DaveTart
02-19-2007, 03:43 PM
The material below is from a 1995 article by Tony Leung who ran a column called 'Roots of Kung Fu'
Enjoy
In Southern China, the five most popular and well known martial systems practised are HUNG-KAR (HON-JIA in Mandarin), LAU-KAR (LIU-JIA), CHOI KAR (CAI-JIA), LEE-KAR (LI-JIA) and MOK-KAR (MO-JIA). In this article we are looking into the historical and training background of LAU-KAR QUAN, the second biggest family system practised in the south of China.
This system flourishes around the areas of QinZhou, LeiZhou, LianZhou and GaoZhou etc. There are differing accounts of who might be the founder of this system. One source claims the style, was founded by Liu QingShan. However, the most commonly accepted version is that it was founded by Liu Sheng of the Qing Emperor QianLon period (CE 1736). Liu was also known as Liu SanYan (Three Eyes) because of an eye-like scar between his two eyes.
Liu might have been a native of XiaSiFu QuangDong province or from a village of the ZhanJiang area. He was a hunter by trade and it is said that during one of his many tiger-hunting ventures, he was attacked and seriously injured by a large tigress. A travelling monk happened to hear Liu's desperate cries and came to the rescue, driving off the tigress and saving Liu from being mauled. The monk carried the badly injured Liu to his home and nursed him back to health with herbal medicines.
It was almost. three months before Liu was back on his feet again. As soon as he regained his strength, he begged the monk to teach him the skills of fighting so he could fend off any further assaults from wild animals or bandits. Finally the monk agreed to teach Liu
his martial arts. Through being ahunter, Liu already had knowledge offighting skills, so he was able to learn quickly. He discovered that the monk's name was ZhiShan and his martial art was of ShaoLin origin. The monk instructed Liu to distinguish his own
practice by naming it after himself. For this reason, Liu named the system Liu-Jia-Quan, meaning 'Liu's family fighting methods'. Liu ShanYan taught hisskills to Liu YuanJin, who in turn was succeeded by Liu BaoShan, Liu ZhaoGuang, Yan ChuMian, etc.
There are very many practitioners of Liu-Jia-Quan in southern China and the following material is extracted from a record of recent successors.
Liu ZhaoGuang, a KeJia man, was born around 1895 and is thought to be from XiangJiaoTang village, BuJi, in BaoAn county. He began training from an early age under Liu BaoShan. In 1930, Liu embarked on a business venture, left his village and went to work in Malaysia, where he, like other Overseas Chinese, was treated very unfairly. He regularly faced racial discrimination and even physical abuse.
One day, the Chinese-owned rubber plantation where Liu was working was suddenly invaded by a group of native Malaysians. They began to take rubber from the trees and needless to say, a fight broke out. The intruders were armed to the teeth and the Chinese workers suffered many casualties. Liu seized a plank of wood used for carrying baskets and dived into the machete swinging crowd. Using the plank and his knowledge of Liu-Jia-Guan (the family's pole fighting skills), Liu disarmed and badly injured most of the assailants.
The workers were amazed to learn that Liu was such a good Kung Fu fighter and thereafter, he taught some of fellow workers. Liu remained in Malaysia, until his return to Hong Kong in 1951, for a well-earned retirement. However, his retirement didn't quite materialise because news of his heroic exploits in Malaysia soon spread around the small KeJia community. Within months, Liu was teaching people from villages all around. One of his pupils was Yan ChuMian.
Yan ChuMian was born in Hong Kong during 1951. He is a native of WeiYang county, GuangDong province. Yan began training under Liu ZhaoGuang when he was about ten years old in the village of KengKou. He became one of the youngest but finest Liu-Jia-Quan practitioners in the local community. Another Liu-Jia-Quan teacher - Long JingLin - was sufficiently impressed by Yan to teach him his own interpretation of Liu-Jia-Quan. These two sets of experiences benefited Yan greatly and his skills quickly improved.
Eventually, Yan's hard training was rewarded when a village elder who was running some overseas Chinese restaurants, asked him to teach Liu-Jia-Quan in Belgium. Yan wasted no time, founding his FU-YING Chinese-martial arts association in 1975. He taught many students - both Chinese and non-Chinese and the following year, his efforts were recognised by the Hong Kong Chinese Martial Arts Association. Two fellow teachers, Long QiMing and Hu ShaoBao signed the letter of recommendation and Yan ChuMian was accepted as a 'SiFu'. He was also appointed as the Liu-Jia-Quan representative in Belgium. Yan taught and demonstrated Liu-Jia-Quan in Germany, Holland, France and other European countries before returning to Hong Kong in 1983.
