Võ Bình Định (Martial Arts of Bình Định Province)
Võ thuật Bình ĐịnhFamily of traditional martial lineages from Vietnam's Bình Định province, the cradle of its native martial arts. The staff roi, quyền forms, and ties to the Tây Sơn uprising.
Quick Facts
VietnamCharacter & 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.
About Võ Bình Định (Martial Arts of Bình Định Province)
Võ Bình Định is the umbrella name for the traditional martial arts of Vietnam's Bình Định province, often called the cradle of the country's native martial arts. It is not a single school with one founder but a family of lineages tied to particular villages and clans, and their character varies accordingly. Two of them are cited most often: the style from the village of An Vinh builds on speed and on chaining strikes together, while the style from An Thái works with a single strike delivered with full force. Technically the art rests on work with a long staff called roi, on unarmed forms called quyền, and on a broader arsenal of edged weapons. Historically it is linked to the uprising of the Tây Sơn brothers, that is, Nguyễn Nhạc, Nguyễn Lữ and Nguyễn Huệ, who in the second half of the eighteenth century overthrew the rule of the Nguyễn and Trịnh lords and unified the country; their teacher Trương Văn Hiến is said by tradition to have opened a school in the village of An Thái around 1765. Sources do not document that the art already looked as it does today, so the link to the Tây Sơn should be read as tradition rather than as documented history of the school. For that reason the catalogue leaves the fields for founder and founding year blank. Today the art is overseen by a federation of traditional Vietnamese martial arts, and village schools continue to pass it on from generation to generation.
Similar styles
Selected by overlap in the style profile, not by historical lineage.