Southern Style History

[Andy]

Does anyone know of a credible source for the history of southern styles such as Bak Mei, Wing Chun, Lung Ying, Hung Gar, Yau Kong Moon, and Fu Hok Yau Kong? All of these styles report a very similar history. Some people refer to them as Southern Shaolin styles while others say there never was a Southern Shaolin temple. Has anyone ever gotten to the bottom of all this? Are there any reliable works on this in English??? Please let me know.

[WanderingMonk]

Does anyone know of a credible source for the history of southern styles such as Bak Mei, Wing Chun, Lung Ying, Hung Gar, Yau Kong Moon, and Fu Hok Yau Kong? All of these styles report a very similar history. Some people refer to them as Southern Shaolin styles while others say there never was a Southern Shaolin temple. Has anyone ever gotten to the bottom of all this? Are there any reliable works on this in English??? Please let me know.

well, you are in luck, Andy. I have a .... :p

sorry, there is no authoritative review of the southern shaolin "legends" for its historical accuray that I have run into.

However, someone did compile significant amount of s. shaolin myths and reviewed it.

This is the english translation (posted by south paw a while back)
http://home.planet.nl/~padbe017/Nan_Shaolin_1.htm

This is the web copy of the chinese original
http://isubculture.ichannel.com.hk/B/B003/B003_007.html

no, it doesn't answer your question, but it does give some documentations to the sources of some of the "legends".

[mantis108]

Well, I am no authority in the subject but I have been following and studying southern style development. Here are a few thoughts to share with you.

1) To understand Southern Styles History, one would have to understand Ming and Qing dynasty period history. It is important to discern Histroy and facts with legends and myths.

2) It is important not just to get trapped in the mindset that there are but Shaolin (Wai Jia), Wudang (Nei Jia) and Zhu Jia (Ming loyalists) being the main influences.

3) Cult such as the White Lotus and secret society such as the Tiandihui are also highly significant in the development of Southern arts. There are historical evidences of these group's influence.

4) In certain cases, Shaolin was just a smoke screen for the rebellion related matters.

5) A lot of the Southern styles could trace their roots back to the same source such as Yong Chun He Fa (Yong Chun's Crane Method), that might have evolved from Ba Zhan Fan which was perhaps the main fighting system used by the White Lotus cult since Ming dynasty.

6) It is highly possible that the majority of Southern Kung Fu really came from the north and mixed with local indigenous ethnic minority fighting system. Beware of creationism myth.

Just a few thoughts to share for now. Again these are personal opinions and a perspective from gathering various materials from many different sources.

Mantis108

[Andy]

So should we assume then that most southern styles trace their origin to one ficticious source? Are the originators of all of these styles being less than credible in the historical accounts that they pass down?

[Anthony]

http://www.nardis.com/~twchan/henning.html

http://ccbs.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-ADM/holcom.htm

Here are two links to well researched articles on the history of "kung-fu." They may not answer your questions directly but are definately worth reading simply because they ARE well researched and do not repeat the same tired, unverifiable myths/legends that you hear everywhere else.

[WanderingMonk]

So should we assume then that most southern styles trace their origin to one ficticious source? Are the originators of all of these styles being less than credible in the historical accounts that they pass down?

well, you asked for hard verifiable researched materials. there isn't that many which is available.

you know there was the flood in the bible. many of the middle east civilization has some story about a great flood. there was a mention of it in the epic of gilgemesh.

so, it would seem that there as a big flood at one time in the middle east at least. but, if you want me to prove it, well, I have to scretch my head. got to get some geologist to go find some kind of geological proof that it happened.

there's all these schools which claim to descend from s. shaolin, and all these stories. it would seem that there might have been something there. where there's smoke there's fire. but, this is the realm of "ye shi" (non-standard history). not that many academia chinese historians are intereted in looking at these type of stuff.

the local provinces and county have people working for them to find the "missing temple".
there was an article published a while back in chinese which claim there was a southern temple and how they located it. they have "certain documentation" which prove it is the temple. but, they are working for the local govern and plan to rebuild the temple. it would seem to get the tourist dollars. wouldn't you be suspicious of the integrity of that work?

so, there's a lot of unsolve issues. but anyways, if everything is solved then life would be pretty boring. :D

[PM]

http://chinwan.com.ar/ross1.htm - very good article by David Ross sifu

PM

www.hungga.org