Shushi no Kon

Quick Facts

About the kata

Shushi no Kon is a kata with the long bo staff. Olaf Steinbrecher calls it the best-known and most widespread kata of Okinawan kobudo, the blog of the Boston dojo Kodokan writes that it forms the basis of much of Okinawan kobudo, and Jaap Kooman adds that it is usually the first kata a student learns in bojutsu. It is named after Mr. Shu, a master of staff fighting from Shanghai, who according to Tetsuhiro Hokama lived in Naha and whose methods were passed on in Okinawa. We have not been able to establish clearly who compiled today's kata from his legacy: some authors credit Chinen Sanda, others Master Soeishi, and we found no decisive written record. It is practised by the lineages of Ryukyu Kobudo Shinken Taira, Matayoshi Kobudo and Yamane-ryu. In the Matayoshi system it ranks first among five staff kata, ahead of Choun no Kon, Sakugawa no Kon, Tsuken no Kon and Shishi no Kon. The official WUKF kobudo kata list records it twice, as Shushi no Kon and as Shushi (Suji) no Kon. We found no mention in the sources of the number of movements or kiai shouts.

The kata in different styles

Meaning of the name

Jaap Kooman and Olaf Steinbrecher interpret the name the same way: 周氏 (Shushi) means 'Mr. Shu' and 棍 (kon) staff-fencing techniques, so the full name is 'Mr. Shu's staff-fencing techniques'. Steinbrecher uses the form Shushi nu Kun, the official WUKF list also gives the reading Suji, and the Oshiro-ha branch of Yamane-ryu writes the kata as Shuji no Kun. The English Wikipedia, in its article on Okinawan kobudo, identifies it with the kata Shishi no Kun; however, Matayoshi Kobudo and the Oshukai federation list Shushi no Kon and Shishi no Kon as two different kata, so we do not treat them as one. The interpretation that the name refers to an Okinawan village is rejected as invented by the author of the Kodokan Boston dojo blog.

Creator and history

Olaf Steinbrecher cites Tetsuhiro Hokama: around 1831 a bojutsu master named Shu from Shanghai lived behind the Sogenji temple in Naha Asato. Steinbrecher points out that there is no written record for the claim that Chinen Sanda (1842–1925), after whom Yamane-ryu is named, studied under Mr. Shu. The blog of the Kodokan Boston dojo from April 2018 sums up further versions: Patrick McCarthy states that the kata was developed by Chinen Sanda, and Nakamoto Masahiro, in the book Okinawa Dento Kobudo, attributes Soeishi no Kon to Master Soeishi; the blog's author, from the similarity of the two kata, infers that Shushi no Kon could also have been created by Soeishi. The blog itself concludes that the available sources are not enough to decide.

Differences between styles

According to Olaf Steinbrecher, the Shinken Taira lineage has two versions, Sho and Dai. The version taught by Shinko Matayoshi is 'very close, almost identical' to Taira's Dai version. The Yamane-ryu version is the shortest of all, shorter even than Taira's Sho, although the 1967 Yamane-ryu curriculum listed both forms, Dai and Sho. According to the same author, the Kokusaireingokai version has the same embusen as the Shogen-ryu version, but the techniques are performed differently within it.

Competition status

• WUKF (World Union of Karate-Do Federations) – Okinawan Kobudo — Official kata list ↗