Huo Style Bajiquan
霍式八極拳A branch of bajiquan after Huo Diange, personal bodyguard of China's last emperor. Built on the stomping step, elbow, and shoulder at close range.
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What the style is built from
Editorial rating on a 0–3 scale, based on how much room each area gets in ordinary training.
Catalogs & Databases for Huo Style Bajiquan
About Huo Style Bajiquan
The Huo branch of bajiquan carries the name of Huo Diange, one of the most famous students of Li Shuwen, a master who lived from 1860 to 1934. Huo became well known beyond the world of martial arts too: he served as the personal bodyguard of Puyi, the last Chinese emperor. Bajiquan itself means the fist of the eight extremities, referring to the eight farthest parts of the body with which one can strike — the fist, the forearm, the elbow, the shoulder, the hip, the thigh, the knee, and the foot. The style is built for combat at close range, and its signature is unmistakable: instead of keeping distance, the practitioner enters inside and attacks with the elbow and shoulder from close up. A peculiarity of the style is zhen jiao, the stomping step that finishes a movement; it is not decoration but a way of sending acceleration, traveling from the waist into the limb, straight into the strike. The usual targets are the chest, the legs, and the neck. The year in which the Huo branch split off from the main line is not documented, and the catalog has removed the previously listed year of 1910 from the record; it is also chronologically suspect, since Huo's service at the imperial court falls into a later period than that date would allow. The branch is still counted today among the recognized lineages of bajiquan. That lineages are named after people rather than after places or forms is typical of bajiquan as a whole: what is passed down is a particular manner of releasing power, and that manner is recognized by whom a given practitioner learned it from.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.