Where are the European martial arts?

probably because modernism developed organically in the West but was kinda forced in Japan and China so more elements of early modern culture such as fighting arts remained in place.

Pankration

So are martial arts in general.

>Why western fighting systems didn't become more wide spread as those?

pic related

Well you have the Russian systema, thats pretty old

But certain martial arts are less memey than others.

Thats why you go Muay Thai

The origins of martial arts dates back to Ancient India. The art was known as "Kalaripuyuttu". Buddhist missionaries such as Bodhidharma traveled to China and taught them Kalari. It then became Karate and Kung-Fu. Shaolin Temple was revered for the Buddhist missionary, Bodhidharma also known as Damo.

Wrong.

Ours involve alot of metal and weapons, as opposed to non-lethal instruments and fists. We quickly scrapped the whole thing and went to guns.

Olympic fencing is meme-tier, but that's an example of a European martial art. I don't know why Asians focus so much on not using weapons, or not just stabbing people.

Well, this is kind of complicated. While Karate is a relatively new style, along with judo, the original point remains if we change the word from karate to jiu jitsu, a lesser known MA (compared to the Brazilian version, or karate because the films) that was trained and employed by the Japanese police like 600 years ago. Many places that train "ninjas" are actually training jiu jitsu, or some variation of.

As for kung fu, it also depends on what style we are talking about. Wing chun, sanshou and such, yeah, are modern invents. But then we have choy leet fut, from the XV century, iirc, and then we can move back to animal styles, like tiger and snake (and the variations like red cobra and such), which are, supposedly, being trained from millennium years or so.

Also, boxing, which is another "gentleman" meme fight.

We're not really built to jump around and spin. We just sort of plant ourselves and start wailing on eachother with our upper bodies, like gorillas.

Not wrong.

Almost all Asian martial arts originally involved weapons, with unarmed fighting as a supplement or fully integrated component.

It is only in the modern era that the weapon elements have been removed or reduced to secondary roles.

Also we didn't quickly scrap the hole thing. There were efficient systems of swordsmanship being taught to westerners up until the World Wars

Pure jujutsu is mostly a product of the edo era starting around 1603. earlier systems were more concerned with battlefield grappling, that is grappling with armor and weapons.

As far as I'm aware most of the 'ancient' Asian martial arts, as the culture and surrounding them, were developed in the late 19th and early twentieth centuries. When you take away the mythology of the ancient art passed down in a recognisable form from master to apprentice with attended spiritual practices and vocabulary all fighting arts are essentially similar. Pre-industrial Europeans practised 'martial arts' to the same degree that Asians, but since they didn't generate an attendant mythology there's an illusion of deficiency.

This is true of most of the modern popular forms.
As Japan and China modernized many teachers felt their arts couldn't survive in the modern world and created new forms suitable for mass instruction and sport applications.

Many of the older martial arts those popular forms are based on still exist, they are just harder to find and a lot of people dont know about them

The whole story:
>boxing, wrestling(particularly folk and catch), cane fighting, savate, sport fencing are all surviving martial arts with European lineages
>Sambo and Krav are modern period creations
>Traditional African, Capoeira, while not "white" started in the western hemisphere

You also need to recognize the rapid cross pollination of martial arts in the 19th and 20th centuries. For this reason, it's much more difficult to establish east from west based on techniques and concepts. Instead we go by lineage. There have always been mutations of techniques in different areas, and there have always been techniques which are the same across arts. The human body only works in so many ways.

Now you also have HEMA people trying to bring back many kinds of martial arts. From the most popular types of swordfighting, down to the less popular bare knuckle boxing, folk wrestling, staff and cane fighting. Using historic sources and attempting to come to a historically accurate interpretation.

And this approach is beginning to bleed out into other places which have recorded martial arts systems. Chinese, Japanese, and recently, Mamluk arts have had texts about them. So people are beginning to recreate those.

And even with martial arts that have current lineages, we're finding old and unused techniques. Martial arts is a game of telephone over hundreds of years with thousands of people.

>The short story
Some martial arts from the west live on, but the bulk of WMA is now research of dead martial arts. Europeans have never had an attachment or fondness with martial tradition.

Its callled boxing and wrestling

>Europeans have never had an attachment or fondness with martial tradition.

