The Oldest Chinese Kung Fu Esoterica
Kung fu, also known as gongfu or the martial arts, is one of the most fascinating aspects of the Chinese culture. Though its origin is too old to be found in certainty, we know that there were books especially written about kung fu at least two thousand years ago.
In Han Shu, or the History of the Han Dynasty, which was written in the 1st century AD, there is a very comprehensive booklist on arts and culture available at that time. One section of the list was dedicated to martial arts. There were seven books on archery, six articles on unarmed fighting, and 38 articles on swordsmanship. By the way, 25 articles on football were also included in this part of the list!
Regretfully, most books recorded in the History of the Han Dynasty have been lost through the years. What the ancient kung fu books really looked like remained a mystery for quite a long time. However, an archeological discovery in 1973 gave us some valuable clues. In that year, a silk painting was discovered in Mawangdui, a group of tombs built in the 3rd century BC in the central south of China.
Though the skill painting was broken into large and small pieces by time, we can still see clearly that it depicted a number of figures with various postures. The people in the painting were of both sexes and in different age groups. Judging from the words written beside the figures, we know that they are the illustrations of body-building exercises. Many of the postures are imitation of animals, such as “twisting like a bear”, “stretching like a bird” and “exhaling like an ape”, which is another reflection of the Chinese traditional bionical approach.
The Mawangdui silk painting is the first of the existing recordation of Chinese kung fu. Besides, it is very rich in content. It is indeed the dream artifact of the kung fu fans!
