Yemeni/middle eastern martial arts

[dcougle]

Hypothetically, if someone was from, say, yemen, or at farthest, indonesia, what is a likely acrobatic martial art they could practice? Is wushu or something similar at all prevalent in the area? Preferrably the hypothetical person would be from yemen.

thanks!

[elder999]

There's something practiced in Egypt, called Tahtib, that uses a staff-there are several variants, including a separate version for women, and one practiced by Sufis; there are a lot of Sufis in Yemen. You can read a little about Tahtib here .I think something similar is practiced in the Middle East or East Africa called naboot. Both words mean "staff" or "club," I think.....

[dcougle]

Hmm, that page you directed me to seems to show it is more weapon specific. I was looking for something more like what Ray Park does in, for instance, star wars episode 1 as darth maul. Something acrobatic with unarmed (and maybe) armed combat that someone could, realistically, know in that part of the world. maybe something like monkey ta sheng(monkey kung fu)?

[MikeWilliams]

Do you have a reason for your search? You seem to be asking quite loaded questions, so a bit of context might help.

Anyway, if anyone can, I would imagine that Joe Svinth would be the man to ask - check out EJMAS

[dcougle]

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "loaded". I do have a reason, but it really wouldn't affect the answer to the question. Do you have Svinth's email address? I don't see it on the page. If not, I guess i could join his mailing list.
thanks!

[MikeWilliams]

I do have a reason

That's what I was getting at. Reading between the lines, it sounds like you

a) want to verify some claims by a 'hypothetical' person or persons;

b) know what you believe already, and want your assumptions/suspicions confirming...

...in which case, we might be able to help you more if we knew what those suspicions are! If I'm wrong, forgive me - maybe I've just been hanging out in Baffling Budo too long.

Joseph Svinth is a moderator on here - look him up and send him a pm. Even if he doesn't have the knowledge himself, I'll be amazed if he doesn't at least turn up some clues on where to go for further info.

I love hearing about non-asian MAs, so please report back if you do find something.

[dcougle]

Oh, well, it's more for a fictional story. I just was hoping to get something accurate sounding.

I think the people from yemen would be offended you considered them non-asian

I will PM him, thanks!

[Hissho]

Check out Silat Mubai for Islamic MA further east:

http://www.mubai.cc/home.htm

[dcougle]

hmm, that looks pretty interesting. i may be able to use that, although I could not find that many pictures of techniques there, or a video, so I found some here
http://www.mubai.com.au/

I guess I'm just wondering, if for some reason, a fictional person(s) existed in yemen, what acrobatic martial art similar to wushu or ta sheng could they realistically know?

[MikeWilliams]

Oh, well, it's more for a fictional story. I just was hoping to get something accurate sounding.

Ah, fair enough! I definitely need a break from bad Budo!

I think the people from yemen would be offended you considered them non-asian

LOL! Good point! But you know what I meant.

Good luck with your search and with the story.

[Joseph Svinth]

There is all kinds of stuff in Indonesia, and Donn Draeger's book is still an essential reference.

A link of possible interest for Indonesian martial arts is http://www.kpsnusantara.com/rapid/rapid-list.htm . Don't fixate on Indonesia, however. An equivalent art in Malaysia is berisilat, and in the Philippines, the difference between silat and arnis is (outwardly, at least) sometimes nothing more than the religion/culture of the practitioner. Also consider the Islamic martial arts of India and China.

In Arab countries, you often find stick dancing. Egyptian tahtib was already mentioned. A related Saudi stick dance is called Saidi. See, for example, http://www.jasminjahal.com/articles/...folkloric.html . Other links of possible interest include:

* http://home.earthlink.net/%7Ercfriend/chubbazi.htm
* http://www.sfusd.k12.ca.us/schwww/sc...ts/Sports.html

As for Yemen itself, you will find judo and taekwondo. The address to the Yemen Taekwondo Federation appears at http://www.koreainfogate.com/taekwon...assoc/mid_east , while the address for the Yemen Judo Federation appears at http://www.ijf.org/member/introduce_view.php?MemIdx=90 .

But it sounds as if you're trying to find something a bit more exotic than judo or taekwondo. For that, I'd recommend giving the guy some African relatives, thereby allowing him to practice an African-descended family art. Remember, an Omani family of Yemeni descent dominated the 19th century East African slave trade from their base at Zanzibar, and Yemen didn't formally ban slavery until 1962. For an introduction to the East African slave trade, see, for example, http://lrrc3.sas.upenn.edu/indianoce...p1/ioslv4.html , http://www.culturalorientation.net/bantu/sbhist.html ,

Today, capoeira is the model for most Americans of an African-descended martial art. However, capoeira is West African rather than East African, and includes a whole lot of Brazilian influence. (Through Vale Tudo, even BJJ is in the modern mix!) So what you ought to do is research the martial arts of the west side of the Indian Ocean.

Dennis Newsome discusses the Somali headbutting game called testa at http://malandros-touro.com/generic15.html . Also take a look at the martial arts of Reunion and the Comoros; examples include Morengy (one transliteration, but there are many others). Ed Powe's book on the martial arts of the Indian Ocean is Da Bomb. Unfortunately, it 1) costs a whole lot of money (like $150 or so) and 2) Ed is on safari a lot, meaning you probably can't get a copy except by visiting one of the libraries that has one. UWisconsin at Madison, maybe? Meanwhile, use Google and include variations. Examples of what turns up include http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-U...CTION=201.html and http://moringue-france.com/English.html .

[jest]

Dennis Newsome discusses the Somali headbutting game called testa at http://malandros-touro.com/generic15.html

Wow.
I don't think I'd ever heard of Testa before.