They did as a symbolic manner. things like halberds were kept in an honorific role in armies. long after they stopped being useful.

Western Martial Arts are the ones they teach the wester countries to their armies. That's literally the definition of martial art.

Because the West is more advanced they no longer teach you to use spears, bows or those huge anime swords like the Boxers used in China. They teach you shit like shooting weapons and some hand to hand combat.

Also, HEMA is a meme because it will never be as accurate as they want it to be. Just look at Kung Fu. If you ask ACTUAL Kung Fu masters they will tell you that a lot of techniques and methods were lost. Keep in mind these guys have a lineage going back to Shaolin Monks. HEMA is a bunch of historyfags who want to rebuild these martial arts by reading old books which nobody taught them how. It's really sad though.

Western militaries were still teaching swordsmanship during the boxer rebellion.

The hema guys know there stuff will never be 100% right. but You really dont need to be that right to be practical. Alot of them do have backgrounds in other martial arts including swordsmanship

youtube.com/watch?v=wMNKLFn41IU

Kung fu, unlike hema, doesn't have extensive and numerous treatises and manuals describing it's techniques in great detail.

Didn't know that. That's cool.
Like I said, the west was more advanced so using different kinds of weapons instead of firearms wasn't important. Maybe you don't know but most of Kung Fu techniques and manuals are from the 19th and 20th century (Wong Fei Hung, Yip Man) not from thousand of years ago. That's because firearms weren't that popular in China in those centuries.

>Why western fighting systems didn't become more wide spread as those?
They did, most people just don't realize it because Eastern arts get a lot more attention, mostly because they're exotic. Boxing, wrestling, and fencing are the three classic western martial arts, and they're still very much alive and widespread. More so in most cases than Eastern arts (at least, in Western society); almost every high school, university, gym, and civic center will usually at least teach one of those arts as standard, whereas Eastern arts are specialties taught at their own schools.

It's mostly just an issue of perception, and this post basically explains why it happened. The Eastern arts were introduced to the west fairly recently, and with a lot of mythology attached to them. Their exotic nature made them more attractive than the western stuff everyone was surrounded with, and the term "martial arts" mostly got applied to them, instead of western arts, which people just saw as sports.

There's also sort of another issue with classification. Western striking is called boxing; Eastern striking is broken down into thousands of different systems, and the same is true of grappling. That means it looks like more Asian arts have survived, but that's mostly the result of terminology.

The Greeks had the Olympic Games and athletisism which would be consecrated to the gods

>What is wrestling
>What is Savate kickboxing
>what is boxing
>What is fencing

Europe has many different types of wrestling, it has boxing, and it has kickboxing, no?

>There's also sort of another issue with classification. Western striking is called boxing; Eastern striking is broken down into thousands of different systems, and the same is true of grappling. That means it looks like more Asian arts have survived, but that's mostly the result of terminology.

This is an over simplification. There were at one time douzens of systems of wrestling practiced in Europe, only two or three survive today.

Were as with jujutsu there are hundreds of surviving modern styles and a few dozen classical styles that are 150 years or older.

The same with fencing. There are three types of Olympic fencing still in common practice. There are dozens of modern styles of japanese sword and nearly a hundred styles old enough to be called early modern or medieval.

These systems are not all the same, many even dont teach you to cut the same way.

Firearms were prevalent in those times. However many local gangs existed in cities like Hong Kong. In rural areas, people trained together as a way to secure keep everyone safe.
chinesemartialstudies.com/2013/09/27/martial-arts-and-community-violence-a-comparative-approach/
chinesemartialstudies.com/2014/11/21/social-distrust-and-the-chinese-martial-artist/
The short of it is that if you joined a martial arts dojo, you probably joined a gang. But you'd train with them, and they'd have your back if you got jumped.
>but guns
We've got even more prevalent guns than before, which are better in every way. But gangs still get into fights with fists, batons, knives, and baseball bats. People only want to kill when it's serious. Just because guns exist in a society, doesn't mean that hand to hand combat disappears.
>HEMA is a meme
Let's see your interpretation of how swordsmanship worked for sword and buckler.
Don't use HEMA findings as sources.

Fencing and Boxing are Yuropean martial arts.

