Chatanyara Kushanku

Quick Facts

About the kata

Chatanyara Kushanku is one of the versions of the kata Kusanku, from which the Shotokan Kanku Dai also derives. English Wikipedia lists it as the most distinctive of them under the name Chatanyara no Kusanku in Matsubayashi-ryu, Shito-ryu and Isshin-ryu. It is named after master Yara from the village of Chatan on Okinawa, to whom tradition attributes it. Jesse Enkamp (karatebyjesse.com) considers it the original form of Kusanku: according to him, Itosu Anko learned it and derived the simplified versions Kusanku Sho and Kusanku Dai from it for school teaching. The International Ryukyu Karate Research Society (koryu-uchinadi.com) describes in Yara Kusanku strikes with hands, elbows, knees and feet, standing clinches, escapes and counterattacks, and ground fighting. We have not been able to find the number of movements and kiai shouts in the sources. Rika Usami won the WKF World Championship in Paris with it in 2012, and according to the WKF, twelve thousand spectators at Bercy gave her a standing ovation. Ryo Kiyuna won the 2015 Asian Championship in Yokohama with it, and Damian Quintero finished second at the 2016 World Championship. In the WUKF list from April 2024, it is an optional tokui kata for Shorin-ryu, Shito-ryu and Shukokai.

The kata in different styles

Meaning of the name

The name has three parts: Chatan, a village on Okinawa; Yara, the master who lived there; and Kusanku, the Chinese teacher from whom the kata, by tradition, originates. The characters 北谷屋良公相君 combine 北谷屋良, used by English Wikipedia for Chatan Yara, with 公相君 (Chinese Kung Hsiang Chun) for Kusanku. Per Wikipedia, that he taught the kata is supported only by its name and oral tradition; no document from that period survives.

Creator and history

English Wikipedia describes the transmission as follows: Kusanku taught the kata to Chatan Yara, who passed it to Sakugawa Kanga, and he to Matsumura Sokon. Sources disagree on when Yara lived. Wikipedia gives the years 1668–1756 and birth in Shuri, while koryu-uchinadi.com writes of Yara Peichin (c. 1741–1812), an official from the Chatan district, and leaves open whether he learned the kata directly from the Chinese master or composed it himself based on his teaching. Kusankun himself, according to Jesse Enkamp, appears in the chronicle Oshima Hikki, written by Tobe Ryoen after a typhoon in 1762 drove an Okinawan ship bound for Satsuma to the coast of Oshima on Shikoku; in it, official Shiohira describes Kusankun's demonstration of kumiai-jutsu combat. He is said to have arrived in 1756, but no trace of him could be found in Beijing or Fuzhou. The kata was also passed on by Kyan Chotoku (1870–1945). Eizo Shimabukuro learned Chatan Yara no Kusanku from him, but excluded it from his Shobayashi Shorin-ryu.

Differences between styles

According to karatephilosophy.com, Shito-ryu recognizes four versions of Kosokun: Kosokun Sho, Kosokun Dai, Shiho Kosokun and Chatanyara Kushanku; it thus keeps the latter separate from the others. In Isshin-ryu it is practiced under the plain name Kusanku – founder Tatsuo Shimabuku learned it from Kyan Chotoku, and the style, according to English Wikipedia, describes it as a kata of night fighting. Shukokai's kata list gives it as Chatanyara Kunsanku.

Competition status

• Sport karate (WKF) — Official kata list · valid from 1/1/2026 ↗
• WUKF (World Union of Karate-Do Federations) – Shito-ryu — Tokui (free choice) · valid from 4/26/2024 ↗
• WUKF (World Union of Karate-Do Federations) – Shorin-ryu — Tokui (free choice) · valid from 4/26/2024 ↗

Related katas

• Variant of: Kanku Dai