Rumi Maki Peruvian Martial Arts

[PCH]

Does anyone know anything about this style...?


I browsed through a new book on the art tonight at the book store.

The art looked pretty decent, actually, but it all also seemed a little to "perfect" to me; an art made up from several different styles of Ancient South American Martial Arts only a few people know that looks a lot like other modern martial arts.

Also, the entire book is on unarmed martial arts techniques. "Ancient" systems almost always have a very heavy weapon component. The empty hand stuff is usually pretty small in comparison.

Just curious about it.

Here's their site:

www.rumimaki.com

Thanks!

Next thing you know they will probably be telling us they have found a jiujitsu style from Brazil!

[wdhmt]

I can't tell if you're serious (I doubt it), but I'll go ahead and answer anyway.

1. Their site, now down, is hosted on Geocities.
2. They do emphasize weapons, the 'spear thrower' and several other useless ones included.
3. No noteworthy hits on the web as far as I could find. Even their Wikipedia article was taken down.
4. Other than the book you mentioned, the only historical 'proof' offered is a newspaper clipping from the 70's.
5. I'm not sure this is the art you're talking about, but I suspect it is. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stojyc8C-eo
Please note the straight-armed, twisting torso, hook-esque punches that are thrown quite often.
6. Ancient MA known to a select few + mysticism = utter bullshit.

[Teh El Macho]

It is rubbish. I saw that book too, glossed over, and there is nothing in it that would elicit any serious response. Take the Quechua-sounding names for their techniques, replace the participants in the picture with blonde folks with mullets, and you have virtually the same type of books as Ashida Kim's.

No, I'm serious.

I hate to say it but Peru has been a haven of where hacks and snake oil sellers concote all kind of crap, banking (or actually whoring) on the mysticism of the Inca civilization. It is actually quite sad that they do such a thing from something so honorable, real and historic as the Inca legacy.

They treat Inca legacy as something mistic, hidden and lost, waiting to be discovered. In reality, however, it is fucking well written and documented, almost every single thing they accomplished, down to the minutia that peppered a common's man daily life.

So, short answer: Rumi Maki is bollocks. Bullshit. Plain and simple.

There are real, little known martial arts autoctonous South America: Capoeira comes to mind. Garrote Larense (a stick fighting method in Venezuela), Wrestling in the Amazons. Argentina had a history of using boleadoras and knife fighting, but that's all lost and there are no live practitioner today who use them as weapons.

And South America is a haven of modern martial arts. Just look at Brazil and their BJJ/Vale Tudo/Luta Livre. Boxing is big, Kyokushin to a lesser extend. And Judo rules. Peru has obscene numbers of Judoka (for example, the head coaches of the US Olympic Judo training center in South Florida are from Peru.) Wrestling is also big.

South America has a rich tradition in martial arts. Rumi Maki is not part of it.

[Dsimon3387]

It is rubbish. I saw that book too, glossed over, and there is nothing in it that would elicit any serious response. Take the Quechua-sounding names for their techniques, replace the participants in the picture with blonde folks with mullets, and you have virtually the same type of books as Ashida Kim's.

No, I'm serious.

I hate to say it but Peru has been a haven of where hacks and snake oil sellers concote all kind of crap, banking (or actually whoring) on the mysticism of the Inca civilization. It is actually quite sad that they do such a thing from something so honorable, real and historic as the Inca legacy.

They treat Inca legacy as something mistic, hidden and lost, waiting to be discovered. In reality, however, it is fucking well written and documented, almost every single thing they accomplished, down to the minutia that peppered a common's man daily life.

So, short answer: Rumi Maki is bollocks. Bullshit. Plain and simple.

There are real, little known martial arts autoctonous South America: Capoeira comes to mind. Garrote Larense (a stick fighting method in Venezuela), Wrestling in the Amazons. Argentina had a history of using boleadoras and knife fighting, but that's all lost and there are no live practitioner today who use them as weapons.