Also, just a fun fact about widespread nature of western martial arts: Bruce Lee, the icon of eastern martial arts, only really has documentation showing proficiency in western arts. His training in Wing Chun, which is usually considered his core art, was incomplete, and his study in most other arts was informal. But, while in high school, he was a champion fencer, and (apparently, but no one can find the records) won a boxing tournament. And both are accepted as huge influences on Jeet Kune Do.

>the icon of eastern martial arts

he is an icon among people who dont practice them. There are people with far greater accomplishments in terms of the arts

But Bruce Lee is still the biggest in pop culture, which is kind of what this thread is about. OP was asking why western arts aren't as widespread, and that definitely has to do with most people's exposure to them. Everyone knows who Bruce Lee is, and pop culture's idea of what martial arts has a lot to do with him and his movies. And even though he's thought of as a guy that did eastern arts, he had a pretty strong background in western arts, according to pretty much all versions of his background.

If we are looking for unarmed style, those were largely frowned upon by the modern era aristocracy and bourgeioisie, wrestling and fencing wasn't exactly the go-to martial arts of the later Renaissance (even though wrestling was a foundation of martial arts in the late middle-ages).
Contrasting this with Japan for instance where jujutsu/yawara was still one of the basic skill the warrior-caste was suppose to possess, it's not that surprising that unarmed styles tend to wane in Europe, where gentlemen would mostly resort to civilian swords rather than fisticuffs and wrestling to defend themselves and their honor. Only in folk wrestling would those traditions be kept and then, modernization of the european states usually went into the eradication of folk culture or regional culture (not everywhere but still).

Wrestling and boxing before the late-19th century was mostly a common people way to fight, and those usually don't stand the passage of time and don't have immense exposition to a larger public. The same eastern styles had exoticism and romanticism for them.

Glíma, the nordic style of wrestling, is a thing too, dating back to the Viking Age, it's just not that well known.

please can someone explain why Krav Maga is not taken seriously?

Too deadly to be taken seriously.

Mostly because of the marketing. It's an art that heavily promotes itself as being hardcore, no-frills, effective fighting that uses better training methodology than most eastern arts. But Krav schools are basically run as a franchise business with little quality control. This means that most of the time you encounter it, it's being taught through compliant drills, and with a lot of techniques that wouldn't work at all in a real fight. But the people that do it still think they would wreck anyone in a fight because they do such an effective art. Seriously, just watch some Krav videos and see how ridiculous a lot of it looks.

What is boxing

Most jujutsu styles, and even most kenjutsu styles were practiced heavily by non-samurai with the exception of "inner styles" who exclusively taught the warriors of a certain domain.

In east asia China had the advantage in unarmed arts as most matial arts there were of a plebeian nature. During the edo era the Japanese actually adapted many Concepts the Chinese developed such as striking vital points and internal training into their unarmed arts, of course some of that was also absorbed back up into their armed arts

Krav of course begun with Isreali commandos. Some of those first generations practitioners were amazing but since then its become heavily watered down

>Most jujutsu styles, and even most kenjutsu styles were practiced heavily by non-samurai with the exception of "inner styles" who exclusively taught the warriors of a certain domain.
But jujutsu were also practiced by samurai, especially lower-ranking ones, and that's the important part. Of course, non-samurai were numerous in those arts, despite the fact that many koryu were suppose to be samurai-only, but surely the fact that the warrior caste practiced unarmed techniques made them survive easier than in Europe, where before the late 19th century, it wasn't really developped among the upper classes.

>Europe, where before the late 19th century, it wasn't really developped among the upper classes.
Knights were nobility, and they were expected to know unarmed fighting techniques as well as armed ones. In general, martial arts among the nobility in Europe functioned almost exactly liked martial arts did for the samurai: the warriors learned how to use weapons, as well as unarmed techniques (mostly wrestling) to assisting in armored fighting. That's why most longsword manuals have sections on wresling; it was the European counterpart to jujutsu, which was taught in basically the same way. Fiore de Liberi, who wrote one of the earliest surviving longsword manuals specifically tells his readers that his techniques were only for nobles, and that in no circumstance should commoners be taught any of his techniques.

Well it gets confusing. Most of the schools were founded by samurai, but often the best student would be a commoner, so the teacher would adopt them, and they would take a warrior name, and so on so on.

