Russian boxing () is the traditional

bare-knuckle boxing Bare-knuckle boxing (also known as bare-knuckle or bare-knuckle fighting) is a full-contact combat sport based on punching without any form of padding on the hands. The sport as it is known today originated in 17th-century England and, although ...

of Rus' and then Russia. Boxers will often train by punching buckets of sand to strengthen bones, and prepare minutes before the fights.

History

The earliest accounts concerning the sport date to the 13th century. Supposedly, fist fighting was practiced even prior to the

Christianization of Kievan Rus' The Christianization of Kievan Rus' was a long and complicated process that took place in several stages. In 867, Patriarch Photius of Constantinople told other Christian patriarchs that the Rus' people were converting enthusiastically, but his ...

, at celebrations dedicated to

Perun In Slavic paganism, Slavic mythology, Perun () is the highest god of the Pantheon (religion), pantheon and the god of sky, thunder, lightning, storms, rain, law, war, fertility and oak trees. His other attributes were fire, mountains, wind, ir ...

. Metropolite Kiril, in 1274, created another one of many personally-instituted rules, declaring expulsion from Christianity for any of those who fist-fight and do not sing a prayer or hymn at the burial of someone who died during a fist fight. The government itself never supported, but also never opposed, fist fighting. Russian

boyar A boyar or bolyar was a member of the highest rank of the feudal nobility in many Eastern European states, including Bulgaria, Kievan Rus' (and later Russia), Moldavia and Wallachia (and later Romania), Lithuania and among Baltic Germans. C ...

s used the sport as mass entertainment, and acquired the best fighters for competitions. The fights most often took place in holiday times and in crowded places. In winter it took place on ice. First the young children fought, then every pair was older than the previous, ending with the last and most notable fist fighters. In two orders released in 1684 and 1686 fist fighting was forbidden, but the sport continued to be practiced. All regions had their heroes in the sport, but the region with the most famous ones historically is Tula. There are documents saying

Peter the Great Peter I (, ; – ), better known as Peter the Great, was the Sovereign, Tsar and Grand Prince of all Russia, Tsar of all Russia from 1682 and the first Emperor of Russia, Emperor of all Russia from 1721 until his death in 1725. He reigned j ...

liked to organize fist fights "in order to show the ability of the Russian people". In 1751, a mass fist fight took place on a street in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...

, which came to the attention of Empress

Elizabeth of Russia Elizabeth or Elizaveta Petrovna (; ) was Empress of Russia from 1741 until her death in 1762. She remains one of the most popular List of Russian rulers, Russian monarchs because of her decision not to execute a single person during her reign, ...

. After that the Empress forbade the organization of fist fights on the territory of

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

and Saint Petersburg. During the reign of

Catherine the Great Catherine II. (born Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst; 2 May 172917 November 1796), most commonly known as Catherine the Great, was the reigning empress of Russia from 1762 to 1796. She came to power after overthrowing her husband, Peter I ...

, the popularity of fist fighting was growing again, and it is said that Count Orlov was a good fist fighter himself and even invited notable fist fighters to compare powers. In 1832,

Nicholas I of Russia Nicholas I, group=pron (Russian language, Russian: Николай I Павлович; – ) was Emperor of Russia, List of rulers of Partitioned Poland#Kings of the Kingdom of Poland, King of Congress Poland, and Grand Duke of Finland from 18 ...

completely forbade fist fights as "harmful fun".

Legacy

K.V. Gradopolov, then the most important

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

specialist in

boxing Boxing is a combat sport and martial art. Taking place in a boxing ring, it involves two people – usually wearing protective equipment, such as boxing glove, protective gloves, hand wraps, and mouthguards – throwing Punch (combat), punch ...

, authored a 1941 work about using proper technique when fist-fighting. In that book, he offered a new exercise, called "group boxing", and he mentioned it was an

ancient Rus Kievan Rus', also known as Kyivan Rus,. * was the first East Slavic state and later an amalgam of principalities in Eastern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical Atlas of Russ ...

sian sport (what he was talking about was the "Stenka na Stenku" version).

