Wuxingquan

Quick Facts

About the kata

Wuxingquan, the five fists, isn't one long sequence but five short forms, each repeating a single kind of lunge. Per the English Wikipedia, four to five forward lunges are done, then a turn, then lunges again; running all five fists this way is called wuxing. The five fists are meant to jointly explore all useful ways of advancing in a straight line. Most schools teach them before the twelve animal forms, being shorter and easier to learn, though mastering them proves harder in the end. Each can also be practiced as the zhan zhuang stance. Bengquan, the most direct of the five, is a grab-and-strike or two punches; power runs from the back leg through the torso into the arm, and a third, closing step readies the body for the next strike. The Yizong school (yizongtw.com) reads the traditional order piquan, zuanquan, bengquan, paoquan, hengquan as a progression from larger to more compact movements, stressing the five fists are training methods, not fighting techniques. Per it, zuanquan drives power up in a spiral from below to the centerline, while hengquan crosses the centerline with a waist turn.

The kata in different styles

Meaning of the name

The five fists are named after the five classical Chinese elements; the English Wikipedia notes the names don't literally match the cosmological concepts, standing only figuratively for five combat states. Piquan (劈, chop) is metal, chopping down and across like an axe; zuanquan (鑽, drilling) is water, drilling diagonally forward; bengquan (崩) is wood, flying straight forward like an arrow; paoquan (炮, cannon) is fire, bursting outward like a cannonball while blocking; hengquan (橫, across) is earth, cutting the opponent's lunge line with a turn. The Chinese Wikipedia also gives the name muquan, 'mother fist': per Jiang Rongqiao's 1929 book Xingyi muquan, the five fists underlie all other forms. Some schools link the elements to organs of Chinese medicine (10000victories.com: metal–lungs, water–kidneys, wood–liver, fire–heart, earth–spleen); the Yizong school rejects such readings as obscuring the movement's mechanics.

Creator and history

Modern xingyiquan was created by Li Luoneng (1807–1888) of Hebei, who studied the xinyi style with the Dai family in Shanxi and reworked the art. Where the five fists themselves came from, we haven't been able to pin down clearly: the Chinese Wikipedia's style overview says the Dai family of Shanxi had already created them, while its own entry on the five fists claims xinyiquan didn't contain them. Per the Chinese Wikipedia, in Li Luoneng's time and that of his student Guo Yunshen, only the five fists, the linking form, and the twelve forms were practiced. Guo Yunshen, famed for bengquan, adjusted the five fists' stances per the same source and created the half-step bengquan (banbu bengquan); the English Wikipedia quotes a saying that he could fight anyone under heaven and found no equal.

Differences between styles

In Henan's xinyi liuhequan, per the English Wikipedia, the five fists aren't found, though similar movements and methods appear in its curriculum; its core is the four hammers (si ba chui) and the ten great forms. The Jia Dajun lineage, per the Chinese Wikipedia, practices piquan and bengquan as the Dai family does, while zuanquan, paoquan, and hengquan lean closer to Li Luoneng's version. Yiquan condensed both the five fists and the twelve animals into the shi li exercises, replacing them. Besides the five fists, Hebei and Shanxi xingyiquan branches both keep a separate linking sequence, wuxing lianhuanquan (五行連環拳); don't confuse it with the five fists.