The point is in the same way most martial artists were burgers rather than knights in Europe, most martial artists in Japan were not samurai by blood or even title

Jujutsu schools at the end of edo were often associated with commoners rather than samurai, with some exceptions of course

What are you

what does a late period deck gun have to do with martial arts?

did pirates have martial arts? Asian pirates?

>Olympic fencing
>japanese sword

I wonder which is more important, the Olympics or japanese sword.

I don't think that is completely true. Yes, gangs and the poor kung fu masters who used to teach only to wealthy now teaching to not so wealthy is a fact, but guns being more popular in the west contributed to the decline of 'old' martial arts. Look at the Boxers, if all of them had guns they wouldn't have used kung fu.

Also, I mean HEMA is a meme because there is no lineage tracing back to at least 19th century when sword fighting was still a thing.

The same happens to some extent in Kung Fu. Not everyone remember all the dances (like kata in Karate) because there are so many. Kung Fu masters sometime 'rebuild' them just like HEMA larpers do.

Martial arts are useless for war. Sport was under Christian pressure in Europe before 19 century.
In fact many Eastern systems were created by Europeans, because China or nearest countries were free of Church.

Gee I dont know. what makes swordsmanship important?
The Japanese dont want their swordsmanship to become an Olympic sport.

Does being an Olympic sport make epee or saber combat efficient? Thats why so many people are going to hema.

I know all of this, I was talking mid-modern era, as in my earlier post. By the 17th century, the nobility was pretty so-so with wrestling.

My point still was that because wrestling was done and practiced by the warrior class (they weren't numerous for a start so of course commoners would be more than them at raw numbers), it stayed at a pretty good status, probably less than kenjutsu or other weapon-practice (and then most jujutsu school would also have a weapon part in their curriculum) but still, it's a martial art and all.
Unarmed Martial arts in Europe was by the 17-18th century mostly a commoner's activity and that didn't help them to survive in a straight lineage, contrary to the japanese example.

The fact that the soke would adopt and basically "pretend" (or actually elevate him) that he is of the warrior-class would support that jujutsu was still very much associated with the warrior class, and that's what matters.

Because the westerns invented portale guns?

>By the 17th century, the nobility was pretty so-so with wrestling.
That's because they weren't expected to participate in armored combat, for the most part. Jujutsu and knightly wrestling were both mostly used seen as complimentary to armed fighting, usually with armor involved. The Samurai kept that system going longer than Europeans did. You're essentially comparing an era where the expectations of the nobility can't be be compared. If you compare both regions during feudal systems where nobles were expected to have similar skills, wrestling was viewed pretty equally.

But after that period in Europe, nobles were still expected to be proficient with martial arts. Maybe not wrestling (or boxing until later), but sword skills were seen as important consistently through the nineteenth century. Hell, the smallsword was developed mostly as a weapon for nobles to use.

>Mamluk arts have had texts about them. So people are beginning to recreate those.

That's neat. So are there like historical Middle Eastern martial arts out there already then?

The question of the thread is "why unarmed martial arts are a thing in Asia and not really Europe".
My common answer is "warrior class stopped doing them in Europe and didn't in specific parts of Asia", it's not about comparing two things that can't be compared... And of course we can compare the expectations of two nobilities during the same time period, that's what comparaisons are for!

I have been saying pretty much everything you are saying in this comment...

Tehre were many village kung fu styles.

While the proliferation of firearms, expecially handguns probably promoted the decline of the martial arts, things like swordsmanship were widly spread in Europe until the 20th century.

>
The same happens to some extent in Kung Fu. Not everyone remember all the dances (like kata in Karate) because there are so many. Kung Fu masters sometime 'rebuild' them just like HEMA larpers do.

Two things, martial arts is not about rigid preservation, even in traditional arts. scrolls and other materials were passed down for a reason and if someone who is already trained can glean lost information from their schools scrolls they should.

Second its not really larping considering how systematic they are being. A lot of people with martial arts experience are involved and doing a lot of important research

>The question of the thread is "why unarmed martial arts are a thing in Asia and not really Europe".
No it's not. It's "why didn't western fighting systems become as widespread as eastern ones?" At least, that's more like what OP asked; either way, we've been answering different questions, then. My position to that question is that they are as widespread, people just don't realize it because most people tend to not think of western martial arts as martial arts.

