RMA

[James Hudec]

OK, I'm a little hesitant to ask this, but do indigenous Russian Martial Arts actually exist?

[Gene Tausk]

Of course they do.

Sambo is an "indigenous" martial art, or to be more precise, a martial art of Russian origin that was created during Soviet times.

Russians have a long history of wrestling excellence.

If you are asking if Russian sword and "cold steel" arts existed, I would say yes. In Moscow and surrounding cities (the "Golden Ring") there are several museums which house outstanding examples of Russian arms and armor from the 11th century onward.

I do not know of any "fechtbuchen" (or I guess the more precise term is "knigi boja") <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />, but Russia had several issues over the time 1100-1600 that Western Europe did not (Mongol invasions and destruction, invasion of Byzantium by Turks making Moscow the "Third Rome," lack of development of literary language until later than for German, Italian, Latin) which I would guess makes the survival of any such books and manuals more difficult.

Russia has heroes such as Alexander Nevskij who was quite formidable with arms and combat and Jurij Dolgorukij, the founder of Moscow, whose prowess with arms was also legendary.

Unfortunately, as stated, I don't know of any Russian fechtbooks that can help us to find out more about Russian martial arts and combat from the Middle Ages and Renaissance.

Don't forget that the domination by the Mongols was pretty extensive until Ivan IV began to throw them out. This really, IMHO, would have reduced the chances of any written materials from this time period being found.


----------------&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;gene tausk
SFS
Director - ARMA Houston Southside Study Group

[James Hudec]

Of course they do.

Sambo is an "indigenous" martial art, or to be more precise, a martial art of Russian origin that was created during Soviet times.

Russians have a long history of wrestling excellence.

Thanks for the response Gene.

I've looked up some information on RMA over the web, and in one or two books, but I'm never really sure what to believe. About half of the information I've read claims that Sambo is the repository of Russia's own unique unarmed combat, and the other half claim it's a rip-off of Judo.

[Gene Tausk]

James:

"About half of the information I've read claims that Sambo is the repository of Russia's own unique unarmed combat, and the other half claim it's a rip-off of Judo. "

Well, yes and yes. Generally, three individuals are given credit for Sambo's development: A.A. Kharlampiev, V. Oschepkov and S. Spirodonov. Of the three, Oschepkov was a black belt holder from the Kodokan (2nd dan I believe) and brought back judo for use by the Red Army after 1917.

Unfortunately, he also ticked off the Soviet authorities during hte 1930's (which was very easy to do) by calling it Judo and, despite the fact that he taught the art to the armed forces, was tossed into jail as a spy and later died of a "fit of angina."

Kharlampiev took the hint and changed the rules for what he termed "Soviet Freestyle Wrestling." He got rid of the long pants, made it mandatory for wrestlers to wear wrestling shoes, got rid of chokeholds and added leglocks, which were popular in Russian wrestling. Hence, no more of that foreign Judo, comrades, we have our own style.

Obviously Judo influenced Sambo to a very high degree, but they are different arts.

There is a good series of books on this subject, but it is all in Russian.


----------------------&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;&gt;gene tausk
SFS
Director - ARMA Southside Houston Study Group

[James Hudec]

Cool. Thanks, I'll have to try and look that up. <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

[Maxim Ogarenko]

OK, I'm a little hesitant to ask this, but do indigenous Russian Martial Arts actually exist?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRqI5kOpJzw
Russian bare-knuckle fisticuffs.

Folk fisticuffs and grappling were widely practiced up to the middle of the 20th century.

[Kyro_Lantsberger]

I am curious about Russian swordsmanship.

I am deeply interested in Russian unarmed fighting as many of the principles seem to mesh very well the the Chinese styles Ive put so much time into.

However, as I look in the areas of swordsmanship, I dont find many surviving historical artifacts. I forget the terms for these weapons, but there is a pretty common curved sabre with no handguard that seems somewhat descended from Byzantine arms. There are also many sabre type weapons from the Napoleonic era forward, but I dont find much from Medieval/Ren times.

I know this is the unarmed forum, but it fits with the Russian theme of the thread. The Russians seem to have many indigenous styles of grappling and unarmed skills, from the peasant level up. Would this indicate that the weaponry was integrated into the other training without specific blade schools developing?

Ive wondered this for a while.

[Gene Tausk]

I am curious about Russian swordsmanship.

I am deeply interested in Russian unarmed fighting as many of the principles seem to mesh very well the the Chinese styles Ive put so much time into.

However, as I look in the areas of swordsmanship, I dont find many surviving historical artifacts. I forget the terms for these weapons, but there is a pretty common curved sabre with no handguard that seems somewhat descended from Byzantine arms. There are also many sabre type weapons from the Napoleonic era forward, but I dont find much from Medieval/Ren times.

