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 The Eight Drunken Immortals | |
| Also known as | Zuiquan,Drunken Boxing, Drunken Arts, Drunken Fist, Drunken Style, Drunken Kungfu, Drunk-Fu, DrunkenEight Immortals Boxing, DrunkenLuohan Boxing, Wine/Alcohol Boxing |
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| Focus | Feints anddeception |
| Country of origin | Greater China |
| Part of a series on |
| Chinese martial arts (Wushu) |
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Historical locations |
Drunken boxing (Chinese:醉拳;pinyin:zuì quán), also known asDrunken Fist, is a general name for variousstyles ofChinese martial arts that imitate the movements of adrunk person.[1] It is an ancient style and its origins are mainly traced back to theBuddhist andDaoist religious communities. The Buddhist style is related to theShaolin temple while the Daoist style is based on the Daoist tale of the drunkenEight Immortals. Drunken boxing has the most unusual body movements among allstyles of Chinese martial arts. Hitting, grappling, locking, dodging,feinting, ground and aerial fighting and all other sophisticated methods of combat are incorporated.
Due to a scarcity of historical sources, it is nearly impossible to point to the time or place of drunken boxing's origin, nor to trace a credible lineage of teachers and students between drunken boxing's earlier documentation and present day practice. Drunken boxing probably appeared and disappeared in different places and at different times, with little more than common cultural and martial arts context to relate the different cases of drunken boxing with each other.[2]
The earliest written reference to drunken boxing is probably in theclassic novelWater Margin, in which theSong dynasty rebelWu Song is depicted as a master of drunken boxing.[citation needed]
In the kung fu manual "Boxing Classic" (拳經;quán jīng) from the 18th century,Shaolin monks are described as practicing the style of eight drunken immortals boxing. This style is described as a technical derivative ofditangquan.[3]
Thebayingquan (八影拳;Bāyǐngquán) lineage fromHenan attributes its wine boxing to theShaolin Kung Fu style.[citation needed]
Hung Ga lineages stemming fromWong Fei-hung attribute their drunken boxing toSo Chan.[citation needed]
Drunken boxing is not a single martial art with an established lineage and hierarchy, but rather a group of loosely related kung fu styles. In this respect, drunken boxing could also be understood as a phenomenon within kung fu. Furthermore, drunken boxing rarely appears as a complete and independent system, but rather as an advanced feature within a broader system. A martial art may include a few drunken boxing techniques, one or more drunken boxingforms, a complementary drunken boxing fighting tactic, or a more developed drunken boxing sub-system. A great variety of kung fu schools have drunken styles, but the two major schools are the Buddhist and Daoist styles:[4]
Creation of the Buddhist style of Drunken boxing is attributed to Shaolin temple. At the beginning of theTang dynasty (618–907 AD), 13 monks from theShaolin temple intervened in a great war to helpLi Shimin against rebel forces. The role of the monks was prominent so Li Shimin, as the next emperor, appreciated the monks' help and bestowed on them officialdom, land, and wealth. In ceremony of the victory, he sent the temple a gift of meat and wine.[5]: vol2,p475 Because of the emperor's permission, the monks could abandon the Buddhist rule of not consuming meat and wine. This happened around 621 AD and since then, some Shaolin monks have consumed wine.
According to some, the drunken style was first introduced in theSong dynasty (960–1279 AD). It is said that a famous martial artist named Liu Qizan accidentally killed a person and sought refuge in Shaolin to avoid trial and to repent. Despite his monastic vows, he still continued drinking wine. This was not tolerable by the monks and they wanted to expel him from the temple. While completely drunk after consuming a huge amount of wine, he defied and beat the monks, some say more than 30 monks. The abbot, after seeing this, praised his skill. This drunken style of combat was adopted from him by the monks and refined over the generations.[4]
The most important Buddhist icons in Shaolin kung fu areArhats, known in Chinese asLuohans. The same holds for the drunken style as a part of Shaolin kung fu, in which, the main character is the drunken luohan. Drunken luohan methods in Shaolin kung fu do not appear only in drunken boxing, but in some other styles as well. For example, inShaolin luohan quan a drunken luohan steps forward, inShaolin 18 luohan quan one of the 18 characters is a drunken luohan, and in Shaolin mad-devil staff[6] a drunken luohan sways to the sides with disorderly steps.
As with otherShaolin styles, Shaolin drunken boxing is not a complete stand-alone system itself, but consists of a few barehanded and weapon forms which together with other forms and styles comprise the whole system of Shaolin quan. Every lineage of Shaolin monks may have one or two barehanded[7][8][9] and one or a few weapon forms of drunken boxing. The main weapon is the drunken staff,[10][11] but other weapons such as the drunken sword[12] are also practiced. Though the technical contents are almost the same, the drunken forms of different lineages are different and their historical sources are mostly unclear.
The Daoist style of drunken boxing imitates the characters of the "DrunkenEight Immortals" (八仙;ba xian), which are a group of legendary immortals inChinese mythology. First described in theYuan dynasty, they were probably named after theEight Immortal Scholars of the Han. Most of them are said to have been born in theTang orSong dynasty. They are revered by Daoists and are also a popular element in the secularChinese culture. In drunken kung fu, the eight immortals are used as martialarchetypes, or as eight sub-styles of drunken kung fu.[13] Each immortal has his or her own strategy and mindset. This style is a complete system itself comprising 8 forms, each representing one of the eight immortal characters:
These elements combine to form a complete fighting art. This style has also several weapon forms. The main weapon is the drunken sword, but other weapons such as the staff are also used.
There are Northern and Southern versions ofdrunken monkey boxing, which is related to drunken boxing.
Drunken boxing isinternal in nature, and emphasizes the role ofjin. Movement is initiated in thedantian area, and moves through the bodydistally towards the hands and feet. The musculature is kept as soft as possible.[citation needed]
Movement in drunken boxing is relatively unique among martial arts in the frequency and degree in which it deviates fromvertical posture, with thetorso bent and twisted in all directions.[24] The default hand position is the "cup holding fist", which is a softly held semi-openfist that uses theknuckles tostrike and the tips of the fingers tograb. Other hand positions are used, too, among them the phoenix eye single knuckle fist.[25]
Many aspects of drunken boxing are specialized towards deception: continuousbobbing and weaving andslipping, feigninginstability and lack offocus, attacking from unusual angles and seemingly weak positions, sudden changes ofmomentum, compounding multiple attacks with the same limb, use of blind-spots andvisual distractions, changinggame plans in mid-fight and employing concealed orimprovised weapons.[citation needed]
Like many styles of kung fu, drunken boxing employs a wide variety of attacks, includingstriking,chin na andwrestling, withtrapping range fighting as a default skill. Strikes and grabs are alternated with the hands striking as they extend towards the enemy and grabbing as they retract. The power for grabs is sometimes generated by dropping the body, either through slightly lifting the feet off the ground and then stomping down with the weight of the entire body or by falling to the prone.[citation needed]
Some styles of drunken boxing usetraditional kung fu weapons, often thejian orgun.[26] TheBayingquan wine boxing system includes many weapons, includingsaber,spear,Guandao,flute,fan,gourd bottle,sash, sash tied to guard and more.[citation needed]
一種國術拳法。相傳模仿醉八仙實態而創的拳術。摔、跌、倒、起都具醉態。
27,^ Drunken Kung Fu –White Wine Form (Baijiu Quan) – Cyril Nolgrove CAMC (video).
