12 section knife form?
- Thread starter Punchy
- Start date
wckf92
Master of Arts
Footwork (?)
Not a legend. last vestige of tradition. The family knife man was taught the 12 sections. Leung Jan's Knife Man was Lo Kwai. Lo Kwai taught his friends. many Wing Chun groups never got the knives so they adopted more traditional southern knife fomr sone forms are short the 12 section form is long. Yip Man taught Yip Bo Ching. Yip taught knife form a section at a time to most for $ per section. Yip Man had to earn a living yet he wanted to be traditional and had never meant to teach. People paid a lot for the knife sections . Some got 8 some 4 some got all footwork some got some some didn't even learn with knives,Moy Yat was taught with chop sticks for example. The important things are footwork, body usage and understand covering and how to move into an attack. If you ever see the full 12 your first reaction may be"cool" your second will be " of course". Any form can be done with knives and the key to knife form is that it holds empty hand methods.. When Leung Sheung and Lok Yiu got pissed that Yip Bo Ching was being taught weapons and they weren't he agreed to teach each one weapon and they could teach each other however Leung Sheung only got 4 sections.
That depends on which 8 section form you are talking about and what you consider a section. For example Yip Ching and Yip Chun have different forms. Ho Kam Ming has a different form .Although many forms have many of the same sections some have unique sections .
Yes, I could give you the differences between several forms at one time but I only kept up with the 2 twelve section forms I know. One for maiming knives,choppers, and one for murder knives,stabbers.
wckf92
Master of Arts
wckf92
Master of Arts
I think this also happened with the pole form. I've heard that Yip passed down a long and a short form for the pole. Dunno...could be just a rumor though.
wckf92
Master of Arts
I'd heard this too. I thought it very strange that YM would do this. I've also read somewhere that he taught Wang Kiu the wooden dummy form by using a human versus the jong.
wckf92
Master of Arts
Agree! A lot of the misconceptions and misunderstandings of wing chun these days are cleared up once one learns the knives. Especially the footwork. Just my opinion of course.
Indeed. Once you finish knife training...you look back through the years of all the hand training and there are many "a ha!" moments.
wckf92
Master of Arts
What would you say are the key differences between these two forms?
8 sections, we use the stabber style knives.
Choppers come from the work of Leung Jan and Lo Kwai. Lo Kwai ran a butcher shop. He developed his skill by butchering pig carcasses.He used choppers since he could work and practice at the same time with them. Having a Buddhist philosophy killing is the last thing you want to do bad karma etc. Leung Jan preferred choppers so you could disarm or maim. Stabbers had only 1 function in the 1800's that was to kill. A deep thrust that hit an organ= death. Chopper form you are attacking the limbs to disarm and slicing the body to incapacitate . You can kill of course but that is not the normal goal. Stabbers focus is on passing or parry the limb and deeply stab the body.
Overall techniques are the same for the most part just some different uses or emphasis
wckf92
Master of Arts
Very interesting. Thank you for that write up.
Would you say that the "chopping" form and the "stabbing" form contain the same and/or similar motions with the blades? I guess I don't know quite how to ask the question; but in my mind I'm picturing the chopping form would have more lengthy movements, perhaps even circular or semi-circular...whereas the stabbing form more linear, straight thrusts, etc. Thoughts?
Flying Crane
Sr. Grandmaster
I dunno man, in the 1800s, with medical knowledge what it was and cleanliness issues and such, I think choppers might have just been a slower death. You defend with a chop and take off half a hand, or the hand at the wrist, or you chop half way through the forearm into the bone, or you chop open the meat of the thigh or into the bone of the shin, or you chop down on the shoulder and take off the whole arm or leave it dangling, all that stuff can leave vital veins and arteries severed, or at the very least it leaves the would open to nasty infections. I think it’s a stretch of the imagination to say that a chopping technique with a heavy blade is meant to be less lethal. Any time you bring a blade into the mix, especially a big, heavy, and/or long blade, the interaction is in the lethal category. If someone DOESNT die, I would say that is lucky fortune.
This is very interesting. We have two differing intents behind our knives, butterfly and crane beak. The butterfly being more flowing and the crane beak more stabby.
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I agree, hell 30 years ago practicing with blunt edge knives and hockey gloves etc an acquaintance needed 80 stitches close a gash on his arm. I can only imagine if the blade had an edge. I think it is a matter of intent. Stabbers have only one use,to kill. Choppers much more disable and if the person dies their bad luck .
