If you look up the word 'martial' in the English dictionary, it says 'pertaining to war; warlike'. Any thesaurus tells us that the word relates to the armed forces, the military, to fighting and to combat. Thousands of years before the invention of firearms, martial systems in the Far East were an art form. Today the term 'martial arts' is generally used to describe Asian or Oriental fighting or combat systems.

No one is quite sure when, where or how the martial arts as we know them were formed. There arn't any scriptures or writings telling us of their birth. Therefor, due to the losses of time, historians can only guess as to the origins of most Asian martial arts. It is thought however that they evolved from the use of the military weapons of the time, like the sword and spear.

There are four main areas within the Orient where martial arts evolved, China, Okinawa, Japan and Korea. Within each region, military fighting systems evolved separately. It is thought that the martial arts known as Karate, Tae-Kwon-do and Kung Fu, which are the best known and most widely practised martial arts, all have their origins in China. It is said that the religious order of the Shaolin Priest (a Buddhist monk) and their monastery, known as the Shaolin temple, is the cradle of martial arts. It is said that soldiers took sanctuary in the Shaolin temple, recuperating and being nursed back to health by the Shaolin monks after being injured in battle. Some of these soldiers stayed on and taught the monks basic self defence techniques to help then defend themselves against attack from bandits. Some of the soldiers became monks themselves.

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