I know this is the unarmed forum, but it fits with the Russian theme of the thread. The Russians seem to have many indigenous styles of grappling and unarmed skills, from the peasant level up. Would this indicate that the weaponry was integrated into the other training without specific blade schools developing?

Ive wondered this for a while.

I have tried (albeit halfheartedly) to look for Russian fencing manuals, without success. I posted earlier on this thread some reasons I think that such manuals are hard to find and may not exist. I certainly hope there is something out there.

There was a Cossack tradition of swordsmanship, but if any of this was written down is as of yet unknown.

I believe the sword to which you refer is a "shashka," a Cossack weapon. It is from AFAIK Iranian influences up through Georgia and the former Turkik repulics of the USSR (or, more specficially, entered southern Russia through the Central Asian parts of the Russian Empire).

Russians have a long history of grappling and wrestling and are known for this, even today. Witness Alexander Karelin, named the greatest Greco-Roman wrestler of the 20th century, for a quick example.

As I said, I certainly hope we can find some Russian fechtbuchen out there. Unfortunately, the development of printing in Russia was forestalled for a number of reasons. Also, the literary language was behind that of Latin based languages in the West.

Still, we should keep our eyes open.

[Michael Douglas]

I know many many Russians from in and around Moscow, and have found something terribly damaging to to progress of real research in this matter.
Russians, in my experience, have a compulsion to bullshit (can I say that word here?) when questioned about their knowledge or ability in ALL subjects.
Take as a well-investigated example, the historical claims of 'Systema' schools. I'm sorry but I am not going to describe the mostly fictional claims in this little post. Lots available on the web.

Russians are keen to train hard and that in itself is pure gold and can generate solid ability and rediscover applicable martial methods. The trouble is that any martial prowess might just be attributed to 'ancient secret cossack fighting traditions' or 'folk village boxing/wrestling from secret russian traditions' etc etc.
I was watching an absolutely horrible article on Russian telly one time about a 'Russian village' fighting system which appeared to me to be EXACTLY Silat with a short whip thrown in. Awful and useless it was.

So, investigate with a huge handful of salt please.

[Will Adamson]

Russians, in my experience, have a compulsion to bullshit (can I say that word here?) when questioned about their knowledge or ability in ALL subjects.

Kind of sounds like the rest of the world.

[Gene Tausk]

I know many many Russians from in and around Moscow, and have found something terribly damaging to to progress of real research in this matter.
Russians, in my experience, have a compulsion to bullshit (can I say that word here?) when questioned about their knowledge or ability in ALL subjects.
Take as a well-investigated example, the historical claims of 'Systema' schools. I'm sorry but I am not going to describe the mostly fictional claims in this little post. Lots available on the web.

1. You will get no argument from me about the horrible misinformation that is out there concerning Russian martial arts. In this respect, Russians are no different than anyone else, but because Russian arts have been at the top of the internet food chain in recent years, it seems to get more notice. My favorite legend concerns the origins of sambo, where Soviet agents supposedly scoured the world to investigate "secret" fighting techniques for incorporation into sambo. This during a time of civil war, political upheaval and massive famines. As if the Soviet state was not broke enough already, they could send undercover kung-fu agents around the world. Yeah, right. When you ask for evidence, all you get is puzzled looks.

2. Don't use profanity on our forums again.

[Jaron Bernstein]

Gene,

There have to be some old Soviet Sambo (or whatever it was called then in Uncle Joe's magic kingdom) training manuals from the 1930's still around. I wonder if they have an insight into the prior history.

[Gene Tausk]

Gene,

There have to be some old Soviet Sambo (or whatever it was called then in Uncle Joe's magic kingdom) training manuals from the 1930's still around. I wonder if they have an insight into the prior history.

The rules for sambo were first codified in 1937. The first tournament was in 1938.

I have a series of books on the history of Russian H2H combat (in Russian) which is very interesting and, AFAIK, accurate. The author wrote the books to combat the "monumental fantasies" (his words) that exist about the subject.

Don't forget that in the 1930's there was a push in the-then Soviet Union to create the "Soviet" man. This included creating "Soviet" culture, and sambo was a part of this movement. The idea was to create a Soviet wrestling system from the 100's of native styles that existed (and many still continue to exist) from the multinational population of the USSR. Although we tend to identify "Soviet" as "Russian," Russians constituted only 1/2 of the population of the former Soviet Union.

[Corey Roberts]

Have any of you checked out Systema?
http://www.russianmartialart.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systema
http://www.dojoofthefourwinds.com/what_is_systema.html

ignoring of course the statement from the above link of "less sophisticated systems from the west".

[Jason Erickson]

You might also want to investigate ROSS. I have no formal training in it, but have been able to work with Scott Sonnon, former head of ROSS in America. His old ROSS videos, particularly the "Bayonet" series, have a truckload of fascinating material for weapons enthusiasts. Sonnon has long since left the ROSS organization and is doing his own thing, but there are other ROSS practitioners still around who will be able to tell you much more than I've presented here.