The history of karate may have begun over a thousand years ago, maybe as early as the sixth Century A.D. when Bodhidharma traveled from India to China to teach Zen Buddhism. He is said to have created a systematized set of exercises designed to strengthen the mind and body. These may have marked the beginning of the Shaolin style of boxing. His teachings may later have become the basis for most Chinese martial arts.
Okinawa is a small Japanese island. It is the main island in a chain called Ryukyu that spans from Japan to Taiwan. Okinawa is approximately 6 miles wide and about 70 miles long. It is situated 740 km (400 nautical miles) east of mainland China, 550 km (300 nautical miles) south of mainland Japan and the same distance north of Taiwan. It became a significant “resting spot” for the Japanese, being at the crossroads of major trading routes. It later developed as a trade center for southeastern Asia, trading with Japan, China, Indo-China, Thailand, Malaysia, Borneo, and the Philippines.
In its earliest stages, the martial art known as “karate” was an Indigenous form of closed fist fighting developed in Okinawa and called Te (手), or ‘hand’. The Ryukyu Islands were united in 1429 as a Kingdom, and to maintain this unity, a decree was issued that banned the possession of all weapons. In 1609 Okinawa was conquered by the rulers of the Satsuma Domain of Kyushu. The Satsuma doubled down on the weapons ban and restricted farming implements that could double as weapons. With no weapons for their defense, Okinawans began developing empty-hand techniques. At this time, Te was only trained in secret.
Te continued to develop primarily in what were back then three separate Okinawan cities: Shuri, Naha, and Tomari. Each was a center to a different sect of society: In Shuri were the kings and nobles, in Naha, the merchants and business people, and in Tomari, the farmers and fishermen. For this reason, different forms of self-defense developed within each city. These forms became known as Shuri-te, Naha-te, and Tomari-te. Collectively they were called Okinawa-Te or Tode, ‘Chinese hand’ or 唐手. Gradually, karate was divided into two main groups: Shorin-ryu which developed around Shuri and Tomari, and Shorei-ryu which came from the Naha area. According to Gichin Funakoshi, who founded Japanese Shotokan Karate in 1922, “It is important to note, however, that the towns of Shuri, Tomari, Naha are only a few miles apart, and that the differences between their arts were essentially ones of emphasis, not of kind. Beneath these surface differences, both the methods and aims of all Okinawan karate are one and the same”.
The Chinese characters 唐 and 手 used to write Tode (Chinese hand) could also be pronounced ‘kara te’ thus the name Te or Tode was replaced with karate-jutsu or ‘Chinese hand art’ by the Okinawan Masters. This was later changed to karate-do by Gichin Funakoshi who adopted an alternate meaning for the Chinese character for kara: 空, ’empty’. From this point on the term karate came to mean ’empty hand’ and was written 空手. The Do in karate-do means ‘way’ or ‘path’, and is indicative of the discipline and philosophy of karate with moral and spiritual connotations.
The martial art of Te has been prevalent since at least the days of the Okinawan Scholar Teijunsoku born in 1663, as this passage from a poem he wrote suggests:
No matter how you may excel in the art of Te,
And in your scholastic endeavors,
Nothing is more important than your behavior
And your humanity as observed in daily life.
The first public demonstration of karate in Japan was in 1917 by Gichin Funakoshi, at the Butoku-den in Kyoto. The performance greatly impressed many Japanese, including Prince Hirohito, who was enthusiastic about the Okinawan art. In 1922, Dr. Jano Kano, founder of the Japanese art of Judo, invited Funakoshi to demonstrate at the famous Kodokan Dojo and to remain in Japan to teach karate.