The History of Wing Chun.

There are many oral traditions that express the origins of Wing Chun. Very little can be exactly qualified by modern historical evidence. However, what is most certain agreed upon, by all That study and practice Wing Chun, is that Wing Chun originated in the Southern Shaolin Temple.

The dates of its origins vary greatly, though it is accepted that it was initially created sometime in the late 1600’s.
In the folklore, many will say that a single woman created the system, though there is no hard evidence that this is the case. Some legends explain that she saw a fight between a snake and crane and that this is where she discovered the system. Again this kind of story is simply myth and fantasy which serves as the origin for many other southern systems, such as tai chi, ng cho kuen, etc.

A more modern consideration of Wing Chun’s history is that it was created to aid in training a force of rebel troups to fight against the formation of the Qing Dynasty. More than likely, it was developed by the head masters of the southern Shaolin Temple, the heads of the Ming Dynasty military, and supporters of the Ming Royal family and others. Alternate legends explain that they met in secret in the Weng Chun Tong (The Eternal Spring time Hall) and opened the doors to what was supposed to become the best of the best of all their martial art systems. The goal at the time was to conjure a master system, no longer based on the movements or immitaions of an animal, but strictly based on the reality of the physical world and the nature of time, space and energy as it relates to life and death in combat.

What makes Wing Chun function is clearly it’s weapon system double short sword, and then the longer dragon pole. The paradigm of all ideas condensed into one system, meaning a weapon in each hand and then both hands on the same weapon.  More history is being uncovered every year, and now the active practitioners of today are reworking the old forms, pressure testing them against other styles, and maintaining the heritage of the theories and methods of conditioning put in place in the days of Shaolin.

Written by Sifu A. Di Guiseppi.