And I think your emphasis on things either needing to be unarmed systems, and from an "straight lineage" kind of demonstrate why. Those are two criteria that don't really need to limit the discussion (OP never specified them, you just assumed it), because they don't really make sense. Armed traditions are still martial arts. Likewise, even though manuals didn't exist for commoner forms of wrestling and boxing, they obviously still continued to exist. The lack of documentation doesn't mean they're not martial arts. If you want to approach the question as OP actually put it (or at least how I saw it), the simplest explanation is the one I put above.

>So, what happened?

Western wrestling and boxing dominates the world stage, and always has, because it relies on direct competition instead of "kata" bullshit. The only Asian arts that come close are those styles that make up Thai boxing, because they, too, use actual fighting as opposed to bullshit "kata" and "spiritual" nonsense.

The ONLY reason oriental arts are a thing outside their respective nations is because of Hollywood movies. Period.

That really untrue, the first westerners who got into these arts at a deep level were often familiar with things like boxing, fencing and wrestling themselves, and many of them were floored by the abilities and level of skill they found in east asia.

Not in all Asian arts mind you, especially if you look at their private correspondence and recollections of friends they sorted through a lot of wannabes and crap, but they found people who could deliver.

In any case you can find some variety of east Asian arts in modern MMA, most of which are modern varieties derived from older methods at the turn of the century, more different in how they were taught than what they taught.

Like I said, Thai boxing, and anything similar that focuses on fitness and actually fighting, is 100% superior to the bullshit kata focused garbage so many Asian arts are predicated on.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrestling

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing

Hold on with your generalizations.

Do you think that those kata arts were not, in their hayday focused on those things?

competitions: both no holds barred and otherwise between schools were common, sumo and similar chinese wrestiling was everywhere, and like today the most fit guys tended to rise to the top.

The idea that "aliveness" is new is patently false. there was alot of put up or shut up, and there was alot of very tough training, either in randori or "breaking" the kata into a semi sparring style.

The used kata in western martial arts too mind you, pretty much any weapon based martial art was taught through something similar with a different name.

The reason modern Asian martial arts appeared as more to do with the need for mass instruction and national standards than the old ones not working.

You don't know fucking shit about fighting. Unarmed combat has been a staple of martial training in the West, and is shown in multiple manuscripts.
thearma.org/essays/G&WinRF.htm#.VAO8Ddm9LCR

>Do you think that those kata arts were not, in their hayday focused on those things?

I think that when they stopped focusing on actual sparring is when they lost their way, because the only shit that's proven to be effective today all come from arts that actively spar and compete.

Again, some sparred some broke the pattern, and its true when they stopped training hard they became incomplete objects of preservation. But regardless of how they did it they were kata arts not much different to watch than ones today.

I think looking at modern arts and then extrapolating historical norms is a rather faulty method of evaluating historical arts.

EMA are real, though.

If they are going to do that kind of transitioning to documents they ought to slow the video down so we can actually compare, but I have no problem with their swordwork

Still the question is why things like that died out when they didn't not totally die in east asia

Y'all need Musashi. And he needs to cut you up.

...

...

Yes well old asp was great for general advice but they were not much interested in anything but MMA, except the sword guys.

>Do you want to be VERY deadly or kinda?
>kinda
>Aikido

>aikido
>deadly at all

hmmmmmmm

The founder of Aikido was not a pacifist, and actually trained people at the Nakano spy school.

There was a time when the aikido hombu took challengers, they always kept a few brawlers and tough guys around to deal with them. They were taught more jujutsu like variations of the "rounded" aikido techniques you often see.

>Here, grab my arm...no not there, here...no, not like that, like this......

...

youtube.com/watch?v=gyXhysmMNhE

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furusiyya

razmafzar - youtube.com/user/JahaneRazmafzar

Because Bruce Lee. There's no western actor let alone an asian actor who had been famous for having any prowess on western martial arts.