According to SiFu Yan, the Liu-Jia-Quan training syllabus includes five training levels of unarmed combat. In the first level, juniors are taught the SI-MEN-WU-JIAN-QUAN which is the four directional and five angular dimensional form. This set shows beginners how to deal with four opponents and helps them develop good balance and agility.
Next, pupils are taught the SHUANG-FEI-HU-DEl-QUAN - the double butterfly palm form. Third level students learn the LIAN-HUAN-HU-BAO-QUAN, which is the tiger and leopard attacking form. Next to be learned is the FENG-CHE-JIAO-HOU-QUAN, or 'windmill rotating striking hands'. The fifth level form is TIAN-ZI-QUAN. In addition to the above, there are other training forms such as SHAO-YUN-TIAN (‘little cloudy sky'), SHI-QUAN ('ten sequences') and WU-XING-QUAN (the five animal forms).
SiFu Yan emphasises that each junior form comprises roughly eighty movements which function both offensively and defensively. He further points out that TIAN-ZI-QUAN is the most difficult because it requires the practitioner to manoeuvre within a 1 metre square floor pattern resembling the Chinese character ‘Tian’. Yan tells us that his teacher was very strict and made him get into the Tian floor pattern. Then he was obliged to leap, punch and kick but he was not allowed to step on any floor marks! If he did, his teacher would have hit him with a stick. Yan now admits that this sort of training helped him improve his balance and footwork. After working out on the Tian floor pattern, successful students are asked to perform all the forms on top of a square dining table!
Liu-Jia-Quan system contains many weapon training forms. These include WU-DIAN-MEI-HUA-GUN (the 'five point prune flower fighting pole form'), SHI-DIAN- SHUANG-TOU- GUN ('ten-point double-tipped pole form’), SHOU-LANG-GUN (‘the wolfs hand pole form’), ZHIN-YEN (‘the silver needle spear form), WU-LONG-CHU-DONG-BA ('five dragons leavingthe cave' tiger fork fighting form), QUING-LONG-RU-HAI-DAO ('the sea-diving green dragon' sabre form), SHI-MEN-JIAN (‘the four-directional double short sword form) and L1U-JIA-CHA-BA, the Liu family's tiger fork form.
Yan further records that there are many special training methods aimed at improving the reflexes and sensitivities of the practitioners. These methods are commonly known as DUI-CHUAN. The SAN-XING-CHUAN, or 'three stars forearm smashing method' is intended to condition students' forearms. Other methods are organised as sets of weapon sparring. SHUNG-GUN -DUI-CHAN is the pole contact fighting form, while YING-ZHEN-DUI-WAO-DENG are the spear vs sitting-bench exercises. DAO-DUI-BA are the sabre against tiger fork sets.
Liu-Jia-Quan is well known for the quality of its short range close-quarters combat. Fighters favour the use of the left-right attacking pattern and when faced with a head-on centre line attack, Liu-Jia practitioners use circular movements to absorb the assault. Then they make use of their five angular levels of attack. Sometimes, fighters use rather low stance work from which to launch low level attacks onto the opponent. The most commonly used stances are the SI-PING-MA (the horse stance), DIAO-MA (back, or cat stance). DI-MA (the low balancing stance) and LA-MA (withdrawing stance).
The above information comes from part of the syllabus covering the historical background of the second biggest Kung Fu 'family' system in Southern China. In order to promote genuine and traditional Liu-Jia-Quan, the China Cultural Fund is offering, two unique wall-charts illustrating an intermediate Liu-Jia-Quan training form, the WU-XING-QUAN (Five Animals). Technical information is supplied by teacher Zhao YongDe of the ZhongShan province.
The step-by-step, easy-to-learn wall charts include more than two hundred offensive and defensive techniques. Chart One (costs £4.80 incl p&p) covers history, background and three sections of the form. Chart Two (£6.80 incl p&p) shows the last two parts of the form. Both charts can be ordered from YUN-YE-TONG (address deleted –remember this is from 1995) YUN-YE-TONG plans to bring Yan ChuMin and his colleagues from Hong Kong for a weekend seminar/ workshop in London and Birmingham during Summer 1996.
