Thank you both, I knew I would beat it out of you sooner or later
clfsean, so I understand this, mimetic boxing originated in south china?
(I was always told there were northern and southern systems of animal forms - I am sure this has been discussed in previous forums....)
thank you for the link.
No... it'd didn't originate there. It flourished in the south to be sure but it was not the only place of origin. Northern Praying Mantis, Eagle Claw & Monkey (Hou Quan) are the best examples of Northern mimetic boxing. However... none of them originated or were propagated by the Songshan Shaolin temple. They have been, like most things Shaolin, been absorbed by set or technique into Shaolin, but are not Shaolin in origin. This is all pretty well documented & easy to find from multiple sources.
Xue, the kung fu in the links are similar in deployment as to what I learned.
My quest is twofold; (Xue please read below - this is why i want to compare)
I want verify a systems legitimacy and find the source. My instructor will only say his master was in vietnam (during the vietnam war era). No name, no school, no organization. For now, please respect the anonymity of my trainer/ing.
My unrequested $.02 ...
Red flags to me. Everything you mentioned above send red flags up to me. Every CMA I'm familiar with has a well established & documented lineage. What's more... everybody's proud of it!! :drinkbeer
That's not to say it's not exactly what you've been told, but in large part, it is a red flag raising event to most long time practitioners. When people get shady, vague, not really forthcoming... people get suspicious.
From what I've seen of Viet MA's that developed from an originated in China art... they're a bit hodge-podged. I've also seen CMA's kept in Vietnam that are hardly changed & all you see is a Vietnamese practicing CMA. Not unusual at all since I'm an American practicing CMA.
I was taught a very primitive and visceral form of tiger kung fu. I have seen others perform "tiger" (in various countries) however they always fell short of intensity.
Most martial arts schools teach the movements of the original animal styles for exercise - they have little or no street value and are not practical. (the declination of combat in martial arts is prevalent in almost all schools today IMO).
It's kinda hard to make standing broad reaching assertions like that. Animal techniques work just as well as any other technique if practiced properly & applied appropriately. The "Karate Kid crane" is a fine example of NOT being proper or appropriate. However a fishhook with a thumb is a fine example of using an animal shaped (fu jow, lung jow) hand when necessary.
I believe that martial arts were principle based (in the past) versus the technically driven training of today.
Again... hard to support broad ranging statements.
For example... in Choy Lee Fut, we use 10 seeds (theories/principles) to drive everything (at least how I was taught and subsequently teach) done. Technical training comes when giving people the seeds as techniques to practice. As they progress, it moves away from the "technique" to the "response" from the seed that spawned the notion or theory needed. The "technique" is just the physical manifestation of the "seed".
As I have the internet at my fingertips I choose to seek out the origin to simply satisfy my own wants. I understand this may be the equivalent to finding a needle in a haystack due to the fact that the chinese martial arts world is extremely vast and unique to each school.
Thank you for all of the assistance.
No problem but you may want to do a couple of things to help:
- prep for the lack of info on your desired search
- prep for dead ends
- maybe ease up on some ideas you postulated because there's much more to CMA's than what is easily seen or evident