This
If it was good enough for Alexander the Great, it's good enough for anybody.

because guns

A meme.
>but guns being more popular in the west contributed to the decline of 'old' martial arts
False. Martial arts were still practiced by soldiers for hand to hand combat. Bayonet fencing was drilled. So was sword fencing for officers and cavalry. Right up until WWI, this was widely done. WWII still had bayonet training, and the Germans and Russians still had cavalry that trained with swords. And used them in a couple of cases.
Europeans had folk wrestling and boxing shows and tournaments. So did Americans. Cane fencing was popular while canes were an item to carry for fashion. And Ireland has living cane fighting lineages, as does France.

People still got beat up and mugged and stabbed with blades while revolvers were around. From bowies to sabers to bayonets. And people still needed to learn how to defend themselves against all of that.

The decline of western martial arts in popularity is a very recent phenomenon. And it is directly related to the introduction of Asian martial arts with immigrant populations.

There are surviving lineages of fencing, wrestling and cane or staff fighting. Sport fencing lays a direct claim all the way back to Rapiers. If you want to be pedantic, you could start it with the introduction of the lunge in Giacomo di Grassi's text. (Note: I could be wrong about him starting lunges in fencing in Europe. He's the earliest swordsman I know of who makes use of them.)
You could say it starts with the beginning of Rapier, or Sidesword which is "close enough" to a Rapier. But that would be stretching it.

There are living lineages of folk wrestling which very likely go back past the 19th century, as they were wrestling styles in the area which were referenced in other non-martial sources.

The difference between a historic martial art and a living martial art, is that a living martial art has that lineage. (continued)

Actually asian martial arts (at least chinese ones and from there all the others who took it as inspiration and base including japanese and korean ones) originated in India.

Look up Kalaripayat

>inb4 cringe weeaboos

So you can confidently go to a master and learn from them, and even if they don't know everything their master learned, you'll get a comprehensive training program.

HEMA has historic documentation, and we take from that to build a training program. We stress test techniques in sparring and competition to see where we're wrong. (And heavens we are wrong all the time.) We seek to build an accurate martial arts system with that available information. Sometimes we look outside of martial arts sources. Matt Galas has been looking for small details in various pieces of art lately. On Facebook he'll occasionally come in with a strange way to shoot a crossbow, or evidence of the use of the index finger over the quillon before the sidesword existed.
Secondary sources are not where we draw the bulk of our knowledge from. It's texts like the Opera Nova, Flower of Battle, and others that we take most of our martial arts concepts.

We then analyze them as martial artists, examine techniques shown in pictures or described in text. We then take those and try them out. And then we teach people, and we have fun.

Calling HEMA a "meme" or "LARPers" is definitely not proper. Because we're taking an academic approach to an academic subject. It just happens to be about martial arts. We're martial artists, historians, translators, archaeologists and athletes. And we're trying to find out how previous societies fought with weapons. And dammit it's a fun hobby to take seriously.
Yes. Razmafzar (linked earlier) isn't the best source, but he's one historian trying to train a subject with no outside support, with a class on his own.
Cuz the mid east kinda has a few problems right about now.
As the mid east stabilizes and people start to accept martial arts back in their lives again, it will grow.
Just the same, historic movements are growing in Chinese and Japanese sword arts. And that's cool. Swords are cool.

why is systema not taken seriously? it's circlejerked as being a hardcore full contact sport (which at least in russia it is) in russia and something spetsnaz get trained

See the comments about Krav Maga in this thread. Systema is basically the same thing, but in Russian.

>The decline of western martial arts in popularity is a very recent phenomenon. And it is directly related to the introduction of Asian martial arts with immigrant populations.

swordsmanship was already very much in decline when Japan was opened. While practical sword systems still existed, many officers left their sidearms unsharpened.

I think this is one of the reasons when westerners first went into Japan they were so impressed with katana and japanese swordsmen. They encountered aesthetically pleasing, razor sharp swords and men who could leap from horseback and cut a man down in a single action.

Even the informed who knew of similar men in other parts of asia and the middle east had to think: "man, we've let ourselves go".

