Okinawan Kobudo
沖縄古武道Okinawan martial arts with weapons such as bo, sai, tonfa, kama and nunchaku. In 1997 Okinawa Prefecture registered them with karate as a prefectural intangible cultural asset.
Quick Facts
JapanCharacter & Origin
Training
Who It Suits
Organisation & Competition
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 Okinawan Kobudo
About Okinawan Kobudo
Okinawan kobudo is a collective term for Okinawan martial arts with weapons. Green (Martial Arts of the World, 2001) states that the word kobudo means old martial arts, but it usually refers to training with weapons, taught as a supplement to karate or as a separate discipline. The overview of the ODKS association, compiled according to a survey by the prefectural board of education, describes it as a traditional martial art handed down from ancient times together with karate. According to ODKS, the weapons include bo, sai, nunchaku, tekko, tonfa, tinbe, a pair of sickles, the weku paddle and suruchin. Okinawa Prefecture registered Okinawan karate and kobujutsu on 8 August 1997 as a prefectural intangible cultural asset. Ron Mottern states in Green's encyclopedia that Okinawan kobudo gained international attention and prestige mainly thanks to the efforts at preservation and dissemination made by Matayoshi Shinko and Taira Shinken.
History
The Prefectural Board of Education states that Okinawan karate and kobujutsu are presumed to have arisen under the Ryukyu Kingdom from martial arts brought from China and to have survived to this day. ODKS links the development of distinctive Okinawan kobudo with the Three Kingdoms period, when Nanzan, Hokuzan and Chuzan were constantly at war and castle building and weapons developed. Mottern writes that training with weapons was introduced in Kume by thirty-six Chinese families, who founded a mission there in 1393, and he cites a tradition according to which Okinawan rokushaku bojutsu was known in Ryukyu only after Sakugawa Toudi and Koura Tsuken (1776–1882) returned from their studies in Satsuma.
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ODKS gives the traditional account that King Sho Shin banned private possession of swords and bows, after which the inhabitants and the warrior class, for self-defense, investigated how to turn everyday tools into weapons, and kobudo was secretly handed down with karate. The Japanese Wikipedia calls the notion that Ryukyu had no weapons because of the ban a folk theory. After the Satsuma subjugation, according to it, Ryukyuan nobles were forbidden only firearms and went on training with the spear, the stick and other weapons. According to ODKS, a mere handful of researchers of Okinawan kobudo barely preserved most of the forms and techniques. The Japanese Wikipedia states that in 1867, at a celebration for the Chinese envoys who had come for the investiture of King Sho Tai, the weapons tecchaku (sai), bo, tinbe and kurumabo were demonstrated. According to an OKIC article, on 12 May 1925, during Prince Chichibu's stop on Okinawa, a kobujutsu demonstration with representatives of the municipalities took place at the Okinawa teacher training institute, at which the youth association from Maekawa performed the stick kata Suji nu kun. The Japanese Wikipedia writes that Yabiku Moden founded Ryukyu Kobujutsu Kenkyukai at the beginning of the Taisho period and that in 1961 the society Okinawa Kobudo Kyokai arose around the master Higa Seitoku. It regards as the three main surviving lineages those of Taira Shinken, Motobu Choyu (Motobu udundi) and Matayoshi Shinko (Kinko-ryu).
How it differs
ODKS states that, according to tradition, the sai on Okinawa was carried by the ufuchiku, an officer of roughly police inspector rank, and that lesser constables, the chikusaji, carried the stick. Both served to protect the king, to direct crowds and make arrests. According to ODKS, the sai reached Ryukyu from India via China and was once a Buddhist ceremonial object. According to ODKS, the kama is the weapon closest at hand to the Okinawan farmer and the only cutting weapon of kobudo. According to ODKS, the tekko derives from a kind of horseshoe used in farming, and according to tradition the nunchaku is derived from a part of a horse harness. The Japanese Wikipedia points out that although many kobudo weapons are claimed to derive from commoners' tools, they were practiced mainly by nobles from Shuri and Naha, not by commoners, with exceptions such as the commoner stick master Chinen Shikiyanaka. Mottern distinguishes Okinawan kumi dances with weapons, performed for entertainment and judged by beauty, from kata with weapons, where the combat interpretation bunkai is stressed.
