build of the person intended to wield the staff. A short staff, called a “fist stick,” may be the length of the person’s pinky finger or the distance between a person’s thumb and pinky. An ideal short staff is the length of a person’s arm, and an exemplary middle staff would be the approximate height of the person with their arm extended above their head. A long staff is the height of the person with their arm extended above the head with an additional arm’s

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length. The relative nature of the size of the staff ensured the user would be able to control it for blocking and striking and other effective maneuvers, while at the same time allowing for the tool to be the appropriate size when used for digging, land-clearing, prying, levering, or other practical uses.

The circumference of the staff must also be relative to the relationship to the user’s needs.

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Selection and Preparation of the Staff Once one chooses a suitable branch, one can cut it with care.

Today, handsaws are preferable to chainsaws, which often leave jagged edges and tend to destroy the tree’s bark. The bark is vital for the staff, so bando practitioners prefer to leave as much of the bark intact as possible. When the staff has been

chosen and cut down with care and intention, the user then sets to it with either sandpaper or sandstone to round off and smooth any rough edges, knots, or burrs found on the staff. The practitioner’s hand must slide up and down naturally without any hitches or catches that could create friction points for the user. Natural curvatures in knots are welcome on the bando staff. Natural features such

as these are advantageous to the wielder. A flared bottom at the end of the staff is useful for creating a club. Midpoint knots are useful as an indexing grip so that the user knows precisely where their hand lies along the staff ’s length. Also, some curvature can help create more force and increase the speed of travel through the air. Bando employs a beneficial practice of curing and conditioning weapons.

After sanding the staff smooth, a seasoning product such as linseed oil comes next, with the staff soaking for up to 90 days. The impregnation of the linseed oil into the staff modifies the structure of the molecules and produces an incredibly water-resistant, hard, yet slightly flexible weapon. Staves treated in this manner are often as hard as metal or poles and can bend and flex slightly. They do not shatter or crack upon extreme use.

A final step of coating a staff with polyurethane will ensure that this impregnation and treatment will last for many years of rigorous use.

Staff Lengths The need for different lengths of staves is also important. A smaller version of the staff, which fits into one’s hand, is a fist stick. A fist stick protrudes outside the fist on both ends, often with pointed or hardened tips, and is easily concealable in a pocket or a purse. With the addition of a lanyard, it can become a very powerful, medium-range weapon. Both military and police techniques employ baton or small flashlights by drawing on traditional fist stick techniques. Fist sticks are also convenient for traveling or concealing when openly carrying weaponry is not legal.

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Forearm to arm-size staves are considered short staves as seen in modern-day use as the police baton or riot baton. A staff of this size is suitable for close, hand-tohand combat. Police employ the riot baton for crowd control, and at times to clear streets of rioters or protestors. The medium staff is commonly the height of the practitioner plus the length of their extended arm. The medium staff is the weapon of choice in many bando forms. The use of such a staff combined with nimble footwork, known as “Mandalay,” “Middle Staff,” or “Dissident Son,” permits an effective defense against multiple attackers on uneven or broken-up terrain.

Staff Grips When holding the staff, bando employs three gripping styles; the forward grip positions a great deal of the length of the staff behind the user, the middle grip positions one’s hands on both ends of the staff, and the rear grip positions the majority of the staff in front of the user. In addition to the type of guard one takes up when picking up a staff, the orientation of the hands is also a crucial consideration. One can use an overhand grip with the palms down, an un-

derhand grip with the palms up, or mixed grip with one palm up and one palm down. These grips change according to the user’s needs, moving from front to middle to rear grips and changing through mixed overhand and underhand grips.

Moving rapidly through the gripping variations creates not only an artful flowing movement, as demonstrated in kata, but effective, powerful use of the weapon.

Bando Fighting Technique As a martial system, bando relies on removing oneself away from the line of attack and then supporting this movement with a block or a parry if need be. Since blocks can often generate an incredibly high amount of force, parrying and deflecting is preferable to a hard block or a perpendicular block when one uses the staff to stop an incoming blow. Direct blocks create undue stress on the user and the weapon and are challenging to sustain over long, extended engagements.

