The Art of Grappling in Japan - By Danny Corr

Unarmed and indeed armed methods of grappling have existed and are as old as man himself. Some of the oldest records in the form of hieroglyphics can be found in the Ancient tombs of Egypt, where we can see fighting techniques resembling modern boxing and in Mesopotamia from about 3000 B.C. there are clear drawings of men taking part in what can only be some ancient form of wrestling which incorporated strikes.  These grappling arts were no less prevalant in Japan where the importance of Grappling was emphasised in Japanese mythology when two dieties determined who was the ultimate boss by indulging in some "last-god" standing grappling sessions.

Despite a lot of belief grappling was not something practised by the lower classes but in fact it was developed by the higher warrior classes into a system of bujutsu. Later on around the 13th or 14th century when the warrior class ruled Japan close quarter grappling became the corner-stone for much of the warrior systems of fighting.

Grappling became even more important simply due to the necessity to deal with opponents who where clad from head-to -toe in armour, thus no self respecting warrior was found lacking in grappling skills.

The Japanese warriors set about developing the practical system of Yoroi kumi-uchi (Grappling in armour). This system came to its most useful when the warrior became devoid of his major weapons or the fight became so face to face that it was impractical to use kicks or the longer blades (Something all us stand-up middle distance karate "experts" should take heed off!).

This art relied heavily on the use of hips and limbs to unbalance, gain leverage and or disrupt mobility either to throw the enemy to the ground or to simply preserve his own fighting advantage.  This was made possible by a system of gripping whereby the combatants could lock onto each other without actually grasping. This left the hands free enough to draw out the special short blade the yoroi-doshi, which was usualy carried in a sash at the right hip and drawn left handed. Of course like all martial arts it required great skill in the heat of battle to keep an opponent unbalanced while drawing a blade and thrusting it into an opponents vital spot not to mention getting it through the tempered armour at the same time.       

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