Although i agree some get caught up in poetic names, some are loaded with meaning and intent. The average practitioner probably has no need to know but transmitters have something of an obligation.
[QUOTE=B.Tunks;1133081]Bai Yuan in Tanglang is a person, not actually an animal. More like a person nicknamed after the animal (but possessing animal spirit), but a figure kind of in the twilight of legend and history. The ‘monkey’ footwork in Tanglang is ‘yuanhou’ - the larger monkey that is called an ape (but is not actually an ape), and is sometimes called ‘mahou’. Sometimes this yuan - ‘ape’ is mistranslated as gibbon, which is actually an ape. There are gibbons in China but this one is not a gibbon.[/QUOTE]
Did Bai Yuan bring the Monkey footwork to Tang Lang? Or was he just a character that exemplified Monkey spirit? The Monkey footwork brought into Mantis… is the original style still in existance? Or maybe was it just some techniques of Monkey style footwork?
The reason I bring this up is that the Monkey I practice (from mooyingmantis) is from a tail less monkey. Tail less Monkeys include Gibbons, Apes, Chimpanzes and Gorillas.
Here are a few Monkey clips. These are less modern day wushu stuff but still not the old traditional Monkey I am looking to find:
More South East Asian Monkey style
I have not really found any old school Monkey. Most stuff on the net today is wushu stuff and not what I am looking for.
[QUOTE=kristcaldwell;1133066]i do, however, have one request. if you have any videos of you performing your style, i would very much like you to share them with us. if i have been misguided in what i believed traditional houquan to be, i would like to see an example of the real thing.[/QUOTE]
Here is a clip of me doing some parts of the forms and some applications:
ginosifu
The Angry Monkey Fist that I practice is rooted in Northern Shaolin basics. I have been practicing the Northern Shaolin lineage of Gu Ru Zhang (Ku Ye Cheong) for over 20 years and can see many similarities in movement and theory of both systems. I have over the years practiced 7 Star Praying Mantis but have not reached a high level yet. I also can see a general resemblance to Praying Mantis style (on a very basic level).
The Angry Monkey system itself very little itching and scratching and eating fleas and more emphasis on fighting tactics. If you look at any of the more traditional Monkey forms and look past the animal mimicry, you can see the emphasis of the style and what techniques the may employ. Here are some more tradtional looking Monkey Forms:
Shaolin Temple Ape - Monkey Boxing
I think these guys are out of Kentucky somewhere
Again look past the antics and see the Monkeys tactics… are they their? Or is it just kung fu techniques with some monkey flavor added?
ginosifu
ps forgot this one
[QUOTE=ginosifu;1132841]In 1564 Governor Zheng, Ruo-zengs wrote a whole chapter on the “The 36 Tactics of the Monkey style” in his book "Posting as Governor South of the Yangtze River.
ginosifu[/QUOTE]
Zheng Ruozeng(1505-1580),was involved in coastal defense against Japanese pirates. In 1562 published Chu Hai Tu Bian-A Maritime Historical Survey
This book was reissued in 1592 & 1624 MINUS Zheng Ruozeng’s name. Instead replaced with the name Hu Zongxian.
I have not been able to uncover other information of Zheng Ruozeng’s published material. Where can I find it?
found it
The book is called Jiang Nan Jing Lue, I would translate that into something like Introduction to the South of the River. Jiang Nan being a common term in Chinese.
I don’t have this book in my collection. I was under the impression that it is a list of martial arts, not an explanation.
The reference to Monkey is Hou quan 36 lu, which means 36 Roads of Monkey Fist. The choice of using the word “tactic” for "road is an interesting one.
The list of martial arts in this book is long including such names as
-
Zhao Family Fist
Southern Fist
Can Family's Northern Fist
Six Roads of Xi Family Fist
Zhang Fei's 4 Roads of Divine Fist
The list goes on and on.
The most interesting being
[INDENT]9 gun 18 die da zhua na- Nine Rolls and 18 Falls of Strikes beatings and siezing[/INDENT]
A form which existed in old Mantis though I have not found its existance in present day.
