History of ancient jiu jitsu
India
2000 B.C.
Some historians say that Jiu-Jitsu, or the “gentle art,” emerged in India circa 2000 B.C., and was practiced by buddhist monks. Concerned with self-defense, these monks developed a fighting technique based on principles of balance and awareness of the body and joints, allowing them to neutralize aggression without necessarily hurting the aggressor. Jiu Jitsu served well the monks’ need for self defense extremely well, and quickly spread throughout Asia, first towards China and later Japan, following the spread of buddhism through the continent.
JAPAN
17th century
The term Jiu-Jitsu was not coined until the 17th century, becoming after that period the common term for a wide array of practices connected to body-to-body fighting. It was in feudal Japan that the art found a fertile atmosphere that allowed it to grow and establish itself as a widespread fighting style. Jiu-Jitsu developed among the samurai as a way to defeat armed adversaries protected by armor without using weapons themselves. Practitioners learned that the most efficient methods of neutralizing an enemy take the form of immobilizations, locks (or wrenches) in joints and falls. These techniques were developed around the principles of utilizing an aggressors own energy against them.
19th century
The radical political, cultural, and social transformations that took place in Japan in the 19th century caused public perception of Jiu-Jitsu to change from that of a respectable combat art to an illegal practice, as the government attempted to break up the bloody conflicts between the now-desolate samurai and their followers.
Jigoro Kano
(1860-1938)
A member of Japan’s Ministry of Culture and Martial Arts, played an important role in restoring Jiu-Jitsu’s reputation in times of peace. Jigoro Kano realized that Jiu-Jitsu could be used as a powerful learning tool, capable of tailoring to each individual’s development. He saw it as beneficial to the Japanese goals of social and economic development and adopted new teaching methods removing dangerous techniques as such as the ground fight. With this new approach the main component of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu was cast aside, restricted to few movements. This created an interesting paradox: although the changes made by Kano contributed tremendously to Jiu-Jitsu’s survival, the focus on falls created a style of fighting that is fragmented, furthering its connection to the original essence of Jiu-Jitsu, as well as the reality of a true conflict. The new approach to the practice of Jiu-Jitsu became known as Kano Jiu-Jitsu and later, Judo.
Mitsuyo Maeda
(1878-1941)
Among Kano’s most gifted students was Mitsuyo Maeda, a fighter that benefited from Kano’s innovations but that had his roots in other schools of Jiu-Jitsu that emphasized ground fighting and self-defense in real-life combat scenarios. Maeda, who later became known as Conde Coma, was gifted, and was sent abroad to help defend Jiu-Jitsu around the globe. After traveling to the United States, Central America and Europe, Maeda landed in Brazil in 1914.
BIRTH OF BRAZILIAN JIU-JITSU
THE MARTIAL ART THAT CONQUERED THE WORLD
1915
Upon settling in Belém do Pará, it was only natural that Maeda make use of his notable fighting skill in public demonstrations, and even by performing in circuses as a way to both earn a living and disseminate the Japanese culture. In one of these demonstrations he met Gastão Gracie, and the two formed a friendship. A father of eight children, five boys and three girls, Gastão became a Jiu-Jitsu enthusiast and brought his oldest son, Carlos, to learn the martial art.
A slight but rebellious and active young man at 15, Carlos Gracie became captivated by Maeda’s ability to defeat opponents much bigger and stronger than himself with superior technique. It was then that he began to see Jiu-Jitsu as a channel for personal realization.
Training under Maeda's orientation had a profound impact in Carlos' mind
He had never felt the degree of self-control and self-confidence that Jiu-Jitsu provided. The connection he felt with his body after each training provided him with a greater understanding of his nature, his limitations and strengths, and brought him a sense of peace that he had never known.
Carlos had to move to Rio de Janeiro with his father and siblings. Arriving at the then-capital of Brazil at 19,
Carlos faced a hard time adapting to this new life and finding a normal job. Despite working in governmental institutions, the rebellious spirit from his youth did not let Carlos settle. The desire to perfect and teach the art that he had learned from Maeda was alive inside him and he decided to pursue it.
1925
Carlos traveled to Bela Horizonte and then to São Paulo teaching classes and beating opponents that were physically much stronger than him. In 1925, Carlos settled in Rio and opened the first Gracie Jiu-Jitsu Academy at 106 Rua Marquês de Abrantes.
THE GRACIE BROTHERS
Carlos, Gastão, Oswaldo, George and Hélio form the first generation of Gracie fighters. Despite Carlos and Hélio having grown very close and having worked and lived together for decades, the five brothers greatly contributed to the growth of Jiu-Jitsu in Brazil in the first half of the 20th century.Retry
1993
While in Brazil Jiu-Jitsu evolved to levels of technical skills never before reached in the ground fight, other arts like Karate, Tae Kwon Do and Judo became popular greatly due to Hollywood movies and the Olympics. Despite these martial arts having great technical, they restrict themselves to only one aspect of a real fight, and only work so long as a series of rules are being respected. Generations of practitioners of martial arts spent years learning one aspect of the fight (punches and kicks, or falls and immobilizations), believing that would be enough in real-life situations.
In 1993, this assumption faced its biggest challenge when Roion Gracie organized the first UFC in the United States, exposing to the world a competition of “Vale Tudo” – a recreation to MMA in the mold of the “Gracie Challenge” created by Grand Master Hélio Gracie and Carlos Gracie in the 20s in Brazil.
The world was shocked when a lighter and seemingly weaker fighter, Royce Gracie, beat all of his challengers fighting almost entirely on the ground, using various chokes to make them tap out. The practitioners of other martial arts began then to realize that if they did not know Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, that they did know would become useless against a Jiu-Jitsu fighter. This realization provoked what many refer to as the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Revolution in the martial arts.
What followed was a great change in focus and training in ground fighting. An impact as large as this in the universe of the martial arts caused a great rise in the search for Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu teaching worldwide.