Technique
ODKS lists bo, sai, nunchaku, tekko, tonfa, tinbe, the pair of sickles nicho-gama, the weku paddle and suruchin as the weapons of Okinawan kobudo. According to ODKS, Okinawan bojutsu is a mixture of stick-fighting methods that came from the north, from the south, and that were already present on Okinawa. According to ODKS, the nunchaku kata was originally meant to weaken the attack of several attackers and calm the enemy, and demonstrations of the nunchaku kata therefore begin with a block. Suruchin is a rope of palm fibers with stones or weights at both ends, about two shaku in the short version and over six shaku in the long one. ODKS names 25 stick kata, among them Tokumine no kon, Sakugawa no kon dai and sho, Shushi no kon dai and sho, Choun no kon and Kasshin bo, and 15 sai kata, among them Chatan Yara no sai, Hamahiga no sai and Ufuchiku no sai. For the other weapons it gives only a few kata, for example Maezato no nunchaku, Hamahiga no tonfa, Maezato no tekko and Kanigawa no tinbe. Mottern divides the weapons of kobudo into military ones, such as bows, katana, naginata and yari, and civilian ones, such as tinbe, kama, kuwa, sai, nunti, suruchin, tekko, tecchu, bo, eku, nunchaku, sansetsukon and tonfa. According to him, the five main weapons used together with karate are rokushakubo, sai, tonfa, kama and nunchaku.
Training
Green states that kobudo may be taught as a supplement to the karate curriculum or as a separate discipline without parallel training in bare-hand forms. The Japanese Wikipedia adds that most schools hand down karate alongside weapons. According to an OKIC article, before the war bojutsu was practiced in villages at night in houses or in caves.
Competition
At the first international Okinawan karate tournament in August 2018, the organizing committee filmed 28 kata with the stick and 17 kata with the sai as the officially selected competition kata, besides 133 karate kata. The stick kata list includes, among others, Ufugushiku nu kun, Choun nu kun, Shushi nu kun, Sakugawa nu kun and Kasshin bo, the sai kata list, among others, Chatan Yara nu sai, Hamahiga nu sai, Nicho sai and Sancho sai.
Today
Okinawa Prefecture registered Okinawan karate and kobujutsu on 8 August 1997 as a prefectural intangible cultural property and at the same time recognized three holders. By May 2020 a total of 14 holders had been recognized, of whom 10 had died, and on 19 May 2020 six more were added. In April 2026 the prefectural council for cultural properties recommended 16 more holders, one of them for kobujutsu, so that after publication there will be 23 holders in total. At the Karate Day demonstration on 25 October 2023 at the Okinawa Karate Kaikan, according to the paper Ryukyu Shimpo, two holders for kobudo performed, among them Iha Kotaro with the kata Shirotaru no kon.
Did you know
According to the annals of the village of Maekawa, cited by OKIC, the prefecture sent to Maekawa a teacher of bojutsu from Shuri known as Bo Ufugusuku, who taught Suji nu kun for two weeks, three hours a day. Before the war, bojutsu was demonstrated at village festivals. A study authored by Abe Akiyuki (2023) shows that in the Okinawan countryside in the twenties of the 20th century, youth associations publicly performed the dance with the bo staff, bo odori, together with karate, gekken and jukendo, at the moon festival on the night of 15 August. The Heibonsha encyclopedia states that the bojutsu called maabo or kumibo is performed at festivals throughout Okinawa by pairs of men with sticks.
Styles & Branches
Okinawan kobudo lineage of the Matayoshi family. Matayoshi Shinko (1888–1947) learned weapons on Okinawa and in China, and his son Shinpo continued the tradition until 1997.
A line of Okinawan kobudo created by Taira Shinken (1897–1970). According to Green, he collected and created kata and in 1955 founded the Ryukyu Kobudo Hozon Shinko Kai.
Okinawan school of fighting with the long bo staff, also given as Yamane-ryu. According to researcher Andreas Quast, Chinen Masami named it after his grandfather.
Frequently asked questions
Which weapons belong to Okinawan kobudo?
The ODKS association lists bo, sai, nunchaku, tekko, tonfa, tinbe, a pair of sickles, the weku paddle and suruchin. Mottern in Green's encyclopedia gives as the five main weapons used together with karate these: rokushakubo, sai, tonfa, kama and nunchaku.
Did kobudo arise from farming tools?
That is the traditional account, which the ODKS association also gives. The Japanese Wikipedia, however, points out that weapons were practiced mainly by nobles from Shuri and Naha, and that after the Satsuma subjugation only firearms were forbidden to them. According to a tradition cited by ODKS, the sai was carried by officials of the police guard.
Is Okinawan kobudo protected?
Yes. In 1997 Okinawa Prefecture registered Okinawan karate and kobujutsu as a prefectural intangible cultural asset and recognizes their holders.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.