All these movements are the same

[RD'S Alias - 1A]

The name could still be referring to Zhao Kuang Yin though even if the martial arts came form Yue Fei's troops, because Zhao founded the dynasty. The uneducated might naturally assumed the style was his, or some variant of his art if it was taught in the military.

Remember, there are Long Fist styles in Shandong that have nothing to do with Zhao Kuang Yin, but are still named in honor of him because he initiated Long Fist practice at Shaolin. This could be the same thing, only a different angle of it.

The other thought it that the style may have gone public before Yue Fei's vindication, so the name of the art was chosen to be after Zhao as a marketing decision of sorts.

[RD'S Alias - 1A]

No , not what I am seeing, the rest of the rows follows the same path as ta ji quan yi lu set, which mostly follows tai zu chang 32, but the movements that are not really seen in the TZ set are seen both here in the Ba fan shou sets and the tai ji quan yi lu set.

That I am finding very strange, wonder what it means?
Both are drawing from the same source?

Or the TZ 32 set originally had those moves that are seen in these 2 other sets?

Reply]
Maybe these moves are found in Qi jiguang's set?

As for these moves being lost moves of the Tai tzu 32, I think it is possible, BUT we have the songs, and all 32 postures form those songs are in the set, so I think it is complete. These moves might be additions later though.

If they DO belong on the 32 Tai tzu Chang Chuan set, then are they moves that somehow fit the songs as well?

If they ARE moves left out, say to mark the set, then finding a line not connected to Shaolin from the surrounding villages would be important. They would still have those moves intact. They might remove others in thier own effort to mark the set, but since they would not be under the direction of shaolin, then the moves they remove would be of thier own choice and would most likely be different ones. So we need to see a local village example of the form to know.

[Sal Canzonieri]

Reply]
Maybe these moves are found in Qi jiguang's set?

As for these moves being lost moves of the Tai tzu 32, I think it is possible, BUT we have the songs, and all 32 postures form those songs are in the set, so I think it is complete. These moves might be additions later though.

If they DO belong on the 32 Tai tzu Chang Chuan set, then are they moves that somehow fit the songs as well?

If they ARE moves left out, say to mark the set, then finding a line not connected to Shaolin from the surrounding villages would be important. They would still have those moves intact. They might remove others in thier own effort to mark the set, but since they would not be under the direction of shaolin, then the moves they remove would be of thier own choice and would most likely be different ones. So we need to see a local village example of the form to know.

Possible.

Could also mean either Chen/Zhao Bao/Etc and Yue Shi Ba Fan Shou are drawing from the same source (which added the extra moves) which would then imply that Chen took their set from somewhere else in it's entirety (which that Tongbei style that I posted the video links to at Emptyflower shows the almost exact set).

OR

These taiji styles drew their inspiration from Ba Fan Shan style?

OR

???

[cjurakpt]

Sal,

Hi - I am trying to follow your exegesis here - if I understand correctly, you are trying to discern Shaolin-based roots of taijiquan? or is that an oversimplification / am I missing something else?

You mention Tong Bei: this particular vid here always struck me as salient: http://br.youtube.com/watch?v=Is7fCc5wef8

any input is appreciated; sorry if I am way behind the learning curve on your line of inquiry...

thanks

Chris

[Royal Dragon]

Maybe Zhao Kuang Yin learned his Tong Bei from the same source as the Chen family did at a later date (hundreds of years later), and he eliminated those extra moves himself.

Remember, Tai tzu is a distillation of the prominent military styles of the time, and Zhao's Hong set was a distillation of all the styles he was good at as well, so it stands to reason that many moves may have been dropped from his previous styles because he just didn't use them often in actual battle.

The other thing to think of, Chen Want Ting and the Li Brothers went to Qianzhi temple to learn. By then they were surely experienced martial artists, especially Chen, Wang Ting because of his military career.

