Martial Arts Information

History Of Martial Arts

Some of the earliest evidence of Martial Arts was found in ancient Chinense extracts, although it is quite possible that each part of the world would have had a Martial Art in some shape or form. Wrestling, perhaps is one of the oldest arts, passed on to us thanks to our very own natural animal instincts. Apes, Bears, Polecats and many other animals all express forms of wrestles, fights and hustles within their ranks and humans in that respect are no different. As the years have passed, many of these fighting styles have been written about, depicted in ancient scrolls and imagery, and passed down from generation to generation long before they spread around the globe thanks to technological advances.

There is of course a difference between Martial Arts and random fighting. In a martial art, all techniques are learned, practised and adhered to, as opposed to a random fight which could just involve two humans engaging in an anything goes style of combat. It is only when a particular method is religiously learned, taught and adhered to does it really become an art, all other natural methods of random fighting would really be better described as instincts than an art as such.

Geography of Martial Arts

With the many styles and types of Martial Arts in the world today, it is quite easy to spot the roots and even the geography of a given martial art simply by looking closely at the techniques used. For example, we know that wrestling and boxing styles originate from the western hemisphere, with early civilizations such as Greece and Rome using a similar style to both boxing and wrestling not only as self defense but primarily as a sport. It is also quite easy to spot the open handed chopping styles of Asian karate and many of its similar styles that clearly show Eastern hemisphere characteristics.

Mixing Martial Arts

As the various martial art systems of the world spread through out the 20th century, it didn't take long before many of the original interpretation of the original martial art started to change. Some adopted different strikes, stances and kicks, some styles were merged, some styles were just taught wrong, some styles were actually made better and evolved, some varied, and some strove to be as close and as rigid to the original style as possible, but out of masses came MMA, the Mixed Martial Art. MMA Combined any style it wanted, however it wanted it for the first time competitively as a sport, students or fighters of one particular style could match up in the ring, or octagon with fighters or practitioners of other styles. They were not bound by their own style, only by their own ability. Grappling wrestlers could be facing street fighting Irish, Boxers could be up against Shotokan masters, Brazilian JuJitsui fighters could take on Chinese Kung Fu warriors all in the name of sport and MMA.

UFC and World Extreme Cage Fighting

The UFC or the Ultimate Fighting Championship, rose up to become the world leader in competition for MMA Fighters. Following the popularity and interest of the growing number of martial arts styles that emerged throughout the last century, The UFC commissioned a competition for MMA fighters from any style or ability to enter and compete in the 1990's. The aim was to find the best style of martial art in the world, the popularity for the event was high, and Mixed Martial Arts started to become a mainstream kind of style in itself and spreading quickly throughout the globe in the form of Cage Fighting where entrants would fight it out in a steel octagon shaped caged ring. The UFC came close to been outlawed by politicians around the world who compared the sport to Human Cockfighting due the close to anything goes environment. The rules are now stricter than and the sport continues to gain followers as Mixed Martial Arts is still an emerging and growing in popularity with the UFC, Ultimate Fighter and World Extreme Cage Fighting all containing the fighters of Martial Arts backgrounds mixing it up in the Sports MMA fighting octagon.