You are right in your thinking. Chopping is at a longer distance and can lead to circular slicing Stabbing is from a shorter distance and is a straight thrusting. Same motions for the most part but subtle differences for example you do not break your wrist when you slice. Some forms like Yip Chuns for example when chopping the wrist breaks so the top of the blade and the arm are all kind of in line. That puts you in a weak position because if your blade is parried from the top then you can be pulled of balance and your blade pushed toward the ground. So slicing I sink my body and hold wrist position If I miss I can quickly reverse slice. When thrusting however the wrist is in the broken position so it comes from a closer position to better avoid the parry and your immediate second move is sink your elbow and the thrust becomes a tan dao.
wckf92
Master of Arts
Thanks Hunter. Great post.
So by wrist 'breaking' you mean articulating the wrist versus keeping it aligned with the forearm correct?
Man it would be so much easier and nicer to have this conversation in person! Ha ha. You said you are no longer living in FL right?
Back to questions then:
1) does either of your two knife forms involve any kicks?
2) you mentioned "reverse slicing"...so does either of your two knife forms involve reversing the blade during the form? (like you see if watching Yip Chun's form, etc)?
3) in order to get a better idea of what you are discussing with us...are there any videos of Lo Kwai's knife form that you know of...or do you know of any footage out there that is close to it?
Thanks again for the discussion!
You are right. So much easier in person. I have trouble being articulate on forums. I second to show you could be 20 paragraphs to try to explain. By breaking I mean if you make a fist everything is aligned and then you bend the fist forward so the fist is pointed down.
Form does have some kicks. By reverse slice I mean as an example if I slice high to low and then come back low to high, We do have moving to the reverse grip. Several variations are trained in the last section.
I am not aware of any public videos however the big differences are not the sections per say but rather more movements and more movements tied together also I think more real combat usage emphasis. I have seen forms where they bring one blade inside the arm of the other blade or turn the blade on a qwan dao for example where the blade at one point faces their own body.
The form is basically like Yip man in structure. A section that introduces the method. 3 times Like qwan dao right left right and then a part that takes the method and moves the method forward and back 4 times however the moment phase ties the base method with other supporting methods. Using qwan dao moving back and to the side the qwan covers,connects and sinks the incoming weapon then double horizontal slice forward, in practice one blade is meant to continue to control the attacking weapon while the free blade attacks and then a small bui ma and a double high to low slice. This is repeating 4 times in all while moving backward per side.Once comfortable you reverse the section and this becomes the moving forward section and the forward becomes the backward. It is like this for 12 sections . The salute is not considered a section.
Not in Florida but I was planning to visit Florida to give a free seminar on weapons and Dummy to anyone interested before Covid hit.
Form does have some kicks. By reverse slice I mean as an example if I slice high to low and then come back low to high, We do have moving to the reverse grip. Several variations are trained in the last section.
I am not aware of any public videos however the big differences are not the sections per say but rather more movements and more movements tied together also I think more real combat usage emphasis. I have seen forms where they bring one blade inside the arm of the other blade or turn the blade on a qwan dao for example where the blade at one point faces their own body.
The form is basically like Yip man in structure. A section that introduces the method. 3 times Like qwan dao right left right and then a part that takes the method and moves the method forward and back 4 times however the moment phase ties the base method with other supporting methods. Using qwan dao moving back and to the side the qwan covers,connects and sinks the incoming weapon then double horizontal slice forward, in practice one blade is meant to continue to control the attacking weapon while the free blade attacks and then a small bui ma and a double high to low slice. This is repeating 4 times in all while moving backward per side.Once comfortable you reverse the section and this becomes the moving forward section and the forward becomes the backward. It is like this for 12 sections . The salute is not considered a section.
Not in Florida but I was planning to visit Florida to give a free seminar on weapons and Dummy to anyone interested before Covid hit.
wckf92
Master of Arts
Thanks for that awesome reply Hunter. I think I'm following you on a lot of it. Or at least I think I am. hahaha.
I'm sure there would be a few from this forum that would attend your Florida seminar once you coordinate it. I'm assuming you are waiting until after this covid thing calms down a bit?
I remember now...you are out in NM. Northwest side of ABQ correct? I'm back out there in Nov timeframe for a week long business trip.
