the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

Kanken Toyama, one of the early masters that introduced Okinawan karate to mainland Japan. Except being knowledgeable in Karate he also learned Chinese boxing arts in Taiwan.

Here are some of the CMA’s he had learned. The names of those martial arts are in Japanese or perhaps even Okinawan.
Anyone here proficient in Japanese that can translate?

. In 1924 Toyama Kanken moved his family to Taiwan where he taught elementary school and studied related systems of Chinese Ch'uan Fa ( kempo/kwan-bop ), which included Taku (Hakuda in Japanese language ), Makaitan, Rutaobai, and Ubo. Taku is one of central China's Hotsupu (northern school) Ch'uan Fa and is further classified as Neikung Ch'uan Fa (Shorei Kempo), that is, an internal method. Makaitan and Rutaobai, which the techniques of nukite (spear hand) came, and Ubo, all belong to the Nampa (southern school) Ch'uan Fa and are external methods or Waikung Ch'uan Fa (Shorei Kempo). These later three styles hail primarily from Taiwan and Fukuden, China. Toyama sensei was also known to have studied and taught Tai Chi Ch'uan Fa. Koyasu sensei studied t'ai chi from Toyama.

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The names look like nonsense. Also, Sinitic terms in Chinese/Okinawan/Japanese/etc. should have some similarity (since they are variant pronunciations of the same words), so something like "Taku" = "Hakuda" is problematic and probably nonsense. Words with the meanings there are often wrong ("hotsupu" should be "hoppa"). I am guessing that "Fukuden" should be "Fukken" = Fujian/Hokkien.

The pseudo-Okinawan words are impossible to figure out, and it may be that they are just names of people. I have also never heard of Toyama having learned taijiquan. (Did anyone know taijiquan in Taiwan in 1924?)

edededed wrote: (Did anyone know taijiquan in Taiwan in 1924?)

I don't know. I'm told the Taiwanese dialect is from the coastal Fujian dialect. White Crane and Dog style. I know there are people who do Praying Mantis in Taiwan. Hakka influence isn't surprising.

edededed wrote:The names look like nonsense. Also, Sinitic terms in Chinese/Okinawan/Japanese/etc. should have some similarity (since they are variant pronunciations of the same words), so something like "Taku" = "Hakuda" is problematic and probably nonsense. Words with the meanings there are often wrong ("hotsupu" should be "hoppa"). I am guessing that "Fukuden" should be "Fukken" = Fujian/Hokkien.

The pseudo-Okinawan words are impossible to figure out, and it may be that they are just names of people. I have also never heard of Toyama having learned taijiquan. (Did anyone know taijiquan in Taiwan in 1924?)

Yes I too thought the names looks kind of strange. For example the karate styles Goju-ryu and Uechi-ryu have the Kata sanchin which comes from Fujianese white crane boxing and have similar sounding in that style ?. And there is the branch of ‘Shorin” styles in karate in Okinawa which mean Shaolin and sound a little similar, also there is the Japanese Shorinji-kenpo which in Chinese is ShaolinSi Quanfa, also kind of similar.

Most of those CMA’s in that linked article in my OP are mentioned with Japanese names, but then it goes on mentioning and breaks away from the japanisation of CMA names, to mention that Kanken Toyama(the karate master) also taugh Tai Chi(Chuan)to some of his students.....it should then have been if follow suit -‘Taikyukuken’, which is the Japanese name for Taijiquan, one can perhaps find a little similarities there, but not easy if one does not speak Japanese.(Yes it sound a little unbelievable that TJQ had found its way to Taiwan already back then, perhaps more likely someone in Tokyo/japan knew some about TJQ?)

Yeah, sanchin is a good example - there is some sound change across the languages, but it is predictable and follows rules. The "k" sound changing to "q" (ch) in Mandarin is one of the funny rules. Japanese also has a wildcard where many sounds get degenerated into other sounds due to the writing system (e.g. b to h).

I think that the original article seems to say that many of those are Okinawan language names, but it is hard to tell. But anyway too many errors overall to put much faith in the article. (Also, the Japanese Internet had nothing that I could find about Toyama Kanken and what he may have learned in Taiwan.)

edededed wrote: (Also, the Japanese Internet had nothing that I could find about Toyama Kanken and what he may have learned in Taiwan.)

Thanks for checking out that

As I mentioned the Japanese/Okinawan martial arts ‘Shorinji-Kenpo’ and ‘Uechi-ryu Karate’, there are some “strange” Japanese names involved to those too.
Shorinji Kenpo’s founder is said to have studied ‘Giwamonken’ at the Shaolin temple....what could Giwamonken be translated into in Chinese ?
And Kanbun Uechi the founder of ‘Uechi-ryu’ studied and also supposedly taught ‘Panggai Noon’ in China for many years.....

1. Giwamonken (Japanese) = Yihemenquan (義和門拳). This means "Fist of the School of the Boxers" (as in the Boxer Rebellion), and was apparently based on meihuaquan.
2. Pangainoon (Okinawan) = Banyingruan (半硬軟). This means "half hard-soft" and may be a hint as to how Okinawans named their kung fu after learning it (some people think it was some kind of tiger style). So it would be hard to guess what any of those martial arts were really called, though.

I have never seen a resource for Chinese character pronunciations in Okinawan language though. The Okinawan language itself has some sounds that are a bit hard to pronounce and distinguish.

‘edededed’, many thanks for that..

That makes sense since the roots of Okinawan fist art was Chinese. From Okinawa to mainland Japan and the Japanese translation (naming convention) became the 'new displacement of art
NOTE: Okinawan language and Japanese language were never the same!

I don't think shorinji Kempo refers to Doshin so,s art
Doesn't it just mean Shaolin school

wayne hansen wrote:I don't think shorinji Kempo refers to Doshin so,s art
Doesn't it just mean Shaolin school

The kenpo would be quanfa - fist method

Shorinji kempo = "Shaolinsi quanfa" ...but noone calls Shaolinquan that in Chinese, right?

wayne hansen wrote:I don't think shorinji Kempo refers to Doshin so,s art
Doesn't it just mean Shaolin school

The Shorinji Kenpo I referred to in previous post is meant to refer to Doshin So.’s Shorinji Kempo. Early on Doshin So claimed to have inherited the true boxing art during his stay/(visit) at the Shaolin temple, and that he was the only true inheritor .

I think if you look at Shorinji Kempo it is hard to see anything that resembles Chinese arts
I trained with Shoringi Kempo in Osaka in 1975
After fighting a second degree black belt who was the second highest ranked in the club he removed his black belt and gave it to me