Enjoy
In Southern China, the five most popular and well known martial systems practised are HUNG-KAR (HON-JIA in Mandarin), LAU-KAR (LIU-JIA), CHOI KAR (CAI-JIA), LEE-KAR (LI-JIA) and MOK-KAR (MO-JIA). In this article we are looking into the historical and training background of LAU-KAR QUAN, the second biggest family system practised in the south of China.
This system flourishes around the areas of QinZhou, LeiZhou, LianZhou and GaoZhou etc. There are differing accounts of who might be the founder of this system. One source claims the style, was founded by Liu QingShan. However, the most commonly accepted version is that it was founded by Liu Sheng of the Qing Emperor QianLon period (CE 1736). Liu was also known as Liu SanYan (Three Eyes) because of an eye-like scar between his two eyes.
Liu might have been a native of XiaSiFu QuangDong province or from a village of the ZhanJiang area. He was a hunter by trade and it is said that during one of his many tiger-hunting ventures, he was attacked and seriously injured by a large tigress. A travelling monk happened to hear Liu's desperate cries and came to the rescue, driving off the tigress and saving Liu from being mauled. The monk carried the badly injured Liu to his home and nursed him back to health with herbal medicines.
It was almost. three months before Liu was back on his feet again. As soon as he regained his strength, he begged the monk to teach him the skills of fighting so he could fend off any further assaults from wild animals or bandits. Finally the monk agreed to teach Liu
his martial arts. Through being ahunter, Liu already had knowledge offighting skills, so he was able to learn quickly. He discovered that the monk's name was ZhiShan and his martial art was of ShaoLin origin. The monk instructed Liu to distinguish his own
practice by naming it after himself. For this reason, Liu named the system Liu-Jia-Quan, meaning 'Liu's family fighting methods'. Liu ShanYan taught hisskills to Liu YuanJin, who in turn was succeeded by Liu BaoShan, Liu ZhaoGuang, Yan ChuMian, etc.
There are very many practitioners of Liu-Jia-Quan in southern China and the following material is extracted from a record of recent successors.
Liu ZhaoGuang, a KeJia man, was born around 1895 and is thought to be from XiangJiaoTang village, BuJi, in BaoAn county. He began training from an early age under Liu BaoShan. In 1930, Liu embarked on a business venture, left his village and went to work in Malaysia, where he, like other Overseas Chinese, was treated very unfairly. He regularly faced racial discrimination and even physical abuse.
One day, the Chinese-owned rubber plantation where Liu was working was suddenly invaded by a group of native Malaysians. They began to take rubber from the trees and needless to say, a fight broke out. The intruders were armed to the teeth and the Chinese workers suffered many casualties. Liu seized a plank of wood used for carrying baskets and dived into the machete swinging crowd. Using the plank and his knowledge of Liu-Jia-Guan (the family's pole fighting skills), Liu disarmed and badly injured most of the assailants.
The workers were amazed to learn that Liu was such a good Kung Fu fighter and thereafter, he taught some of fellow workers. Liu remained in Malaysia, until his return to Hong Kong in 1951, for a well-earned retirement. However, his retirement didn't quite materialise because news of his heroic exploits in Malaysia soon spread around the small KeJia community. Within months, Liu was teaching people from villages all around. One of his pupils was Yan ChuMian.
Yan ChuMian was born in Hong Kong during 1951. He is a native of WeiYang county, GuangDong province. Yan began training under Liu ZhaoGuang when he was about ten years old in the village of KengKou. He became one of the youngest but finest Liu-Jia-Quan practitioners in the local community. Another Liu-Jia-Quan teacher - Long JingLin - was sufficiently impressed by Yan to teach him his own interpretation of Liu-Jia-Quan. These two sets of experiences benefited Yan greatly and his skills quickly improved.
Eventually, Yan's hard training was rewarded when a village elder who was running some overseas Chinese restaurants, asked him to teach Liu-Jia-Quan in Belgium. Yan wasted no time, founding his FU-YING Chinese-martial arts association in 1975. He taught many students - both Chinese and non-Chinese and the following year, his efforts were recognised by the Hong Kong Chinese Martial Arts Association. Two fellow teachers, Long QiMing and Hu ShaoBao signed the letter of recommendation and Yan ChuMian was accepted as a 'SiFu'. He was also appointed as the Liu-Jia-Quan representative in Belgium. Yan taught and demonstrated Liu-Jia-Quan in Germany, Holland, France and other European countries before returning to Hong Kong in 1983.
