Punos_Rey

Saw this thread and was inspired to make a similar one:

http://www.historum.com/ancient-hist...dsmanship.html

One of my main(if not the main) interests of mine when it comes to history is Hoplology(studying combative behavior). There's tons of information on martial arts of Asia(along with an ever growing presence of HEMA), yet I'm frustrated in efforts to find information on African martial arts. There was a dvd on AMA being produced a few years back, but the project lost steam, so wanting to see what other Historum goers have discovered if anything?

One picture I found really interesting is this collection of swords here, could there possibly have been swordsmanship styles(beyond merely just hacking and slashing)?




As far as modern stuff I've found, here's a collection of stuff:

Nubian Wrestling:
http://wysinger.homestead.com/nubiansport.html




Dambe(Hausa Boxing style):




Senegalese Wrestling:
http://thevknewsreport.com/?p=365 - article that includes a picture of Ancient Egyptian Wrestling techniques

Tairusiano

Hi Punos although there is little information of african martial arts there is plenty of forms of combat but most are wrestling and a few boxing form a interesting example is the Ereitrean/Ethiopean Testa Fight where there is a strong emphasis on using strikes with the head Os Malandros de Mestre Touro

Punos_Rey

^Tairusiano, thanks!

Yeah, seems like there's not a lot out there that I've been able to find :/ other than some of the indigenous wrestling styles in the vids. I figured there had to be something at least with spears and arrows, though when I came across the swords collection it piqued my curious as to possible african swordsmanship styles.

jehosafats

Tigel

Wrestling Roots | Documenting & Promoting Traditional Wrestling Styles from Around the World has a small handful of articles regarding wrestling in Africa: Lutte (Senegal), Nubian (Sudan), Tigel (Ethiopia).

The Lutte and Nubian wrestling have videos, but the Tigel is a photo essay/report.

I am sorry if this sounds spam-ish, but I found this thread on Historum while googling and I wanted to toss out our website. We are trying to turn many of the traditional forms of wrestling and their rules into written form.

Many of the rules of traditional sports are handed down through oral tradition. We are trying to turn the oral tradition into written form. So far, we have wrestled in Vietnam, China, Mongolia, Ethiopia, and India. However, we also ask for other first person essays from others who have experienced these traditional forms of wrestling to add to the site.

Tigel

One quick thing I wanted to note about Nubian wrestling:

Throughout history, many arguments within the tribes of Sudan and South Sudan were settled due to Nubian wrestling matches. Rather than going to battle over an issue, many tribes used sport (wrestling) to settle disagreements. This was a more peaceful way to settle disputes than using weapons.

Punos_Rey

^Cool, yeah I've been reading a lot about Nubian wrestling too, there's a guy who's doing documentaries on grappling styles around the world, first Mongol Bokh, then he went to Nubia and had some clips/stories of the wrestlers, really interesting stuff.

Bluehawk

This looks very interesting, on a topic rarely, if ever, explored in American media.

Punos_Rey

Surprisingly enough, I received an update on the African martial arts dvd I mentioned that I thought had fizzed out years ago:

Dear Sir,
We apologise for the long lapse in replying, and keeping those who originally enquired about the Dambe video slightly out of the loop, since as researchers and practitioners of authentic African martial arts our work is 100% field based; travelling to the most remote areas in Africa to learn real African combat systems from the masters, areas with no electricity, running water or cell phone coverage. We're humble in saying we have sat and are still learning from these African masters.
We are simply students learning from these African masters, and everything we do is dictated by what they allow us to do and not to do, hence the delay in the release of the Dambe videos, since the elders want to make sure we're dedicated in preserving these systems for future generations, instead of exploiting them for quick gains, which is what some researchers have tried to do. Hence after long discussions with the elders they have advised and allowed us to do the following in terms of bringing this knowledge on authentic African martial culture to the world, before they allow us to do a detailed documentary on Dambe boxing:

1) A website will be launched by end of September 2012 on authentic African martial systems that will be regularly updated, with our contact detailes also a forum where members of the public can come and ask questions about any aspect of African warrior culture.

2) An online magazine with detailed info on African martial systems will be available to purchase via the website, containing detailes directly from the masters themselves, information not currently in publication anywhere in the world.

3) With interest from the website, number of visitors, forum discussions, and the sale of the online magazine we can then present these findings to the elders and finally get them to agree, and give a green light to the long overdue project on a documentary on Dambe boxing and martial culture in Hausa land, with techniques breakdown, interview with masters, and analysis of other arts similar to Dambe in west Africa; as opposed to just showing two Dambe fighters wildly hitting each other, which sadly is what happened when we introduced some foreign T.V stations to the elders to film Dambe for promotion purposes, and since Dambe was not shown as the elders would have liked, this then delayed our documentary as the elders assumed we would do the same thing. But we have
convinced them otherwise, hence this e-mail to all of you who showed interest online before to visit our website when complete in September 2012, take part in discussions and if interested purchase our online magazine.

If interested in being notified of the website launch this september please reply to this e-mail. We humbly appreciate the interest people have shown in what we do.
Regards
Khamesse
Mukhanda International


email is: mashera76@yahoo.com

I also came across this book and I think it might be really interesting

Tigel

Great update Punos_Rey!

I tried to send you a reply to your PM, but I do not have a high enough post count to send PMs. I wanted to thank you for sending our information along to the profesor and magazine editor (oh, and please "like" our facebook page..we try to update it daily).

I look forward to seeing the African Martial Arts website in a regular basis when it is online. I hope we coule do a project in conjunction with them in the future.

Thanks for posting this reply to your inquiry. I am encouraged to see that African martial arts/wrestling is getting newfound attention. I have seen a couple of CNN articles (and a piece in the NYT) about Laamb in the past couple of months. Plus, both Senegal and Nigeria sent women to the Olympics to wrestle last week. The growth in womens wrestling has been great to witness on the international level. My gut tells me that the more re-introduction of indigenous wrestling/martial arts in countries will also increase opportunities for women to compete in sports in different countries around the world.