B ocнoвнoм из-зa мapкeтингa. Этo иcкyccтвo, кoтopoe в знaчитeльнoй cтeпeни cпocoбcтвyeт ceбя кaк хapдкop, бeз излишecтв, эффeктивнaя бopьбa, кoтopaя иcпoльзyeт лyчшyю мeтoдикy oбyчeния, чeм бoльшинcтвo вocтoчных иcкyccтв. Ho SYSTEMA шкoлы в ocнoвнoм paбoтaть кaк фpaншизы бизнec c нeбoльшим кoнтpoлeм кaчecтвa. Этo oзнaчaeт, чтo бoльшyю чacть вpeмeни вы cтaлкивaeтecь c ним, oнa пpeпoдaeтcя чepeз coвмecтимыe cвepлa, и c бoльшим кoличecтвoм мeтoдoв, кoтopыe нe бyдyт paбoтaть вooбщe в peaльнoм бoю. Ho люди, кoтopыe дeлaют этo дo cих пop дyмaют, чтo oни лишилo бы ктo-нибyдь в бoю, пoтoмy чтo oни дeлaют тaкoe эффeктивнoe иcкyccтвo. Cepьeзнo, пpocтo cмoтpeть нeкoтopыe видeo SYSTEMA и пocмoтpeть, кaк cмeшнo мнoгo этo выглядит.
I translated it to Russian for you.

There is no hard evidence of that. While Bodhidharma might have imported some Indian practices it is unlikely they are the origin of all kung fu. Indeed the references to him dong this were written long after his life.

Much less japanese systems that occasionally borrowed from Chinese sources but more or less developed independently.

>many officers left their sidearms unsharpened.
That doesn't mean what you think it does. Swords were issued blunt, and officers didn't sharpen them until they went into combat duty. It didn't mean that they didn't train with them. From the same time period when that was practiced, there are tons of training manuals and records about how people trained. Those officers also tended to do pretty well against Japanese swordsman when that happened.

And there isn't really anything from Europeans saying that the Japanese were better swordsman. Accounts are favorable, and most people seemed to hold Kenjutsu in pretty high regard, but it wasn't like they were saying that Europeans weren't as good with swords. In the 16th century, swords in general were banned for civilians after Portuguese sailors kept killing Japanese people in duels.

tameshigiri.ca/2014/05/07/european-vs-japanese-swordsmen-historical-encounters-in-the-16th-19th-centuries/

The very site you posted suggest the opposite

>“In Japan, it was necessary for every man to carry a pistol; but the Japanese [with their swords] invariably got the better of every man carrying one, even when he had it in his hand… …I maintain the great fault in our swords is that they will not cut. Use them as much as you like, unless you have them specially sharpened the night before, they are useless. In the cut, our swords are useless in nine cases out of ten. The Japanese use two-handed swords; if we could use them, I should say cut by all means; for they never want a second cut.”

the one quote on the rapier fights also paints a different picture.

>Maybe no recorded personal duel per se but the story about the Portuguese being banned from bringing swords (rapiers) ashore during the extensive trading exchanges in Kyushu is documented. The reason for the ban was linked to the fact that the Portuguese originally cut down so many samurai. The local samurai responded by having new swords made which were much lighter than the battle blades they normally carried. Later, another encounter occurred and a virtual small scale war ensued with many Portuguese dying in the skirmish. I know about this because a distant relative of my teacher actually took part in this bit of historical trivia. My teacher (Takamura Yukiyoshi) still owned
his relatives sword which was made specifically in response to the Portuguese sword tactics the samurai encountered in Kyushu. Like the famous Kogarasu Maru, this sword was double edged from about 5 inches to the kissaki but much lighter and faster. This design was adopted to allow a swift back-cut like the ones the Portuguese employed so effectively against the samurai with rapiers. Once armed with swords of this style, the samurai turned the tables even on the Portuguese in the second encounter. This is when the ban was finally instituted. The whole trading relationship was threatened….”

thank you friendly western

>The very site you posted suggest the opposite
Well, it's a weaboo site. I guess I should have been clearer about even a site heavily biased towards painting Japanese swordsman in a good light didn't make the kind of statements you did (plus, it was the only site I could find quickly that had that many references on it, which was handy). Most of the quotes on that site are basically "their swords are really neat, and they're good at using them." Not the kind of thing you were talking about.

Plus, that second quote doesn't really paint a different different picture. If the Japanese had to modify their weapons and techniques that much to even stand a chance against the Portuguese, that's really not a sign that Europeans were bad swordsman.