[QUOTE=kristcaldwell;1133066]i feel as though i must apologize to mooying. i didn’t mean to waste anyone’s time with a post that was “pointless.” i was trying to stimulate the conversation so as to uncover more information (and for that, i believe i have been successful).
you obviously have more experience than i (you have been teaching longer than i have been alive). and i am happy to know that traditional houquan is alive and well in the US. your knowledge of the subject speaks for itself.
i do, however, have one request. if you have any videos of you performing your style, i would very much like you to share them with us. if i have been misguided in what i believed traditional houquan to be, i would like to see an example of the real thing.[/QUOTE]
Kristcaldwell,
Sorry, “pointless” was a poor choice of words. I meant no offense, but after rereading what I wrote I see that I came off like an a$$. My apologies.
No, I do not have any videos of me performing our forms. However, I am sure there are others out there who attended the Great Lakes Kung Fu Championships or the Hall of Fame Open International Chinese Martial Arts Championship in the past that may have videotaped my part of the Master’s Demos. If so, I hope they will upload a clip to YouTube.
Gino posted a link to his DVD trailer that shows a few of the techniques of our style taken straight from the forms: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKuZpw8tteM
The July/August 2010 issue of Kung Fu Tai Chi magazine has an article about the fighting strategies of our style. These will give you an idea of what we do and how we do it.
Mantid1,
Thank you for your kind words! Though I think you over-rate me. LOL!
thank you for the link…but it was just enough to make me want to see more (guess i’ll be buying some DVDs)!
[QUOTE=ginosifu;1133111]Did Bai Yuan bring the Monkey footwork to Tang Lang? Or was he just a character that exemplified Monkey spirit? The Monkey footwork brought into Mantis… is the original style still in existance? Or maybe was it just some techniques of Monkey style footwork?
The reason I bring this up is that the Monkey I practice (from mooyingmantis) is from a tail less monkey. Tail less Monkeys include Gibbons, Apes, Chimpanzes and Gorillas. [/QUOTE]
Bai Yuan is two things, a mythological/historical figure and a system of long boxing which is both linked to this figure and influenced by the physical characteristics of apes or monkeys. The footwork doesn’t come from the person. Most likely this footwork in Tanglang comes from Tongbei AKA Bai Yuan Tongbei.
There are no true apes (the only true ape is the Gibbon) in central or Northern China - where these styles originated. They are found only in the south - Yunnan. They were once found in Central China too but have been extinct there since about the 10th century and were almost certainly a different species from what is left today. Yuan became the generic name for big monkeys with very short or next to no tails, such as the Stump-tailed macaque. Apart from Tongbei, most monkey boxing seems to relates to these monkeys (macaques). Obviously there are no chimp or gorilla type apes in China and there hasn’t been any since Gigantopithecus.
Maybe your style is based on the gibbon and possibly related to Tongbei? I have no idea. Nu Hou Quan isn’t found in China so the people that first taught it in America would have the best idea about it’s origins and the particular primate it’s modelled on.
BT
[QUOTE=B.Tunks;1133297] Apart from Tongbei, most monkey boxing seems to relates to these monkeys (macaques).
BT[/QUOTE]
I seem to remember my sifu saying something like this about the monkey we have in black tiger… there is very little mimicking (eating fleas or facial expression) but, you can tell it’s definitely monkey!
[QUOTE=B.Tunks;1133297]Bai Yuan is two things, a mythological/historical figure and a system of long boxing which is both linked to this figure and influenced by the physical characteristics of apes or monkeys. The footwork doesn’t come from the person. Most likely this footwork in Tanglang comes from Tongbei AKA Bai Yuan Tongbei.
There are no true apes (the only true ape is the Gibbon) in central or Northern China - where these styles originated. They are found only in the south - Yunnan. They were once found in Central China too but have been extinct there since about the 10th century and were almost certainly a different species from what is left today. Yuan became the generic name for big monkeys with very short or next to no tails, such as the Stump-tailed macaque. Apart from Tongbei, most monkey boxing seems to relates to these monkeys (macaques). Obviously there are no chimp or gorilla type apes in China and there hasn’t been any since Gigantopithecus.
Maybe your style is based on the gibbon and possibly related to Tongbei? I have no idea. Nu Hou Quan isn’t found in China so the people that first taught it in America would have the best idea about it’s origins and the particular primate it’s modelled on.