Faster, agile movements of dodging and deflecting are preferable due to their sustainable nature, as well as the tendency to create a moment in which parries and deflections leave the opponent open for a counterstrike.

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Striking with the staff targets the lower portions of the body, such as the feet, ankles, and knees, because it is more challenging to defend the lower half of the body.

It is also more difficult to see the strikes coming, as most originate below the attacker’s eye level.

Blows straight to the head, shoulders, arms, chest, and abdomen are employed, though easily deflected or blocked. Strikes such as these need to be set up where the opponent is vulnerable to a strike to the chest, head, abdomen, or worse, the neck.

Stepping is also essential. Bando employs a “trident” stepping pattern, utilizing 45-degree angles to create a tactical advantage. Extended, shuffle, and full steps are used to maneuver oneself into an advantageous angle. Bando schools often have trident or star patterns painted or taped onto the floor and used as guidelines for stepping practice.

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Long Staff

Uses of the staff in Bando Practice

The long staff, often between nine and 12 feet in length, is predominantly used for combat. Against mounted targets such as horseman and elephant cavalry, it was exceptionally useful. To be able to withstand the shock of fighting off mounted soldiers, the staff had to be durable yet flexible enough to take out the legs of a galloping animal, due to the force generated from a charging elephant or horse.

Tasked to deal specifically with mounted soldiers, groups of men armed with long staff successfully repelled these attacks. Other times, soldiers outfitted their staves with blades, spikes, or weights.

They proved to be incredibly effective against multiple attackers.

Polearms also proved effective in holding wide swathes of ground due to their reach and power. Adding a hook to a polearm added another weapon, for example, to pull riders from their mounts, remove the stability of the mount’s footing, and grasp or reach for weapons wielded by mounted combatants. It takes an incredible amount of stamina and strength to wield such a large weapon for any long period. Therefore, the training employed by the units utilizing these tools was rigorous and incredibly physically demanding.

Many martial arts systems employ the striking of invisible or “air” targets. Bando is more well known for its hard striking targets such as bricks, concrete blocks, hanging logs, and stones. It is not uncommon for a practitioner to hang a log from two to five feet in length and up to 12 inches in diameter from a chain and use this as a striking pole. The striking pole gives realistic feedback to the user. When one strikes a hard surface, the force generated reverberates back from the target into the user. If one has spent their time practicing striking the air the first time one strikes a real-life opponent, the possibility of the weapon vibrating right out of the user’s control is genuine.

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For this reason, grip strength and hand conditioning are critical to wield a staff weapon in combat realistically. To this end, hours of striking hard targets is required, along with recovery and healing practices to offset the abuse. The person and the staff must be strong enough to withstand the grueling training necessary.

Animal Forms and the Staff In the bando system, there are nine different animal forms. Each of these animal forms has a corresponding staff that is similar or appropriate for the animal to which it is related. For example, the “bull staff ” is traditionally larger, heavier, and denser. The bull practitioner utilizes body locking techniques to generate the magnitude of force uncommon to other animal styles. Another example is the “python staff,” which includes a slightly longer, narrower staff with an attached vine. In modern days, a rope or lanyard is attached to facilitate trapping, grappling, twisting, and pulling techniques.

links breath to the spirit and the universe. The bando stick practitioner seeks to harmonize the disparate elements of existence using the stick as an expression of this harmonization, which occurs through movement and engaging with life’s challenges with a simple yet profound tool provided by nature for the ultimate goal of survival.

A third example is the “scorpion staff,” somewhat shorter in length and circumference yet equipped with a pointed and potentially hardened or even poisoned sharp end. In these examples, the variation of the staff ’s direct relationship to the practitioner’s needs is observable. A profound link connects the nature of the staff to the history of the Burmese people.

Within the grueling practices and vicious combat, a connection also

Ethan Minor @ ethan.minor.58

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Stick Arts VOL 1, ISSUE 3

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