Choy Li Fut
蔡李佛A southern Chinese style founded in 1836 by Chan Heung. It joins the low stances and strong arms of the south with the long swinging strikes and turns of the north.
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About Choy Li Fut
Choy Li Fut was founded in 1836 by Chan Heung in the village of King Mui in Guangdong province. The name thanks three sources: the monk Choy Fook, master Li Yau-san, and the syllable fut, meaning Buddha, which honours the Shaolin tradition the style claims. Technically it joins two worlds. From the south it takes low stances and close-range work, but it adds long swinging arms of a kind not found elsewhere in southern China: sau chui, a whipping backfist carried in an arc across the whole reach, along with charp chui and kwa chui. The arms turn like flails and attacks come in series rather than singly. What can be heard is equally distinctive. Each type of strike has its own shout — yik, wah or dik — used to time the technique and to breathe out on impact. The style has an unusually large armoury, from staffs and swords to the nine-section whip, and a lion dance tradition of its own. Historically it was bound up with anti-Qing societies, which gave it the reputation of an art not practised for health. Today it divides into three main branches — Hung Sing, King Mui and the Chan family line — and ranks among the southern Chinese styles that fared best in the early full-contact bouts on the lei tai platform.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.