Renaissance Martial Arts - the Web Documentary: Part 1of10

[noworriestoday]

europe is very skilled in very much things also in fighting even today

[antijavi]

I love this documentary, it really is great for people to see that not all martial arts comes or is derived from Asia. However I have to agree that the Asians did lead the world when it came not only to martial arts but war in general. Look at the Katana vs. the long sword or how Ganges Khan conquered half the world. The Asian were the true perfectionist, but the Europeans still had their own effective systems and weaponry, and its great to see something on it.

[FearThisChannel]

Now this is interesting. I always thought that unarmed techniques from European fighting styles sucked. I was obviously mistaken.

[BangTheRocksTogether]

@ odekeye, Please please punctuate and capitalize. Then, do some reading. Read about Da Vinci, Borgia, Dante, Machiavelli, and the Medicis. That is the Renaissance. If you are still curious about WMA after that Fiore de Liberi and Ridolfo Capoferro are interesting. The Medieval German Fechtbuchs [Fightbooks] are cool. They are surprisingly sophisticated. Don't forget, all of their weapons were made with coal and a hammer. Don't worry, all these WMA books have plenty of pictures.

[odekeye]

the renaissance was a time of thievery,Europe would hire people to go and steal,gold ,silver, people, writings,books,culture,etc.how sophisacated are we to believe europe's martial arts were,when these same people thought the world was flat,and they had no proof that Mars was out there,and before anyone mentions the "scholarly"men of europe,first find out where they got their education.

[ishouldplayzelda]

the art of killing other people... why isn't it still taught?

[pey10ab]

... ...the drummer for this intro tune has terrible consistency.

[sinen0mine]

I like european fencing and sword fighting. But this documentation sucks. It is just an endless stream of pictures that the camera moves across. You get head ache watching this. There is not a single picture shown still and in detail. Every picture is zoomed in and out and moved across all the time within seconds. You get eye cancer. And a monotone voice reading without dot and comma. What about visiting a fencing school and let the pictures be shown professionally?

[MastrPackr]

Most stills depict two combatants with identical weapons & armor - Unrealistic circumstances

[bassmanboe]

allot more kicks to the crotch then i expected.

[jystyle]

@bassmanboe because they have no real skill in kicks

[frederico4d]

"From Spain to Russia"??? !!! Portugal was compleatly kicked out of europe in this documentary, thank you!

(nice video btw)

[XCritonX]

@frederico4d I agree. Portugal had the best weapon technology in Europe from the 14th to 16th century.

In my city (I live in Portugal) we have a sword master. Next September when classes start again I should go and get some more training.

[kensei1972]

It is in the living laboratory of daily use that skill develop to a fine point. Such labs are all but dead in the West today ( except in prison) - Paris in 1400 had many , many more knife murders than all the prisons in the US combined . An edged weapon of some sort was universally carried. Drunkenness was common. Knife cultures require routine violent coaching in edged survival , as it will be a requirement to reach majority . This inevitably creates systems . Those of Europe were simply lost .

[kensei1972]

Inevitably , it is the man and his training . East v West is of less matter . Are we talking Musashi Miyamoto against some peasant from 9th century England ? Or Reginald of Bulogne against some peon with a yari, put there purely to absorb cavalry charges ? That said, there is absolutely no reason to suppose that Eastern unarmed styles would be "better" other than entertainment -based bias. Imagine someone nailing down first rate ringen , but they train it like a UFC fighter .

[kensei1972]

As well, there is reason to believe that unarmed/knife ability in Europe would have been more widespread than in , say Japan of the era. due to social stratification, Japan has had a comparatively low crime rate during times of significant administrative ability. Not so Europe. Homicide rates were often many times worse than the worst American cities ever achieved. What records exist attest to large numbers of violent crimes of all types. Close quarters assault would have been a common passtime

[christmanpunch]

The reason why European martial arts are widely unknown today as opposed to asian martial arts is because Europeans advanced to gun usage in warfare many centuries ago whereas asians continued to use blades. Besides some European martial arts are alive today such as boxing, kick boxing, savate and wrestling. They just aren't referred to as martial arts. Also the first ever known martial art was of European origin called Pankration. Invented by the Spartans and spread by the ancient Greek Empire.

[christmanpunch]

Some historians even believe that it was the grandfather of kung fu and thus all asian martial arts. That would make sense since Pankration was the most popular event in the ancient Greek olympic games which the Greeks spread all the way to India where it's believed a Buddhist monk took kung fu to China.

[jystyle]

its no surprised, martial arts asian or not is simply logic of movement. Any culture who spend time at war will undoubtely develop an art of war.

I am sure europeens probably had a great deal of skill with weapons but in terms of unarmed combat i would like to think eastern fighters were more advance in ancient times.

[megasayajinsongoku99]

jystyle no my friend the western martial arts are in unarmed combat at least so efficient as the Asian combatives...

