Wu Tang???

[jimmy23]

what does wu tang translate to? Ive seen this name over and over, but Im not a CMA stylist and have no idea what it means

[African Tiger]

that it is a *******ization of Wudan - the other temple in the formation of kung fu.

Or as Method Man (fr Hip Hop group Wu Tang) told me while I worked on How High, they got their name from watching Shaw Brothers movies back in the day, and named their group from the sound of a sword rushing through the air (Whoosh or Wu), and the sound of two swonds colliding (Ting or Tang).

Other than the literal Madarin to English, I have to defer to someone else. Hope I was of some help, though.

[African Tiger]

wow, you guys edit out b-a-s-t-a-r-d? That fuhking sucks dik.

[Ky-Fi]

I believe Wudang is a mountain(s?) in China, where, legend has it, the Chinese Internal arts--Taijiquan, Baguazhang, Xingyiquan, and other arts based on similar principles were created. From my understanding, though, once you go back further than a couple hundred years in Chinese martial arts history, things get pretty murky and it's hard to tell where fact begins and legends end.

[RAF]

http://www.wutan.org/

See article for definition of Wu Tan, Wu Tang used by late GM Liu Yun Qiao

[EARTH DRAGON]

translations
shaolin ( beautiful forest)
Wu Tang (quiet mountain)

[Tvebak]

Ive always been told that Shaolin=New forest...???
I have heard that Wudang was famous for Sword techs? any truth in this?

[CanadianBadAss]

I think Si is the mandarin pronunciation, and sun is the Cantonese. Sun wu dang and wu dang si

[SevenStar]

AT, what did you have to do with How High?

[African Tiger]

I was Redman's stand in.

I also did stunt work for Obba Babatune (the Dean), which was kind of funny, seeing as he's about 5'9 and I'm 6'2.

Aaaaaaaaand, I did all of Red and Meth's hand inserts, and hand inserts for Baby Powder (The Pimp). If you look hard enough you can actually see my hands in the trailer when the pimp slaps the asian character.

Needless to say I was the jack of all trades on that movie. :D Since it was pretty low budget ($12 million), they couldn't afford to hire someone else for all the above.

[Goldenmane]

As I understand it, Wu Tang Shan (Mount Wu Tang) was a fairly major centre (and still sorta is) for Daoist monks/hermits... some pretty funky kung fu styles originated there, including the commonly named ones (baguazhang, etc... mostly internal) and some of the lesser-known ones (Crimson Fist, Devils Palm/Fist (?) and Butterfly Palm, to name the ones I know of).

It was also pretty much the centre in China for Daoist military magic (some pretty odd sh!t, from the little I know about it).

Anyway, it can be seen to be roughly analogous in Chinese martial legend/history on the Daoist side to Shaolin on the Buddhist side. Chances are that any art that is based in Daoist concepts is more likely to be traced to Wu Tang or thereabouts than to Shaolin.

Which is always something that makes me laugh when people talk about the Wu Tang Clan guys learning kung fu (apparently) from a Shaolin monk (or ex-Shaolin monk). The guys on Wu Tang Shan were not renowned for being looked upon highly by the Shaolin guys... though later in history there were some crossovers between stylists of the two.

This is all just from bits and peices I have picked up here and there, though the sources for most of it were pretty decent.

-geoff

[Crimson Phoenix]

Nah, shao is young, small is xiao and lacks one line to make it the caracter "shao" (shao is written with xiao plus an aditional brush stroke under).
As for Wudang, it is written with the caracter for "martial, military" and the one for "equal, suitable, in charge of, worthy of" depending on the pronounciation (I ignore what the complete name really means, it could as well acquire a whole new meaning)...