The field of martial arts is a very manifold field. As everybody knows, most of the popular martial arts have their origin in Asia. One, for sure, is able to call out no less then three martial arts styles located in Asia. First of all let´s have a look at maybe the most famous martial arts of all. This art is called “Kung Fu”. There may be only a few people who never heard about it. Kung Fu became really famous in the late 1960´s by the actor and martial arts professional called Bruce Lee. The movies of Lee as an incredible Kung Fu fighter brought him fame all over the world. Even today, about 35 years after his tragic death, Kung Fu still is enjoying great popularity.
The real origin of this style of fighting can be found in China in the 15th century, when the so called “Monks of the Shaolin” developed it to defend their monastery against bandits and other hostile groups. This became a tradition and the monks hold on it until today.
Another famous martial arts technique is called Judo. This style only is for self-defense, it has only a few attacking moves. It was developed in the in the period located in the years around 710a.d. and was mostly created for competition at the emperors palace in Japan.
Jiu Jitsu is another martial art, which is being taught until today all over the world. In opposite to Judo, this technique consists of punches, kicks, choking and throwing moves. The origin of Jiu Jitsu also is located in Japan, to make it more precise it was invented by the Samurai. The reason is that the Samurai wanted to know a non-weapon based close-combat technique in case they loose their main weapon.
Beside Kung Fu there is another world wide famous fighting technique located in Japan called Karate. The translation of the word Karate means something like “empty hands”, which means that the fight is fought with the bare hands. Basically it is for self-defense, like Judo, but here you use kicks, punches and holds.
A weapon based fighting technique is called Kendo. Kendo leaves the fighter with a so called kendo, a kind of wooden sword normally made of bamboo wood. This technique was invented to strengthen the body and mind; and to learn the way of the warrior, the samurai.
There aren´t only techniques from China or Japan. So let´s have a closer look at Korea for instance. The famous Taekwondo has its roots here. It was invented in the late 1950´s by General Choi, mostly for army use. The purpose was to create a non weapon-based combat style. These martial arts mostly use kicks as attack and defense moves, punches are used less frequently. One famous figure of Taekwondo is the actor and Member of the International Taekwondo Federation (ITF) Chuck Norris. He is the first person from the western countries who achieved the highest decoration in Taekwondo.
Last but not least to mention is the worlds famous Muay Thai from Thailand. It´s origin is located somewhere around the year 1560. Like Jiu Jitsu this technique was invented for using kicks and punches with fists or elbows if the weapon was lost or broken. A long time until today the reputation of Muay Thai was not that good, because people looked at it as brawling without thinking. That is not true at all.
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