[jystyle]

I don't think any Spartans, Legionaries, Knights, fencers, boxers, wrestlers in ancient Europe had the same skill and advance knowledge of a Shaolin Monk or a Ninja Assassin in unarmed combat.

I know as a battle unit Europeans are fierce and strong(with weapons) but at individual (unarmed) combat they are just not that advance because they lack physical conditioning and knowledge of human anatomic weaknesses,

[megasayajinsongoku99]

jystyle you are wrong...... I try to explain to you.... Today it is common to believe that armed and unarmed arts are 2 different thinks... But the truth is that armed and unarmed arts are one big art .

Since thousands of years have almost every culture martials arts and warfare traditions....

The right question is not to ask ''wich nation has martial arts'', but ''which nation has not martial arts ?''.....

[megasayajinsongoku99]

jystyle As I sayed almost every nation of the world has martial arts. It is a modern myth that martial arts are only common in East Asia.... The only reason that the Asian martial arts would famous is that we had gun weapons since the middel ages , the Asians(Japanese) first since the middle of the 19 Century.... It is also very natural to like every exotic thing.... for example the Japanese were facsinating from Catch as Catch can Wrestling and Glima.

[megasayajinsongoku99]

jystyle Boxing, Wrestling, Fencing are ''only'' modern sports. When you will see true european Arts de Marcialis you must study bare-nuckle boxing, Catch as Catch can Wrestling,Savate , Historical Fencing, Kampfringen , Glima , Runa Glima ..... When you studied the arts you will see that the Europeans had much more anatomic knowledge then you maybe think....

[megasayajinsongoku99]

jystyle Shaolin monks were basically monks, Ninja Assasins were basically assasins..... How can you compare monks and assasins to warriors? Japan was isolatad for hundreds of years and they fought only small civile wars.... In Europe we fought since thousands years violent and bloody wars... Mirmidons, Spartans, Romans, Teutonic-Germanics, knights,Vikings, Landsknecht and many many more....

[megasayajinsongoku99]

Even 100 % obektive I would say that the martial arts from Europe are most advanced because of the much more war expirience................ Study better the western arts and you will see .... :-)

Besides of this as Europeans we must respect our native traditions.... only so we can understand our itself.....

[jystyle]

sure wtv you say.... its so pointless

[megasayajinsongoku99]

that was for rctrue

Yes I see you are a little confused. I try to help.

Modern olympian Greco-Roman Wrestling is a french art. Ancient hellenic Pankration, ancient hellenic wrestling has nothing together with the french ''greco-roman wrestling''.

Almost every nation has a traditional style of wrestling and a style of fistfighting.... But the olympic styles of Boxing, Freestyle Wrestling , ''Greeco-Roman'' Wrestling are from Great Britain and France.....

[bassmanboe]

if a practitioner of ninjutsu found himself in hand to hand combat, then he failed his mission. they were peasants used for the least honorable form of combat for the time, assassination. historically they primarily poisoned their victims. They were not allowed swords, and were viewed as expendable. it is only in pop culture that the are revered.

[jystyle]

lol yeah that is right ninjas are just shit... lol hahahahhah

White power!!! lol!! Ancient Europeans are the best martial artist in the world hahahahahhahahahah

All of you are fucking morons, hahahahahah

There is no point reasoning with deluded idiots on martial arts.

Jui jitsu > western wrestling

Muay thai> western boxing

plain and simple you fucking morons jesus christ plz you white supremacist shut up!!!!

[bassmanboe]

and you sir, are a poonanny.

[AoDNightmare]

@jystyle maybe you sir, are the supremacist

[jystyle]

@AoDNightmare lol hahahah jesus christ you dumb white guys... people like you thinks its ok to cast white actors as the Air bender and Goku ... hahahah i bet, give me a break asian martial arts is best bro best bro best in Europe bro!! Go to Europe and ask around lol hahahhaha

[GuamKomudo]

I hate when people compare ninjas to warriors like Knights or something. Ninja wins a Knight everytime because the only time a real Ninja is fighting a Knight is when the Knight is sleeping in his bed. Or the Knight takes a drink of his drink and dies from poison =P Ninja, reguardless of what Hollywood shows you, would never fight you straight out, and often wouldn't even kill you, just steal stuff...

[ishouldplayzelda]

@GuamKomudo okay, so the ninja is a coward! HUZZAH!!