So if Zhao Kuang Yin (or the creators of the 32) removed those extra moves because he didn't use them much, maybe they were still in the Tong Bei taught at Qianzhi, and Chen Wang Ting added them back in?

Zhao Kuang Yin may not have actually been at Shaolin to add his imput to the 32 Tai Tzu Chang Chuan, BUT you have told me the Shaolin records state that they Started with his style, so it stands to reason he would have had imput in it's creation.

I can picture the Monks going to the palace with the form, and Zhao looking at it, then saying "not bad, but get rid of these moves here, and this one over there, we never use them in battle anyway."

The Monks would then go back and continue working on the form untill it was time to show Zhao thier progress again.

If the Monks really liked those moves, maybe they lived on in a "Unofficial" version that spread to the villages later down the road.

[Sal Canzonieri]

Sal,

Hi - I am trying to follow your exegesis here - if I understand correctly, you are trying to discern Shaolin-based roots of taijiquan? or is that an oversimplification / am I missing something else?

You mention Tong Bei: this particular vid here always struck me as salient: http://br.youtube.com/watch?v=Is7fCc5wef8

any input is appreciated; sorry if I am way behind the learning curve on your line of inquiry...

thanks

Chris

Hi;

Shaolin based roots of taiji quan has been accept long ago (from Shaolin Rou Quan (soft fist), Hong Quan, Tai Zu Quan, etc. ) that's not what's being discerned.

Yes, that video has many people interested in how old that set really is, and where they got it from and so on. Did Chen TJQ come first or this? It is being found by researchers in China that certain branch of tongbei quan is the root to Chen taiji quan and the very similar Li style. Also Zhaobao TJQ is related, of course.

I made a chart that connects all these styles and shows how exactly.
Check out: http://www.bgtent.com/naturalcma/CMA...risonChart.htm

[Sal Canzonieri]

Maybe Zhao Kuang Yin learned his Tong Bei from the same source as the Chen family did at a later date (hundreds of years later), and he eliminated those extra moves himself.

Remember, Tai tzu is a distillation of the prominent military styles of the time, and Zhao's Hong set was a distillation of all the styles he was good at as well, so it stands to reason that many moves may have been dropped from his previous styles because he just didn't use them often in actual battle.

The other thing to think of, Chen Want Ting and the Li Brothers went to Qianzhi temple to learn. By then they were surely experienced martial artists, especially Chen, Wang Ting because of his military career.

So if Zhao Kuang Yin (or the creators of the 32) removed those extra moves because he didn't use them much, maybe they were still in the Tong Bei taught at Qianzhi, and Chen Wang Ting added them back in?

Zhao Kuang Yin may not have actually been at Shaolin to add his imput to the 32 Tai Tzu Chang Chuan, BUT you have told me the Shaolin records state that they Started with his style, so it stands to reason he would have had imput in it's creation.

I can picture the Monks going to the palace with the form, and Zhao looking at it, then saying "not bad, but get rid of these moves here, and this one over there, we never use them in battle anyway."

The Monks would then go back and continue working on the form untill it was time to show Zhao thier progress again.

If the Monks really liked those moves, maybe they lived on in a "Unofficial" version that spread to the villages later down the road.

The moves are from the input of people contemporary to Zhao, and what the base of material from him that the 32 starts from is Zhao's Lao Hong Quan.

[cjurakpt]

Shaolin based roots of taiji quan has been accept long ago (from Shaolin Rou Quan (soft fist), Hong Quan, Tai Zu Quan, etc. ) that's not what's being discerned.

ok, cool - my taiji teacher first put this to me several years ago, at the time it was not particularly PC, I guess - glad to see that this is now understood as such (not saying you recently came up with this, for all I know you figured this out ages ago, but it seems like a lot of peeps were not hip to this for some time)

Yes, that video has many people interested in how old that set really is, and where they got it from and so on. Did Chen TJQ come first or this? It is being found by researchers in China that certain branch of tongbei quan is the root to Chen taiji quan and the very similar Li style. Also Zhaobao TJQ is related, of course.

