Wild weapons of kung fu movies.

[GOLDEN DRAGON YIN-YANG]

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1590236234555890/permalink/2205557923023715/?comment_id=2205739839672190&notif_id=1536208632274244&notif_t=group_comment_reply

GD Y-Y

[NoKUNGFUforYU]

I am starting to wonder how many weapons were purely decorative back in the day, and for fictional illustrations and so forth. Also, many films are cheap and only use Cantonese versions of most weapons from Hung Gar schools and/or Northern Shaolin weapons. The reality is there were many kinds of swords used, including one that were very similar to Katana as well as Rapiers. It's just like what I read about Japanese troops using spears more than swords. Doesn't fit with the whole propaganda of bushido battles with duels within battles, but it sounds more like reality. The steel whips are great for movies for example, but you would have a tough time killing a guy who has a broadsword. Nice for a non lethal gang fight, though. And a 3 section staff is incredible hard to master, really, and hitting with a stick instead of a sword? And these are some of my movie favorites, but still.................

[shukocarl]

Was David Chiang's 3 Section Steel Nunchaku Thing in BLOOD BROTHERS a real (historic) or fake weapon?

[ShawAngela]

Non facebook members can't see what's in the link, sadly...

[NoKUNGFUforYU]

I would think it would be possible people created their own weapons, a la Tung Chia, for whatever they wanted to accomplish or favor. You have to remember, culturally, there was not a lot of dueling, ever. Status was not gained through violence, rather taking Confucian tests and have strong business connections and wads of money. The government has many times suppressed martial arts practice in China. The chief goal of Chinese rulers is to consolidate power so they can have a lot of wealth and land, prattling on about how great it is to be "united" under some tyrant, I mean emperor. Not unlike a lot of other places. Martial arts practice made it harder to subjugate the populace, so it was frowned upon at various times. Also, after the Boxer Rebellion, martial arts practitioners were viewed as troublemakers and low class. So, carrying around weapons, etc, was something the police and criminals did.

[NoKUNGFUforYU]

From Kung Fu Tea-

A Foolish Farmer

 

As I mentioned in my previous post, this particular postcard comes up at auction frequently enough that one suspects that it must have been fairly popular when it was first published in the early 20^th century.  As such the vertical inscription on the left hand side of the image has been previously addressed.  Scott Rodell and Peter Dekker noted that it reads “Stupid Farmer Practicing Boxing.”  Douglas Wile concurred and read the same phrase as “Ignorant Peasant Practices Martial Arts.”

Given the financial ruin and national humiliation that the Boxer Rebellion unleashed on the state, the hostility of this title is not surprising.  As I have mentioned elsewhere, the Chinese martial arts probably came closer to actual extinction during the period that this card was produced than at any time since.  It would be another decade before the hard work of a group of nationally minded reformers would launch these fighting systems back into the national consciousness.

Yet for much of the first decade of the 20^th century the rapidly urbanizing Chinese population took an increasingly hostile view towards anything related to the martial arts.  These fighting systems had traditionally been associated with poor youth from the countryside.  Rapidly unfolding processes of modernizationshifted the center of social power decisively into the urban sphere.

Thus it seems likely that there is a double mockery embedded in this title.  In addition to taking a swipe at the despised legacy of the Boxer Rebellion, this postcard also appears to take aim that the ignorant, “backwards youth” of the countryside who have not yet been swept up in the unfolding process of urbanization and modernization.

More interesting is the inscription on the boy’s chest badge.  When first thinking about this postcard I simply ignored this inscription.  I had assumed that it would be uninteresting because of the way that most of these images were produced.

Rather than capturing subjects in their natural state, it was common for photographers (either in the street or working in their studios), to provide a variety of props to the individuals that they were photographing.  This might include stock weapons, costumes and furniture.

Further, when examining the boy’s ill-fitting uniform more closely it looked like it was made up of random bits of other cobbled together military uniforms.  As such it was unlikely to be of any significance to its intended audience.  Doug Wile, however, pointed out that there seemed to be something interesting about the boy’s badge.  Rather than simply being recycled costuming, of the sort often found in early studios, the photographer appears to have been attempting to broadcast a more pointed message.  But to who?

After blowing up and enhancing the photo to make it more legible, it was determined that the bottom most vertical line read “Yi He” (義合).   Wile noted that while this particular set of characters was not common, it was an early, previously attested, variant of name “Yi Hi Boxers” (or the Righteous and Harmonious Fist) typically written as 義和.  See for example the 1899 edition of the Wanguo gongbao and A. Henry Savage-Landor’s 1901 China and the Allies.

Of course this is the proper name of the spirit boxing movement that swept across northern China between 1899-1900.  Wile further speculates that a third character (團 or 拳) is hidden under the boy’s sash, completing the typical formulation of the movement’s name.

 

A Banner from the Boxer Uprising using the more 

[DragonClaws]

On 9/6/2018 at 7:37 PM, NoKUNGFUforYU said:

The chief goal of Chinese rulers is to consolidate power so they can have a lot of wealth and land, prattling on about how great it is to be "united" under some tyrant, I mean emperor. Not unlike a lot of other places

 

Too true, this has been the goal of all ruling powers, a few control the many, unless you lived in France, during the French revolution. When they decided, they'ed had enough of being kept poor by the powers that be. Whenever you do get such an event in a country, the people ruling it, often bailed to another country, or changed their names.

[GOLDEN DRAGON YIN-YANG]

😀

GD Y-Y