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Nunchucks
is a traditional East-Asian martial arts weapon consisting of two sticks (traditionally made of wood), connected to each other at their ends by a short metal chain or a rope. It is approximately (sticks) and (rope). A person who has practiced using this weapon is referred to in Japanese as . The nunchaku is most widely used in Southern Chinese Kung fu, Okinawan Kobudo and karate. It is intended to be used as a training weapon, since practicing with it enables the development of quick hand movements and improves posture. Modern nunchaku may be made of metal, plastic, or fiberglass instead of the traditional wood. Toy versions and replicas not intended to be used as weapons may be made of polystyrene foam or plastic. Possession of this weapon is illegal in some countries, except for use in professional martial arts schools. The origin of the nunchaku is unclear. One traditional explanation holds that it was originally invented by Emperor Taizu of Song, as a weapon utilis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Active Interest Media
Active Interest Media (AIM) is a publisher specializing in "niche enthusiast magazines" (i.e. magazines targeted at hobbyists). History The company was formed in 2003 by private-equity investment firm Wind Point Partners by the acquisition of ''Sabot Publishing'', a "special interest" publisher based in Richmond, VA which had been established in 1999 by James Causey and Colonnade Capital. In July 2017, the company announced that it had acquired the United States Team roping, Team Roping Championships and the TRIAD Classification Agency. In 2020, AIM sold these properties in conjunction with the sale of many of its largest divisions to Pocket Outdoor Media. Overview Active Interest Media publications are organized in three "groups", the Collectibles group (antiques, Numismatics, currency collecting, sports, military, and collectable cars, the Home Arts group (woodworking, gardening, cooking, and sewing), and the Home Building Group (home building, home improvement, renovation, arc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tadashi Yamashita
Tadashi Yamashita (born February 5, 1942) is a Japanese American martial artist and actor. Early life Tadashi Yamashita was born in Japan in 1942, but he considers himself an Okinawan. His father died when he was three and he and his mother moved to Okinawa when he was 8, after the Second World War. He began martial arts at 11. Yamashita was awarded his black belt when he was 16. He captured the All-Okinawan Shorin-Ryu Free Sparring Grand Championship Title in 1960. He visited Japan in 1968 and tested before Shugoro Nakazato and Chosin Chibana. He lived in Okinawa until in 1966 he moved to the US where he became a citizen. Yamashita began training in martial arts at the age of 11 when the school PTA president, who was also a martial arts instructor, took him on as a student because he was picking fights with other students. He began training with Hanshi Shugoro Nakazato and Hanshi Shinpo Matayoshi in 1953 and in 1968 he tested before his Sensei Shugoro Nakazato, and Gr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flail (weapon)
A flail is a weapon consisting of a striking head attached to a handle by a flexible rope, strap, or chain. The chief tactical virtue of the flail is its capacity to strike around a defender's shield or parry. Its chief liability is a lack of precision and the difficulty of using it in close combat, or closely-ranked formations. There are two broad types of flail: a long, two-handed infantry weapon with a cylindrical head, and a shorter weapon with a round metal striking head. The longer cylindrical-headed flail is a hand weapon derived from the Flail (tool), agricultural tool of the same name, commonly used in threshing. It was primarily considered a peasant's weapon, and while not common, they were deployed in Germany and Central Europe in the later Late Middle Ages. The smaller, more spherical-headed flail appears to be even less common; it appears occasionally in artwork from the 15th century onward, but many historians have expressed doubts that it ever saw use as an actu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xirong
Xirong () or Rong were various people who lived primarily in and around the western extremities of ancient China (in modern Gansu and Qinghai). They were known as early as the Shang dynasty (1765–1122 BCE), as one of the Four Barbarians that frequently (and often violently) interacted with the sinitic Huaxia civilization. They typically resided to the west of Guanzhong Plains from the Zhou dynasty (1046–221 BCE) onwards. They were mentioned in some ancient Chinese texts as perhaps genetically and linguistically related to the people of the Chinese civilization. Etymology The historian Li Feng says that during the Western Zhou period, since the term ''Rong'' "warlike foreigners" was "often used in bronze inscriptions to mean 'warfare', it is likely that when a people was called 'Rong', the Zhou considered them as political and military adversaries rather than as cultural and ethnic 'others'." Paul R. Goldin also proposes that ''Rong'' was a "pseudo-ethnonym" meaning "belli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Northern Song Dynasty