in our style of taiji what most call Fan Through Back, we call Opening the Three Gates of the Back - Sam Tong Bei; my teacher always maintained that this also indicates the relationship of taiji to Tong Bei; actually, after that move, we do a 180 turn into a technique called Dang Yu - Waiting for Fish - that I have not seen in any other versions to date (but wouldn't be surprised if it existed in whatever proto-style it was derived from), and then we do Green / Young Dragon Exits Sea before moving into the next Lan Jaht Yee (Too Lazy Too Bind Robe as my teacher translates it); FYI, I study a non-familial branch of Yang Lu Chan; ostensibly our version of the form is a pre-Beijing version - we still have the jump kicks, the low spinning sweeps, etc.; another interesting thing - we also do our "jai" / press w/a semi-closed fist, similar to here at 2:32)

I made a chart that connects all these styles and shows how exactly.
Check out: http://www.bgtent.com/naturalcma/CMA...risonChart.htm

awesome - thank you for your efforts towards "uncovering" the truth;

[Sal Canzonieri]

ok, cool - my taiji teacher first put this to me several years ago, at the time it was not particularly PC, I guess - glad to see that this is now understood as such (not saying you recently came up with this, for all I know you figured this out ages ago, but it seems like a lot of peeps were not hip to this for some time)


in our style of taiji what most call Fan Through Back, we call Opening the Three Gates of the Back - Sam Tong Bei; my teacher always maintained that this also indicates the relationship of taiji to Tong Bei; actually, after that move, we do a 180 turn into a technique called Dang Yu - Waiting for Fish - that I have not seen in any other versions to date (but wouldn't be surprised if it existed in whatever proto-style it was derived from), and then we do Green / Young Dragon Exits Sea before moving into the next Lan Jaht Yee (Too Lazy Too Bind Robe as my teacher translates it); FYI, I study a non-familial branch of Yang Lu Chan; ostensibly our version of the form is a pre-Beijing version - we still have the jump kicks, the low spinning sweeps, etc.; another interesting thing - we also do our "jai" / press w/a semi-closed fist, similar to here at 2:32)


awesome - thank you for your efforts towards "uncovering" the truth;

Wow, great about your Yang style. those moves are indeed in the Shaolin Rou Quan 36 set! And I have always been thinking that Yang taiji has extra influence of Shaolin Rou quan that makes it different from Chen.
Can you please provide more info about your branch of Yang TJQ? It's lineage, etc., thanks!

[cjurakpt]

Wow, great about your Yang style. those moves are indeed in the Shaolin Rou Quan 36 set!

ok - looked at your vids on that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4zI7DNKsoU
starting ~:43, he goes into Needling Sea Bottom (and actually gets into it very much how we do, which is different from all other versions of the form I've seen, with the "extra' crossing of the hands before going into the downward move w/the right hand), to Opening Three Gates, and turns and does the series of moves very similarly to us - very interesting! I will have to take some time to look at it in more detail, should be very interesting...

And I have always been thinking that Yang taiji has extra influence of Shaolin Rou quan that makes it different from Chen.

as far as why the Yang is so different from Chen - that has been a question on my mind for a long time; obviously I am not versed in the Shaolin arts as you are so have not been able to compare accordingly; however, one thing has struck me about the 3rd "chapter" of the Yang form, which is that there are elements that seem very different from the rest of the form, and also the way the are organized, like Wild Horse, Jade Maiden - sort of just "thrown" in with Lan Zat Yi's seperating them - like they were single techniques from somewhere else that he just added on (I also wonder to what extent they were influenced by his contact w/Dong Hai Chuan - who, my sifu believes probably was a far superior fighter to Yang...)

