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terça-feira, 20 de dezembro de 2016

Who was Takemura? Is there a Kusanku from Takemura?

Akamine taught a karate that was a combination of Naha-te and an old version of Shuri-te attributed to Kijun Kishimoto (1862-1945), supposed disciple of Takemura (1814-1896). Personally, Akamine used the techniques of the later system and had Ryufa (Liufa) and Kusukun as his personal katas. Subsequently, he discontinued this forms and they become "secret katas" (Okugi kata).  He learned these kata with Seitoku Higa, who at that time was Kishimoto's successor, before founding his own organization, the Bugeikan.

(Azato-no-Kusanku ou "Takemura"-no-Kusanku, as taught in Shoreijikan)

 
 
In the later 80s I decided to teach both systems separately, reserving the Shuri-te Kishimoto-ha only for more senior students. This system is build on two basics kata, Naifanchi and Nipabu, and the avanced Ryufa and Azato-no-Kusukun, as they was passed to Akamine from Seitoku Higa.
Seitoku Higa said that Kishimoto's master was the only student of Takemura "Bushi", but the story of this master was transmitted by Seitoku himself. We have fragmentary information from him, but nothing we can assert with a certainty beyond all reasonable doubt. I would like to put some of my doubts here:

1. Apparently, Kishimoto never mentioned his master. Higa Seitoku claimed to have been Takemura (or Tachimura), a contemporary of "Bushi" Matsumura.
Shukomine never mentioned Takemura, and said that Kishimoto learned his karate in the streets and in nature, in the same way that Motobu "zaru".
 
2. It is said that Takemura was a disciple of Sakugawa "Tode", but I do not found evidences that. If Takemura was a disciple of Sakugawa, why is his Kusukun so different from that of Chatan Yara (another disciple of the famous "Tuidi" master)? In this later, as in all Kusanku from Shuri lineage, the nidan-geri is at the end of the kata, but in the Takemura’s it's in the beginning of the kata.


3. The kata of Shukomine and Akamine are different in some important aspects and interpretations. I believe that Shukomine revised the katas to bring him closer to the contemporary forms of Okinawa, while Akamine apparently taught them as learnt.

4. Shukomine's Kosokun (Kusanku) has a spin that ends in the ground, as the other Kusanku, but in the Akamine’s version this movement is replaced by a very difficult technique in the ground (the "dog's technique"), in which one uses the legs to take down the opponent. This technique is unique of this kata, it is not found in any version of Kusanku I have seen.

5. There is no any relationship between the Takemura and Matsumura systems. I think that Takemura and/or Kishimoto-ha is tipically a kenpo style from Tomari area, not Shuri.

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