Bartitsu and Sherlock Holmes

[Baritsumaster]

We at the Bartitsu Society are putting out a documentary about Sherlock Holmes and the lost art of Bartitsu, to coincide with the release of the Robert Downey Jr.
movie.
The clip for the documentary is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?=ZDNaC-2HW-A

Hope you enjoy it. we shot it all over the world.

[Baritsumaster]

Make that:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v-ZDNaC-2HW-A

[Baritsumaster]

My apologies. Third time's the charm.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDNaC-2HW-A

[doug maverick]

the style in the movie, was a blend of wing chun and jiu jutsu. didnt really look like baristsu. but cool that you did that.

[Dragonzbane76]

I like the philosophy about the fight range. Sounds a lot like mma fights usually start striking dis. and end in grappling.


http://www.bartitsu.org/index.php/20...su-kickboxing/

[taai gihk yahn]

you said "tit", he he he...

no srsly, it was a valid approach at hybridization, and seemed to encourage working "live" in regards to much of the teaching;

although I don't know about his conceit regarding using a "gentleman's" art to ward off London's ruffians, scalywags and ne'er-do-wells...give those bounders a sound thrashing, and all that, what, what?

[Dragonzbane76]

haha considering this is the early part of the century we are talking about. The guy was way ahead of his time.

[GeneChing]

Sherlock Holmes' 'Lost' Martial Art Makes NYC Premiere
July 21, 2011 7:18am | By Meredith Hoffman, DNAinfo


CHELSEA — Self defense was never as noble as in the Sherlock Holmes novels.

At least, that's the opinion of practitioners of Bartitsu, the "lost" martial art made famous by the author of the famed detective series, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Bartitsu fans will hold a workshop this weekend in what may be the first NYC performance of the so-called "gentlemanly art of self-defense."

"It's great for me being a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes and for many years wondering what 'Bartitsu' was," said Rachel Klingsberg, a Bartitsu student and the event's organizer.

She explained that Holmes' fighting style, written as "Baritsu" in Doyle's published stories, had puzzled scholars, who finally found in the 1980s that it was actually referring to the obscure martial arts form Bartitsu, but was missing the letter "t."

Presented by the New York Nineteenth Century Historical Society, the workshop at 34 West 28th Street invites students to "use a walking stick, parasol, jacket, and other accessories for protection."

"As far as we can tell, this weekend is the premiere of Bartitsu in New York City," said Klingberg, noting that the martial art form actually began in the late 1800s in England but never "made it to the New World."

"The most challenging thing was using a parasol for self defense," she said, recalling her first stab at the sport a few months ago in New Jersey at the Steampunks Fair, an event where people don traditional 19th Century clothes.

"I had to transition to using accessories as tools of self-defense."

Klingberg explained that Bartitsu is highly popular for Steampunks, a group of people dedicated to 19th Century science fiction. The martial art has also received renewed interest from Westerners, with more practitioners popping up around the country, she added.

"The first Sherlock Holmes movie showed him as willing to take on the bad guy in a physical and martial way. ...It caused interest in what technique he was using," she said.

At this weekend's event, Klingberg said she encourages people to wear 19th Century attire, as part of the Bartitsu experience.

"We do discourage people from wearing high heel boots...it could be difficult to practice," said Klingberg, who said 17 people have already bought tickets for the event. "But at least half of the people will be in traditional Victorian attire."

Mark Donnelly, a longtime fighter and the author of over 20 books, will lead the workshop, which runs between 1 and 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Donnelly earned the title Professor of Arms for founding the Society for the Study of Swordmanship in 1998, and said he first discovered Bartitsu through other forms of fighting arts.

"I'm interested in historical combat," explained Donnelly.

"I also teach 'neo-Bartitsu,' like how to use your cell phone defensively, not because it's a weapon but because it's in your hand," said Donnelly. "This is purely a self defense system. An object either becomes an encumbrance or an asset."

Students can register online beforehand or at the door when they arrive — just be prepared to pay $45 a day for the experience.

Because nothing screams steam-punk like Bartitsu cell phone techniques.

[SimonM]

Because nothing screams steam-punk like Bartitsu cell phone techniques.

Man, I'm missing the boat here.

I know steam-punks, I could gussy up some truncheon forms, put on a waist coat and call it Bartitsu.

[Lee Chiang Po]

This is just another lineage of jiujitsu, that's all. He might lay claim to it, but it is purely jiujitsu. No Wing Chun, just jiujitsu. Not BJJ, but the Japanese version.

[jdhowland]

This is just another lineage of jiujitsu, that's all. He might lay claim to it, but it is purely jiujitsu. No Wing Chun, just jiujitsu. Not BJJ, but the Japanese version.

Not "purely jujitsu." Barton-Wright's approach was to blend boxing, wrestling, stick arts and anything else that came to hand into a well balanced self defense system. The development of bartitsu ended in its infancy, but the idea was novel for its time.

[GeneChing]

What a great piece of history...

Edith Garrud: a public vote for the suffragette who taught martial arts

The woman who introduced jujutsu to the suffragette cause is honoured with a plaque on her London house

Rachel Williams
guardian.co.uk, Monday 25 June 2012 16.00 EDT



Garrud depicted in a 1910 Punch cartoon. Photograph: Arthur Wallis Mills

The horrors of forcible feeding endured by imprisoned suffragettes on hunger strike are relatively well known; the image of rubber tubes being rammed down women's throats as they were held or tied down is a hard one to shake. Less widely documented have been the efforts made to protect the movement's leaders from arrest in the first place: of the 30-strong elite "bodyguard" trained to resist the police using the martial art jujutsu, and of the woman who taught them – Edith Garrud. But this Saturday, Islington council will unveil a People's Plaque, voted for by residents, at the house where this little-known suffragette lived in Thornhill Square, London.

One of the western world's first female martial arts instructors, Garrud, who died in 1971 aged 99, is thought to have learned jujutsu in the late 19th century. She began working with suffragettes between 1908 and 1911, eventually at her own women-only training hall, a room at the Palladium Academy dance school in Argyll Street.

When the government passed the notorious "Cat and Mouse Act" in 1913 – under which hunger strikers were released only to be rearrested when they had regained their strength – the Women's Social and Political Union responded by setting up a dedicated unit to protect Emmeline Pankhurst and other leaders from arrest.

Martial arts expert Tony Wolf, andauthor of a book about Edith Garrud aimed at teenage girls, says there was a "direct progression" from this job to that of official trainer of the bodyguard. "Members [of the bodyguard] had to be athletic and willing to face injury and arrest. She trained them in jujutsu at secret locations throughout London, and also taught them how to use wooden Indian clubs, which were concealed in their dresses and used as weapons against the truncheons of the police." Garrud, who was just 4ft 11in tall, seems to have embraced the spotlight, even before the bodyguard was formed. In 1910 she produced an illustrated article explaining how woman using the jujutsu methods had "brought great burly cowards nearly twice their size to their feet and made them howl for mercy."

"Woman is exposed to many perils nowadays, because so many who call themselves men are not worthy of that exalted title, and it is her duty to learn how to defend herself," she wrote, in the same year a Punch cartoon depicted policemen cowering before her.

But Tony Wolf cautions against romanticised images of suffragettes throwing officers around. "The bodyguard had some remarkable tactical victories using decoys and disguises," he says. "But the grim reality is that they were heavily outnumbered by the police and were often injured."