BT[/QUOTE]
Good info… thank you. The Nu Hou Quan is supposed to have come from Shanxi province. Isn’t there a reference to Tong Bei coming from somewhere in Shanxi or near there?
ginosifu
ginosifu,
B.Tunks has offered something that you may want to research and that is the migratory patterns of people. People often get into the “from the north to the south” when it comes to some styles. Why not from the south to the north?
I think Taiwan still maintains monkey styles from Fukien province. Of major importance are the fingers-- for stabs and thrusts and they still train for that.
mickey
Friends,
To set the record straight:
- Our style has nothing to do with Tongbeiquan. It looks and moves nothing like it.
- The style was originally a marriage of Northern Shaolin basics, Di Tang ground fighting and Monkey Boxing.
- It was passed to me as Monkey Boxing (Houquan). I changed the name to Angry Monkey Boxing (Nu Hou Quan) because the name of the first form is Angry Monkey Exits the Cave (Nu Hou Chu Dong).
- I have no idea what type of monkey/ape the style was originally based on. The style is tailless in that none of the moves mimic the actions of a monkey’s tail.
- The style consists of three empty hand sets, plus weapon sets.
- I learned the style in my early twenties (late 70s) when I was too dumb to ask the right questions I would now ask an instructor and too broke to afford a Super 8 or VHS recorder to record my training.
There you have it!
T
FTR, doesn’t look like TB to me either from what I’ve seen. More like TLQ.
[QUOTE=ginosifu;1132841]Tai Tsu created a Monkey or just practiced a Monkey style? Was it a whole system or just a form?[/QUOTE]
It is my understanding he practiced an existing system, or several of them. Sal may debate me, but I have had more than one lineage or branch of Tai Tzu tell me it had 8 core sets.
I know Shaolin preserved one set. They didn’t get it from him though. They had to go to the town he learned it form, and get it form them. I think they made the set though. It was probably just loose techniques when he did them.
One of the Generals that was in the military before Zhao Kuang Yin was Emperor did a type of monkey style based on a Gibbon called Tong Bi Quan. Since they were freinds, many people assume this was the Monkey system he was known for. I feel that is probably correct as they were of similar rank in addition to being freinds. They would have known the same stuff.
There are a number of Tong Bi sets preserved at Shaolin. These are supposed to be that system.
This Gibbon based style does not ‘Look’ like a Monkey, or ape style. This is because it uses the body mechanics of the Gibbon, but does not imitate the way it fights or acts.
Zhao Kuang Yin developed his Hong Quan system (Flooding Fist), which looks almost exactly like the Tong Bi of his freind to me. The two arts are also generally paired together when listed, which leads me to believe they are intimately ties together.
If you put the forms all in the same curriculum, I cannot tell them apart actually. They look like the same system to me.
[QUOTE=ginosifu;1133145]
Shaolin Temple Ape - Monkey Boxing
[/QUOTE]
This is the set from Zhao Kuang Yin. Shaolin did not get it form him though. They got it form the same village he did. That is the history as I understand it.
[QUOTE=RD’S Alias - 1A;1133495]This is the set from Zhao Kuang Yin.[/QUOTE]
From the death of Zhao Kuangyin until the first NON fiction mention of a martial art descended from him passed a period of about 500 years.
Here is the quote of Monkey Boxing from the original Ming Dynasty Book.
[INDENT]Monkey Boxing 36 Roads[/INDENT]
It comes from the 8th scroll. Here is a listing of the contents, which you can see do not include much on martial arts.
Different military tactics of the time including boats of many types, fire, marines etc
Kind of dissapointing for us, though what he had to say on Longfist was unique. More later…
[QUOTE=B.Tunks;1133489]FTR, doesn’t look like TB to me either from what I’ve seen. More like TLQ.[/QUOTE]
Though a couple moves look similar to TLQ, the moves are played quite differently. Different feel, different flow. Plus the system strategies are quite different.
My introduction to TLQ did not happen till about seven years after my introduction to Houquan. Though it was a few similarities between the two that first piqued my interest in TLQ.
mi tsung i
Let’s not forget mi tsung i, the lost track style, as a complete monkey system.