Rules and types

Every region in

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

incorporated different rules, unlike the sport of boxing. In some places they fought with bare arms, while in others they stretched their sleeves over the fists. There were cases where participants would cheat by putting iron under their sleeves. There are three types of Russian fist fighting: the first is the singles type, a one-on-one fight; the second type is a team fight also known as "wall on wall". The third one, "catch drop", was the least practiced. There were several versions of the singles fight. One version was like modern boxing, where one fighter hits the other wherever he wants or can. The other version is when the fighters take turns hitting each other. Escaping from a punch, answering it not on turn, and moving aside were not allowed; all that could be done was to use the hands to try to protect one's own body. Victory could be achieved in a few ways: when one of the fighters falls, till first blood, or till one of the fighters gives up. The "wall-on-wall" fight (with anywhere from dozen to several hundred participants) was performed strictly by rules and could go on for hours. Both "walls" had a chief fighter, who served as a tactician and a commanding officer. "Walls" themselves were tight straight formations 3-4 ranks deep. Repeated attacks were performed, aiming to push the opposing "wall" out of the game area. Basic tactics were used, such as breaching using heavy fighters (who were usually held in reserve), encircling, false retreat and others; but as a rule, tight wall formation was not broken. Tactics also included battle planning. The "wall-on-wall" fights, while performed for entertainment, were in fact close to military training. For example, notable ethnographer V. Gilyarovsky recalled that during his voluntary service in an infantry regiment, soldiers often staged wall-on-wall fistfights with factory workers. A famous phrase in

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

, "Do not hit a man when he's down", has roots in that sport.

Fist fighting in Russian popular culture

As for centuries fist fighting was so popular and was such a part of Russian folk life, it occurred frequently in

Russian literature Russian literature refers to the literature of Russia, its Russian diaspora, émigrés, and to Russian language, Russian-language literature. Major contributors to Russian literature, as well as English for instance, are authors of different e ...

and

art Art is a diverse range of cultural activity centered around ''works'' utilizing creative or imaginative talents, which are expected to evoke a worthwhile experience, generally through an expression of emotional power, conceptual ideas, tec ...

. The most famous portrayal of a Russian fistfight is in

Mikhail Lermontov Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov ( , ; rus, Михаи́л Ю́рьевич Ле́рмонтов, , mʲɪxɐˈil ˈjʉrʲjɪvʲɪtɕ ˈlʲerməntəf, links=yes; – ) was a Russian Romanticism, Romantic writer, poet and painter, sometimes called ...

's poem, "The Song of the Merchant Kalashnikov". There, the fistfight tales place as a form of honor

duel A duel is an arranged engagement in combat between two people with matched weapons. During the 17th and 18th centuries (and earlier), duels were mostly single combats fought with swords (the rapier and later the small sword), but beginning in ...

between an oprichnik (government police agent) and a merchant. It is notable that, according to Lermontov, both characters use combat gloves ("rukavitsy", reinforced mittens). Though it may be an example of poetic license, the poem states that the first connected blow by Kalashnikov bent a large bronze cross hanging from his opponent's neck, and the second fractured the opponent's temple, killing him. The fight also features in the

opera Opera is a form of History of theatre#European theatre, Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by Singing, singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically ...

'' The Merchant Kalashnikov'' by Anton Rubinstein (1880). In the 19th century Sergei Aksakov watched famous fist fights on the frozen Kaban Lakes in

Kazan Kazan; , IPA: Help:IPA/Tatar, ɑzanis the largest city and capital city, capital of Tatarstan, Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Volga and the Kazanka (river), Kazanka Rivers, covering an area of , with a population of over 1. ...

, and later wrote about them in his "Story about student life". Some decades later, at the same lake, the young future opera singer Feodor Chaliapin took part in a similar fight: "From one side came we, the

Russians Russians ( ) are an East Slavs, East Slavic ethnic group native to Eastern Europe. Their mother tongue is Russian language, Russian, the most spoken Slavic languages, Slavic language. The majority of Russians adhere to Eastern Orthodox Church ...

, from the other side the

Tatars Tatars ( )Tatar
in the Collins English Dictionary are a group of Turkic peoples across Eas ...

. We fought hard without feeling sorry for ourselves, but never broke the historic rules of not to hit one that is already down, not to kick, and not to keep iron up one's sleeves". Later the young Chaliapin was attacked in a fight over a girl, but thanks to his proficiency in fist fighting, he won. He wrote: "He jumped to beat me, and even though I was afraid of the police, learning fist fighting at the frozen lakes of

helped me, and he humiliatingly lost". The Russian poet Sergei Yesenin in his autobiography tells that his grandfather taught him fist fighting. One of the heroes in the book "Thief" by the

novelist Leonid Leonov says, "In childhood, it happened, only in fist fights I found real friends... And was never wrong! Because only in a fight the whole human nature comes out". Claims have been made that the

Russian nobility The Russian nobility or ''dvoryanstvo'' () arose in the Middle Ages. In 1914, it consisted of approximately 1,900,000 members, out of a total population of 138,200,000. Up until the February Revolution of 1917, the Russian noble estates staffed ...

favoured fistfights over duels, but on the other hand it has been suggested that the nobility actually were against fistfights and preferred weapons.

References

;Notes ;Works cited * * *

External links