Doce Pares
A Filipino eskrima system founded in Cebu in 1932 by twelve masters. It works in three ranges and has its own competition rules.
Quick Facts
PhilippinesCharacter & Origin
Training
Organisation & Competition
What the style is built from
Editorial rating on a 0–3 scale, based on how much room each area gets in ordinary training.
About Doce Pares
Doce Pares is a Filipino eskrima system founded in 1932 in Cebu as a society for the promotion of the country's native martial art. It has no single founder: twelve master eskrimadors established the organisation, among whom Lorenzo Saavedra was regarded as the foremost, alongside Teodoro and Federico Saavedra and the Cañete brothers. Eulogio Cañete became its first president and held the office until 1988. The name is Spanish and refers to the Twelve Peers of Charlemagne, whose stories reached the Philippines through colonial literature and theatre. The syllabus works in three ranges: corto (close), media largo (medium) and larga mano (long). Single and double stick, the knife, empty hand and further weapons are all trained, and the transition between ranges is the real core of the system rather than any list of techniques. Doce Pares also stood at one of the principal splits in Filipino arts. Venancio Bacon left the society because he judged its approach insufficiently effective, and founded Balintawak. In the 1950s Ciriaco "Cacoy" Cañete systematised the method and created eskrido, joining eskrima to judo principles. It was Dionisio Cañete who brought the system into sport, drawing up tournament rules and full-body protective gear and founding WEKAF in 1987. That turned street practice into a competitive discipline. Today several organisations represent Doce Pares; Danny Guba's federation operates in more than forty countries.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.