The Song dynasty ( ) was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 960 to 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song, who usurped the throne of the Later Zhou dynasty and went on to conquer the rest of the Ten Kingdoms, ending the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period. The Song frequently came into conflict with the contemporaneous Liao, Western Xia and Jin dynasties in northern China. After retreating to southern China following attacks by the Jin dynasty, the Song was eventually conquered by the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The dynasty's history is divided into two periods: during the Northern Song (; 960–1127), the capital was in the northern city of Bianjing (now Kaifeng) and the dynasty controlled most of what is now East China. The Southern Song (; 1127–1279) comprise the period following the loss of control over the northern half of Song territory to the Jurchen-led Jin dynasty in the Jin–Song wars. At that time, the Song court retreated sou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wujing Zongyao
The ''Wujing Zongyao'' (), sometimes rendered in English as the ''Complete Essentials for the Military Classics'', is a Chinese military compendium written from around 1040 to 1044. The book was compiled during the Northern Song dynasty by Zeng Gongliang (曾公亮), Ding Du (丁度) and Yang Weide (楊惟德), whose writing influenced many later Chinese military writers. The compendium was published under the auspices of Emperor Renzong of Song, who also authored the book's preface. The book covers a wide range of subjects, including everything from naval warships to different types of catapults. It contains the earliest known written chemical formulas for gunpowder, made from saltpeter, sulphur and charcoal along with many added ingredients. In addition to formulas for gunpowder, the compendium also contains details on various other gunpowder weapons such as fire arrows, incendiary bombs and projectiles, and grenades and smoke bombs. It also describes an early form of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Compendium
A compendium ( compendia or compendiums) is a comprehensive collection of information and analysis pertaining to a body of knowledge. A compendium may concisely summarize a larger work. In most cases, the body of knowledge will concern a specific field of human interest or endeavour (for example: hydrogeology, logology (science), logology, ichthyology, phytosociology or myrmecology), while a general encyclopedia can be referred to as a "compendium of all human knowledge". The word ''compendium'' arrives from the Latin word ''compeneri'', meaning "to weigh together or balance". The 21st century has seen the rise of democratized, online compendia in various fields. Meaning, etymology and definitions The Latin prefix 'con-' is used in compound words to suggest, 'a being or bringing together of many objects' and also suggests striving for completeness with perfection. And ''compenso'' means balance, poise, weigh, offset. The entry on the word 'compendious' in the ''Online Etymology ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Okinawan Language
Okinawan (, , , ), or more precisely Central Okinawan, is a Northern Ryukyuan languages, Ryukyuan language spoken primarily in the southern half of the Okinawa Island, island of Okinawa, as well as in the surrounding islands of Kerama Islands, Kerama, Kumejima, Okinawa, Kumejima, Tonaki, Okinawa, Tonaki, Aguni, Okinawa, Aguni and a number of smaller peripheral islands. Central Okinawan distinguishes itself from the speech of Northern Okinawa, which is classified independently as the Kunigami language. Both languages are listed by UNESCO as Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger, endangered. Though Okinawan encompasses a number of local dialects, the Shuri, Okinawa, Shuri–Naha variant is generally recognized as the ''de facto'' standard, as it had been used as the official language of the Ryukyu Kingdom since the reign of King Shō Shin (1477–1526). Moreover, as the former capital of Shuri was built around the royal palace, the language used by the royal court became the reg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Min Chinese
Min ( zh, t=, s=闽语, p=Mǐnyǔ, poj=Bân-gú / Bân-gír / Bân-gí; Bàng-uâ-cê, BUC: ''Mìng-ngṳ̄'') is a broad group of Sinitic languages with about 75 million native speakers. These languages are spoken in Fujian province and Chaoshan, as well as by the descendants of Min-speaking colonists on the Leizhou Peninsula, Hainan, parts of Zhongshan, three counties in southern Wenzhou, the Zhoushan archipelago, Taiwan, and scattered in pockets or sporadically across Hong Kong, Macau, and several countries in Southeast Asia, particularly Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Brunei. The name is derived from the Min River (Fujian), Min River in Fujian, which is also the abbreviated name of Fujian Province. Min varieties are not mutually intelligible with one another nor with any other variety of Chinese (such as Mandarin Chinese, Mandarin, Cantonese, Wu Chinese, Wu, Gan Chinese, Gan, Xiang Chinese, Xiang, or Hakka Chinese, Hak ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Contact Sport
A contact sport is any sport where physical contact between competitors, or their environment, is an integral part of the game. For example, gridiron football. Contact may come about as the result of intentional or incidental actions by the players in the course of play. This is in contrast to noncontact sports where players often have no opportunity to make contact with each other and the laws of the game may expressly forbid contact. In contact sports some forms of contact are encouraged as a critical aspect of the game such as Tackle (football move), tackling, while others are incidental such as when shielding the ball or contesting an aerial challenge. As the types of contact between players is not equal between all sports they define the types of contact that is deemed acceptable and fall within the laws of the game, while outlawing other types of physical contact that might be considered expressly dangerous or risky such as a high tackle or spear tackle, or against the spirit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
