How was karate practiced before the 19th century?

[RoniSwersky]

Hi everyone.
I am trying to write a paper regarding the history of karate, and one of the things that interest me is how was karate taught before the 19th century. I specifically wanted to find out about teaching methods before Karate was introduced into the school systems in Okinawa and Japan.
If you have any information on this or can recommend sources about this subject, I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks

 

[punisher73]

A lot of that wouldn't have been written down. But, there are many oral traditions from students in the 1900's. I would focus on students of Kanryo Higaonna, Kanbun Uechi, Chotoku Kyan and Gichin Funakoshi's autobiography as places to start. This will give you insight to the main three "styles" of karate (Goju-Ryu, Uechi-Ryu and Shorin-Ryu based).

Mainly, they were very small classes (usually not more than 5-6) held at the teacher's home. Lots of drilling on technique and kata. Kata was often taught with the specific student in mind. For example, Kanryo Higaonna started all students on Sanchin kata and then the other kata(s) varied based on the student. Even then, students didn't learn more than 2-3 kata from him.

In Funakoshi's autobiography "Karate-do: My Way of Life", he talks about going at night to his teacher's house and just drilling kata over and over until he got it right and then would be given a little bit more.

Kanbun Uechi's students also started on Sanchin and would practice that and Hojo-Undo, Kotekitai drills for 2-3 years to develop the proper body and structure before learning the next kata. Originally, the system that Uechi brought back from China (and very insistant on transmitting it exactly as he learned it) only had 3 kata.

Students of Chotoku Kyan talk about learning Seisan kata first and that it was done with weight implements and would train the body in a much similar manner as Sanchin kata.

So basically, the "old school karate" was very limited curriculum, but lots of body/strength development for its foundation and LOTS of drilling and repetition to perfect the basics and make it usable.

Also, there was no "belt system" or ranks

 

[Oily Dragon]

There are a few texts out there with illustrations, but in my reading experience most are actually Chinese, because the Chinese loved pumping out military texts with descriptions and sometimes illustrations of martial stuff found all over Asia, including Japan and Korea. If you search around you'll find a handful of Japanese sources, pre and post Meiji (mostly sword stuff), but a dozen or more much older Chinese ones going back about 500 years. And a lot of these contain literal copy-paste of other, older scrolls and stuff lost forever.

The big fish of these is the Bubishi, the Japanese name for the Wu Bei Zhi, the largest extant Chinese military compendium, and a sort of missing link between China, Okinawa, and Japan.

People who train karate and Chinese styles together will often find little nuggets of shared DNA. Sanchin/San Zhan/Saam Jin is probably the best example, it's all over the place.

Book Review - Bubishi: The Classic Manual of Combat • Karate Obsession

Karate Obsession Book Review - Bubishi: The Classic Manual of Combat

www.karateobsession.com