[GuamKomudo]

It's not the most honorable role in the world no, but that was point. In Japan there was a need for a dishonorable person in the war, so they could win. Samurai sure as hell not gonn spy on people and dress up and act like a normal person and steal important stuff like that. So the ninja were created, a dishonorable low life loser with nothing to lose was the ACTUAL ninja in history. You're 100% correct. Europe has it's own version too, it's just not a pop culture super star

[ishouldplayzelda]

@GuamKomudo i guess that makes sense but i'm just sick of the pop culture image of the ninja. it just needs to die off

[GuamKomudo]

By the end of the ninja's time they were very organized groups with very high knowledge of stealth, stealing, desquise, and other skills like that. They had some martial art skill based on sneak attacks. Just like now days, their main weapon was the fact that everyone THOUGHT they were badass ghost like warriors. They can disapear into smoke!The legend of the ninja was based on magic tricks, rumor and very ignorant people. Today not much is actually known about them, just the way they wanted it

[TheUsrper1]

@GuamKomudo ...Did you just say that a ninja would win the fight by not fighting? That seems like a total paradox. Ninjas were not warriors, they were assassins. If they could go the entire mission without combat, that was perfect. One on one a knight would kill a ninja, hands down. But a ninja would never allow himself to be in that situation, so its all speculation. And for the record, ninjas are far more fabricated by Hollywood than knights. But still not as much as the samurai.

[GuamKomudo]

If you are SO smart you should be able to undersand what I mean instead of picking it apart and making me sound wrong but you're actually saying the same thing as me... >.>

[cave321]

@jystyle

Wow your stupid. What about wrestling? And Boxing is much better than teakwondo, karate and wing chun. And do you really believe every muay thai fighter would win against a boxer?

[XIPM3]

systema is a european martial art.

[b3ntleg]

Looking at these images there seem to be alot of jui jitsu type holds. It is a shame europe forgot these techniques.

[GuamKomudo]

Well yeah, there was even a "Guard Position". There is only so many ways we can use our bodies as a weapons, ground fighting has been a real part of fighting of EVERY martial art that actually fought in real life, even Kung fu, and many arts nowdays seen as "Unuseful". That is because they were changed from the original war born hand to hand combat systems.

[williebl2005]

@b3ntleg They didn't forget. They call it "Catch as Catch Can" in England & "Collar & Elbow" in the early years of the New World USA. 1st President George Washington was a practitioner of both Grappling Art. It is currently known as Catch Wrestling. refer to Erik Paulson, Coach to UFC's Sean Sherk, Brock Lesnar, Afflictions's John Barnett and many others.

[odekeye]

@b3ntleg they were taught to europe by africans, the beni hassan heiroglyphs show a hug piece of what we today call jiu-jitsu.the sword fighting ,from the moors of spain, who were really the moors of africa.

[atraherne]

@b3ntleg Europe was also heavily spiritual, meditation / cosmic awareness / healing arts / deep connection with the earth, the animals and the energy behind it. Europe went through the processes for more complex / developed societies to set the stage for the modern world we live in. Now a growing % of the modern world are looking back to intergrate the significantly abandoned qualities.

[VegaEtereo]

Sweet! *****

[flashart]

Great stuff- A real eye opener.

It's sad that we've neglected our European Combat traditions. Most of us will initially think of Kung Fu or Karate/Ju Jitsu when hearing the term Martial Arts.

Thanks for posting.

[rctrue]

Look up Pankration. It was created by the Greeks over 1000 years ago. Thats were we get western boxing and Wrestling. It was the first mixed martial art.

[jimilli09]

Pankration is not where you guys get boxing, though olympic boxing came out of Pankration. Bill Russell...look him up. There's another Europing boxing style too..I forgot the name of the guy who created it. When I get it I will post it for you. Pankration is cool, I like it.

[megasayajinsongoku99]

rctrue  ..... Western Boxing and Wrestling are from Great Britain!!!!!!!!!

[rctrue]

Greece bro. Pankration

[megasayajinsongoku99]

rctrue Yes I am from Greece , but the truth is that Boxing and Wrestling are from Great Britain.... :-)

[rctrue]

Explain Roman Greco wrestling and Pankration then.

[megasayajinsongoku99]

Yes I see you are a little confused. I try to help.

Modern olympian Greco-Roman Wrestling is a french art.  Ancient hellenic Pankration, ancient hellenic wrestling has nothing together with the french ''greco-roman wrestling''.

Almost every nation has a traditional style of wrestling and a style of fistfighting.... But the olympic styles of Boxing, Freestyle Wrestling , ''Greeco-Roman'' Wrestling are from Great Britain and France.....

[Sefardi123]

@rctrue

More like 2500 years ago

[PhysXProg]

@rctrue

actually it is pankration.. not mixed martial arts, one style that possesses both striking and grappling moves, MMA is taking for example karate, jujutsu and capoera :) just to clear that up

[darkmoon21]

I'm taking Rapier/medieval weapon training with the world champion traditional rapier fight Lee Smith *thumbs up*

[nielsdejong]

nice work :) love this series :)

[ggn1]

I still like Japanese Martial Arts though because its the same place where my ever so beloved Japanese Cartoons come from which engulfs my life to this day.

[cmsahe]

Tons of images!! Thanks a lot ARMA. :) Carlos