The African origins of martial arts...

One evening, I was watching a Tariq Nasheed video (and for the uninitiated, Tariq is the man who produced the ‘Hidden Colors’ documentary series) and on this night, Tariq was talking about the recent climate surrounding the gestapo-like tactics of american cops and the ‘Blue Lives Matter’ law.

One anglophilic negro-of-a-Black man called into Tariq’s show and started a dumbfounded diatribe about the dysfunctional state of Black americans. He started out by saying that we (Black americans) shouldn’t resort to looting and burning down our own neighborhoods, if we want to stage any kind of continuous protests against police corruption.

Firstly, for any other Black men or women who subscribe to this nimrod’s point of view, let me say straight away that especially in the case of our people’s revolts in Ferguson, Missouri, that what those young men and women DID NOT do was burn down their own neighborhoods. 

Meaning, not one of those young people burned down the apartment, condo, or homes they lived in. What they burned down were the retail stores that our people didn't own. Moreover, they rightfully burned down these stores cause they continuously overcharge and disrespect us in our neighborhoods, while selling us expired products and thinking they’re doing us a favor in the process.

A few seconds later, this nit-wit said that in response to police brutality, just like Koreans have ‘Tae Kwon Do’, Thailand’s citizens have ‘Muay thai boxing’ and Brazilians have ‘Jiu-Jitsu’, Black people should create their own kind of organized ‘self-defense systems’.

I just shook my head.

I thought to myself, not only has this Tom bought into every stereotype white fascists fed him about us, but he has no idea where the martial arts really come from. So that's what I'm gonna' expound on in this post.

Let’s start with my own pseudonym, ‘MontUHURU Mimia’.

Our ancient ancestor’s worshipped an African war deity named ‘Montu’. And before the phrase ‘martial arts’ was coined, our people called these fighting methods the ‘Montu’ Arts. So not only did the ‘Montu Arts’ pre-date the ‘martial arts’ by several centuries, but I’ll show you how the contemporary martial arts were directly descended from our Montu Arts.

*Side note: One last fact about my pseudonym—the term ‘Uhuru’ is Swahili for ‘Freedom’, so my first name ‘MontUHURU’, literally translates into ‘War or fight for freedom’.

Now the pic to the right displays glyphs on the walls of the Temple of Ramses III. These glyphs illustrate a combination of hand and ‘fencing’ type fighting styles using sticks. These martial artists are also wearing face masks for protection. You can click onto this picture to see more of it. And I'd like to note how european 'fencing' still uses face masks to this day. Also, to the left and right of these central figures, are pictures depicting wrestling throws over the shoulders of other martial artists. The Temple of Ramses and these pics date back to 1080 B.C.E., and they're located in Kemet, Africa…this area is now known by the name whites gave it, and that name is ‘Egypt’.

This pic to the right, is one illustrating the ancient Nubian/Senegalese wrestling martial art called ‘Lutte’. The moves depicted on these walls are where modern Judo/Jiu-Jitsu, or MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) grappling techniques come from.

Now, when I was in my pre-teens, Bruce Lee was a bona-fide star in Black neighborhoods. We not only respected his fighting style, but the ingenuity of his mastering the art of blocking and countering simultaneously. And I also remember in a documentary called, ‘I am Bruce Lee’, the film’s white narrator credited him for creating the Hip-Hop style of ‘break-dancing’ from the way he wielded his ‘nun-chucks’ and pounded out his opponents feet while spinning in semi-circles on the floor. And that's one of the more famous scenes from the movie, ‘The Chinese Connection’.

Also, I remember how the iconic Hip-Hop group, the ‘Wu-Tang Clan’ revered asian martial arts movies depicting the fighting styles of the famed ‘Shaolin Temple’. So much so, that they actually named their group after a rebel gang in one of those films.

But if you wanna’ really talk about ‘asian’ martial arts and the Shaolin Temple, we’ll have to take yet another look at the founding contributions of ancient Black people.

In the 5^th or 6^th century, a Buddhist monk named ‘Bodhidharma’ traversed China. And in his journeys he closely observed the animals in nature, i.e., snakes, tigers, cranes, etc. After his travels, he formulated fighting styles based on these animals, and long story short, Bodhidharma established the Shaolin Temple and its ‘nature-based’ martial arts techniques. Mind you, Bodhidharma was a Black man. Those are his images in the upper left corner, and you can click on that pic to enlarge it.

Now, for those of you saying, c’mon bruh…there weren’t any Black people in ancient China, I’d tell you that China’s first dynasty, the ‘Shang’ dynasty, was comprised solely of Black people.

So whenever you watch any ‘karate flick’ like the cult classic ‘Five Deadly Venoms’, or any film centered around the Shaolin Temple, know that your ancestors founded those fighting styles.

Now, let’s go in on ‘Brazilian’ Jiu-jitsu…

First off, what that ignoramus of a Black man who called Tariq’s show didn’t know, is Brazil has the second largest concentration of Black people in it, outside of Africa.

So whenever you talk about Brazilians, you’re talking about Black people.

Now, I think by now, especially with the previous information, it’s fairly easy to see where Jiu-Jitsu’s grappling techniques come from. And I also think it's common knowledge that the most recognizably African martial art comes out of Brazil. And that martial art is called ‘Capoeira’. And this circular-motioned fighting style is what most directly influenced the creation of Hip-Hop’s break-dancing. On top of that, Capoeira has its roots in the ancient Congo. It combines elements of dance, acrobatics and music, and is now very popular with white folks in keeping with their themes of cultural theft.

So I’ve said all that to say, or at least to reiterate, that Black people created not just some of the world's arts, but ALL of them. Additionally, we not only created some of the world's sciences—but ALL of the world’s sciences. And you don’t have to take my word for it, just research any science long enough and you’ll eventually find our people at its genesis.

Case in point, the symbol to the right is called the ‘Gye-Nyame’ and is pictured in the center of this post’s header. It’s what Bruce Lee’s looking sideways at. This is an ancient symbol from Ghana, Africa and it literally means, ‘except for God’. Now, what the ancient Ghanians meant by that phrase is, some achievements are nearly impossible to attain ‘except for God’. And this symbol is where ancient asians got their swirling ‘Yin-Yang’ symbol from (if you’ve never seen a Yin-Yang symbol, google it).

So if you’re a Black man or woman reading this, the next time you're watching a super cool kung-fu flick, or you’re admiring any fair-skinned martial artist’s style, remember the people who started all of these fighting systems…and then remember that they all looked like you.

I've said it before and I'll say it again...

I LOVE BEING BLACK!!

Later…

MontUHURU Mimia 

P.S. 

Here's a video that goes into more details about the African roots of martial arts. Enjoy.