According to SiFu Yan, the Liu-Jia-Quan training syllabus includes five training levels of unarmed combat. In the first level, juniors are taught the SI-MEN-WU-JIAN-QUAN which is the four directional and five angular dimensional form. This set shows beginners how to deal with four opponents and helps them develop good balance and agility.
Next, pupils are taught the SHUANG-FEI-HU-DEl-QUAN - the double butterfly palm form. Third level students learn the LIAN-HUAN-HU-BAO-QUAN, which is the tiger and leopard attacking form. Next to be learned is the FENG-CHE-JIAO-HOU-QUAN, or 'windmill rotating striking hands'. The fifth level form is TIAN-ZI-QUAN. In addition to the above, there are other training forms such as SHAO-YUN-TIAN (‘little cloudy sky'), SHI-QUAN ('ten sequences') and WU-XING-QUAN (the five animal forms).
SiFu Yan emphasises that each junior form comprises roughly eighty movements which function both offensively and defensively. He further points out that TIAN-ZI-QUAN is the most difficult because it requires the practitioner to manoeuvre within a 1 metre square floor pattern resembling the Chinese character ‘Tian’. Yan tells us that his teacher was very strict and made him get into the Tian floor pattern. Then he was obliged to leap, punch and kick but he was not allowed to step on any floor marks! If he did, his teacher would have hit him with a stick. Yan now admits that this sort of training helped him improve his balance and footwork. After working out on the Tian floor pattern, successful students are asked to perform all the forms on top of a square dining table!
Liu-Jia-Quan system contains many weapon training forms. These include WU-DIAN-MEI-HUA-GUN (the 'five point prune flower fighting pole form'), SHI-DIAN- SHUANG-TOU- GUN ('ten-point double-tipped pole form’), SHOU-LANG-GUN (‘the wolfs hand pole form’), ZHIN-YEN (‘the silver needle spear form), WU-LONG-CHU-DONG-BA ('five dragons leavingthe cave' tiger fork fighting form), QUING-LONG-RU-HAI-DAO ('the sea-diving green dragon' sabre form), SHI-MEN-JIAN (‘the four-directional double short sword form) and L1U-JIA-CHA-BA, the Liu family's tiger fork form.
Yan further records that there are many special training methods aimed at improving the reflexes and sensitivities of the practitioners. These methods are commonly known as DUI-CHUAN. The SAN-XING-CHUAN, or 'three stars forearm smashing method' is intended to condition students' forearms. Other methods are organised as sets of weapon sparring. SHUNG-GUN -DUI-CHAN is the pole contact fighting form, while YING-ZHEN-DUI-WAO-DENG are the spear vs sitting-bench exercises. DAO-DUI-BA are the sabre against tiger fork sets.
Liu-Jia-Quan is well known for the quality of its short range close-quarters combat. Fighters favour the use of the left-right attacking pattern and when faced with a head-on centre line attack, Liu-Jia practitioners use circular movements to absorb the assault. Then they make use of their five angular levels of attack. Sometimes, fighters use rather low stance work from which to launch low level attacks onto the opponent. The most commonly used stances are the SI-PING-MA (the horse stance), DIAO-MA (back, or cat stance). DI-MA (the low balancing stance) and LA-MA (withdrawing stance).
The above information comes from part of the syllabus covering the historical background of the second biggest Kung Fu 'family' system in Southern China. In order to promote genuine and traditional Liu-Jia-Quan, the China Cultural Fund is offering, two unique wall-charts illustrating an intermediate Liu-Jia-Quan training form, the WU-XING-QUAN (Five Animals). Technical information is supplied by teacher Zhao YongDe of the ZhongShan province.
The step-by-step, easy-to-learn wall charts include more than two hundred offensive and defensive techniques. Chart One (costs £4.80 incl p&p) covers history, background and three sections of the form. Chart Two (£6.80 incl p&p) shows the last two parts of the form. Both charts can be ordered from YUN-YE-TONG (address deleted –remember this is from 1995) YUN-YE-TONG plans to bring Yan ChuMin and his colleagues from Hong Kong for a weekend seminar/ workshop in London and Birmingham during Summer 1996.