Can you please provide more info about your branch of Yang TJQ? It's lineage, etc., thanks!

my teacher is Master Sat Chuen Hon; his teacher was Master Ham King Koo; Master Koo's teacher was someone by the name of Yang Zai Teng (my transliteration may be way off), who was some sort of Beijing court official who was evidently rather scholarly and all that, who studied with YLC directly (at least that's the story as I know it); Master Koo was very young when he studied w/Master Teng (1910, I bellieve), who was very old at the time; Maser Koo was in his 70's when my sifu met him (somewhere in the mid- or early 1970's) and passed away in 1999 at the age of 95.
http://users.erols.com/dantao/koo.html
Master Koo was also very good friend w/Master Tung Ying Jieh, and in fact we do a version of the Tung fast form that is "flavored" a bit differently; there are also some elements in our long form that seem to have been absorbed by Master Koo from Tung as well;
you might have read Master Hon's article on his personal research on the Daoist Alchemical roots of taiji in the Winter 07-08 issue of Qi? if not, it may be of interest to you; if so, I am curious about your opinion (even if you do not agree w/his perspective, that's fine, I'd be interested why not)

again, thank you very much for your assistance and in depth research!

[TenTigers]

Sal, Yue Fei is also reputed to be the founder, or one of the developers of Hsing-Yi Ch'uan. The movement you describe in your opening post also appears in some Hung Kuen sets as well. In our Moi-Fa, the movement is beggar;s hands into double Tiger claw, one striking forward, the other either pushing or pulling (depending on how youplay) by the elbow-similar to pek kuen.
Could yuor reference and connections made to 'Great Ancestor" also explain Ancestral Crane Boxing as well? They also use the SamJien, and Fukien White Crane systems seem to be the root perhaps in many Hakka systems.

As far as the Yang Tai Chi-I have always preferred Yang Family to Chen due to the any similarities it has with my own Hung-Ga, which is also Shaolin-based.Look at Brush Knee and Push, Push, White Crane Spreads its Wings, Shoulder Strike, Fair Lady works the Shuttle, Diagonal Flying, etc-all Siu-Lum (Shaolin) Hung Kuen.
The Shaolin/Tai=Chi connection has been mentioned before. In some versions, A General Jiang is said to have trained in Shaolin and may have also then gone to Chen Village. Yang Lu-Chuan was said to have been a Shaolin practitioner who then went to Chen village as well. It would stand to reason as Yang's Tai-Chi shows more similarities to Shaolin than Chen.

[TenTigers]

The Shaolin Rou Quan looks like a textbook containing Ba Ji, Hsing-Yi, and Pa Kua, all together! What a storehouse of information!

[Royal Dragon]

The energics of a Zhaobao Taijiquan compared to say Ba fanshou are way disimilar, so any movement resemblance has no bearing. Martial arts is not dance, movements alone are insufficient.


Reply]
Shaolin Master,
It is not the fact that similar movements are showing up in different styles that is significant, it is the fact that the same moves keep showing up, in the same sequential order, over and over again in certain styles, that is significant.

You are right though, there is much more to it than the moves themselves. The body method is also significant.

I would like to see a chart documenting various body methods and their evolution from style to style as well. It would shed light on the other end of the spectrum.

[TenTigers]

the same movement taught to different people with varied backrounds and experiences will then develop and evolve into different methodolgies/systems/tactics. Whatis intersting is seeing the source, and then the separate evolutions of the individual styles. Witness Fukien/Hakka styles, White Crane/Southern Mantis/Wing Chun/Ngo Cho etc.

[Royal Dragon]

I don't think Tai Tzu crane has any relation to Zhao, Kuang Yin. I think in this case "Tai Tzu"just refers to the fact that is is a really old Crane style system, or it is the great ancestor to more modern ones.

The words Tai Tzu are not mutually exclusive to Zhao Kuang Yin. There are a number of styles with that name, and not many are related to each other nor are they related to Zhao Kuang Yin's style. It's like Hong Fist, lots of different styles have that name. some are connected to each other, and some are not.