Hankido
한기도Korean internal branch of hapkido by Myung Jae-nam: circle, flow, and heart, with twelve foundational techniques.
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South KoreaCharacter & Origin
Organisation & Competition
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About Hankido
Hankido is a Korean martial art created in the nineteen-eighties by Myung Jae-nam (died 1999). It grew out of traditional hapkido, which Myung had studied and which forms its technical foundation, but it moved in a different direction: whereas hapkido is often described as a half-internal art, hankido is internal. It relies not on strength but on what its founder called the power of softness. The whole system rests on three concepts — won, meaning circle; ju, meaning flow; and hwa, meaning heart. Movement is circular and uninterrupted; an attacker's force is not stopped but drawn into an arc until it is exhausted. Its foundation consists of twelve self-defense techniques, linked to twenty-four breathing exercises; they are practiced in a form called ilsoo sik dae ryun, meaning one technique against one attack. Hankido was first presented publicly at the 1st International H.K.D. Games in Seoul, and the name was registered in 1993. Sources do not give an exact founding year, so that field is left empty in the record. After Myung's death in 1999, the Jaenam Musul Won Foundation took over the art's development, and Master Ko Baek Yong founded the World Hankimuye Federation, which spreads the art abroad, chiefly in Europe and the United States. Hankido thus differs from most Korean systems in that its measure is not effectiveness against resistance but the fluidity of movement and breath.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.