Motobu Udundi (Motobu Palace Art)
本部御殿手Art of the Okinawan noble Motobu family, with tuiti joint locks and throws and weapons, according to the Motobu-ryu website. Uehara Seikichi named it Motobu udundi in 1970 and published it.
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About Motobu Udundi (Motobu Palace Art)
Motobu udundi is an Okinawan martial art passed down in the noble Motobu family. The overview of kobudo lineages on the ODKS association website, based on a survey by the prefectural board of education, lists it as a secret martial art of the Ryukyuan royal house and names the sixth son of King Sho Shitsu as the lineage founder. An abstract in a Japanese scholarly journal on budo states it was passed down only to the eldest son of the family. According to Green (Martial Arts of the World, 2001), the Motobu Udun family supplied the royal court with teachers of te, and eleven successive generations inherited the art. The eleventh head was Motobu Choyu. His student Uehara Seikichi founded the Motobu Udundi Kobujutsu Kyokai association in 1970, and only since then is the art, according to the abstract, publicly known. The author of the same study infers that Motobu udundi, which shows no direct Chinese influence, apparently belongs to the ti lineage, an art developed independently in the Ryukyu Kingdom. The Motobu-ryu website lists tuiti joint locks and throws and weapon work including the sword, spear and naginata.
History
An abstract of a lecture in a Japanese scholarly journal on budo states the art was inherited in the Motobu family, whose founder was the sixth son of the tenth king Sho Shitsu of the second Sho dynasty. As a secret art it was passed down only to the eldest son, who began training at six and mastered all the techniques by adulthood. Not even brothers were allowed to watch the training. Motobu Choki, youngest brother of Motobu Choyu, eleventh head of the family, according to the abstract did not know the content of the family art until Choyu later taught him.
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Green states that the Motobu Udun family supplied the royal court with teachers of te and that the art was inherited by eleven generations. According to him the last in the line was Motobu Choyu, a teacher of te for the marquis, who was Sho Ten, and he died in 1926. The years that sources give for Motobu Choyu differ: the ODKS overview has 1857 to 1927, the Japanese Wikipedia 1865 to 1928, and the Motobu-ryu website the birth year 1865. According to the Motobu-ryu website, after the Meiji reforms in 1871 only Motobu Choyu preserved the art. In 1924, according to the same website, the young Uehara Seikichi traveled to Wakayama to teach Motobu Chomo, second son of Motobu Choyu, what he had learned from his father. The Japanese Wikipedia gives the year 1925. Chomo, according to the Motobu-ryu website, died in 1945 in the bombing of Osaka. According to the Motobu-ryu website timeline, Uehara returned from the Philippines in March 1947 and on November 3, 1951 opened a dojo in Ginowan. In 1961, according to the Motobu-ryu website, Uehara named his school Motobu-ryu in honor of Motobu Choyu and founded the Motobu-ryu Kobujutsu Kyokai. In 1970 he renamed it Motobu udundi and founded the Motobu Udundi Kobujutsu Kyokai, which he chaired. In 1976 he first met Motobu Chosei, son of Motobu Choki, and told him of his wish to return the art to the Motobu family. At the celebration of his 99th birthday on August 17, 2003 he handed over the title of soke, which Motobu Chosei accepted. The ODKS overview lists Motobu Chomo as the twelfth generation, Uehara as teacher (shike) and Motobu Chosei as the thirteenth generation, whereas the abstract in the budo journal counts Uehara as the twelfth head.
How it differs
An abstract in a Japanese scholarly journal on budo compared Motobu udundi with karate styles and found many differences in training methods, in the relation of empty-hand techniques to weapons and in the conception of kata. Since it shows no direct Chinese influence and has many features unknown to mainland Japanese kobudo, the author places it in the ti lineage, an art developed independently in the Ryukyu Kingdom. Organizationally, according to the Motobu-ryu website, Motobu udundi is administered separately from Motobu kenpo, a karate lineage led by Nihon Karatedo Motobu-kai, but both arts belong to one organization called Motobu-ryu.
Technique
The Motobu-ryu website describes the basic stance tachu-gwaa, upright with straight knees, heels slightly raised and weight on the forefeet. Strikes use the front arm and kicks the front leg, and instead of hiki-te the rear hand touches the elbow of the front arm (me-oto-de). Purely blocking techniques such as soto-uke, uchi-uke or gedan-barai are not used according to the website, attacks are avoided with the body and the response strikes and blocks at once.
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According to the website, the foundation is motode, an exercise resembling the kata sanchin of Naha-te but differing in breathing, stance, strength and hand twisting. Uehara adapted it as a kata for group training, in fist and open-hand versions. According to the website, Uehara also created three kata kasshin-di from the techniques Choyu taught him, and since the art originally had no kata, training rests on paired exercises (sotai-dosa). The abstract in a Japanese scholarly journal on budo mentions kata motode one and two. Tuiti, joint locks and throws, are meant according to the website to defeat the opponent without injury, and their hand positions are said to derive from court dances. Weapons include bo, jo, ueku, paired tanbo, nuchiku, tonfa, sai and kama, and the sword, spear and naginata, which the lower military class lacked. Advanced instruction includes the dance bu no mai, in which techniques such as tuiti are hidden according to the website.
Ranks and progression
The Motobu-ryu rules of 2012 and 2015 state that shihan instructors may award grades up to 4th dan in Motobu udundi or Motobu kenpo, higher grades and all titles are awarded only by the soke, jun-shihan instructors may award kyu and shidoin may teach but do not award grades. An abstract in a Japanese scholarly journal on budo examined seven Motobu udundi practitioners with grades from 1st kyu to 8th dan and found a connection between kata assessment and grade. According to the Motobu-ryu website, Uehara Seikichi received the highest title, hanshi, on 8 April 1964.
Today
According to the association's page from June 2025, the honorary chairman is Motobu Chosei. The soke and chairman is Motobu Tomoyuki. According to the Motobu-ryu website, in 1984 Motobu udundi became the first Okinawan school to join Nihon Kobudo Kyokai. According to the same website, the first Motobu-ryu school outside Okinawa and Japan is in Canada and new schools have been approved in Ukraine and Colombia (as of 2015). ODKS lists Motobu Udundi Kobujutsu Kyokai among Okinawan organizations of traditional kobudo.
Did you know
An abstract in a Japanese scholarly journal on budo measured the heart rate of soke Uehara Seikichi at the ages of 83, 86 and 88 during kassen demonstrations at the Nihon Kobudo Enbu Taikai in the Nippon Budokan, in which an attacker with several weapons faces multiple opponents. The demonstrations lasted about eight and a half minutes and at 86 and 88 he performed techniques on average 3.4 times faster than at 83. The authors cite his saying that the foundation of bu lies in walking. According to the Japanese Wikipedia, a claim arose that Hakko-ryu influenced tuiti because in 1962 Uehara attended a Hakko-ryu seminar in Naha. The school refuted it with evidence that he had taught tuiti years earlier, and the researcher apologized.
Frequently asked questions
Is Motobu udundi a school of karate?
According to the abstract in a Japanese scholarly journal on budo, no. The author places it in the ti lineage without direct Chinese influence and finds many differences from karate in training methods and in the concept of kata.
Who made Motobu udundi public?
Uehara Seikichi, a student of Motobu Choyu. In 1970 he founded the Motobu Udundi Kobujutsu Kyokai association, and only then, according to the abstract in the budo journal, did the art become publicly known.
Does Motobu udundi have grades?
Yes, kyu and dan. According to the rules of Motobu-ryu, shihan instructors award grades up to 4th dan, and only the soke awards higher grades and titles.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.