And South America is a haven of modern martial arts. Just look at Brazil and their BJJ/Vale Tudo/Luta Livre. Boxing is big, Kyokushin to a lesser extend. And Judo rules. Peru has obscene numbers of Judoka (for example, the head coaches of the US Olympic Judo training center in South Florida are from Peru.) Wrestling is also big.

South America has a rich tradition in martial arts. Rumi Maki is not part of it.

Nice post. I don't know shit about the subject but I am swayed by your facts.

1) True about the Incas and many (maybe all?) of the ancient American empires.... They were among other things, literate. Makes a big difference in that when we can decipher we can read and know what went on there. There are no mysteries. I actually have a rare book in my possession that describes Aztec combat against Spanairds and it is interesting to say the least... hardly mystical though.

Thing is empires take soldgering and the warriors may be part of it, may not, but the Aztecs at least (different from the Incas i know not in this regard) had a higher regard for soldgering and bribery than one may imagine.

There might be some guys who know something... I am not quite ready to say it is impossible, but it would be a hard act to pull off. A lot of generations and they would have to match the Japanese Ko Ryu for longevity..... the oldest one in existence at least. And nobody had the obsession of the Japanese which is why we have Tanachi Ryu and a few slelect other arts that people with a passion for history can study.

[Teh El Macho]

With the massive depopulation, forced relocation and mass migrations experienced by Amerindian nations during the conquest, and a complete loss of the upper classes (warriors and professional soldiers as well as the ruling and priestly classes who were record keepers), it is highly improbable that there is someone with undiscovered, and most importantly, authentic secrets or knowledge from the pre-columbian period.

One good example is in my country, Nicaragua. With the exception of a few tribal nations in the Atlantic coast, every single Amerindian tribe in existance today were formed after the conquest. During the conquest, those who didn't die were relocated, intermingled with people from other ethnicities. Thus, the original national identity was lost (along with much, but not all, of their traditions.)

New population nucleus were formed and new nation/tribal identities were formed. New native languages were adopted, or dropped completely in favor of Spanish (or English or Miskito in the Atlantic coast.)

This process was repeated all over the Americas. Few population centers were able to retain their cohesiveness (either because of cheer numbers as in the Maya, Mapuche or Aymara) or because they lived in remote areas (as in the Amazon basin.)

In Mexico, right after the conquest, Nahuatl (the language of the Aztecs which were pretty much decimated) was used as a lingua franca by the Spaniards. Other nations switched to it, and eventually most of them dropped it in favor of their own version of Spanish.

In Brazil, it was the Tupi-Guarani who became the lingua franca (which made many other ethnic groups adopt it.) In Paraguay, Spaniards and mixed-blood people actually dropped Spanish and fully adopted Guarani as the language.

In Peru, which is the focus of this thread, Quechua, the language of the Inca, was not widespread. After the conquest of the Inca, and after almost a century of fighting and eventual conquest of a remnant Neo-Inca state, the Spaniards adopted, once again, what they deemed a useful lingua franca. In this case, it was Quechua.

It was during that first century after the conquest that people got shuffled and reshuffled, losing their elites, their national identities and part of the historical records (via oral tradition), adopting new tribal or mixed blood (mestizo) identities, and adopting one language, and then another.

And all of these has been perfectly documented, by priests and scholars that came from Spain at that time, and by the few scribes and nobility that survived the conquest and who became literate in Spanish and Latin, writing as much as they could before passing away.

So, in that background, is it possible that after 500+/- years of well-documented cultural reshuffling, all of the sudden we find a previously unknown martial arts tradition, that claims to trace itself back to the Inca (who were pretty much decimated or subject to the cultural reshufling)?

In particular, can that possibly occur in a heavely populated, urbanized area? This claim is not occuring in some obscure village in the middle of the jungle. The Andean Plateau of Peru and Bolivia is choked-full of cities and towns with an indigenous population of millions.

So, is it possible? Yep. However, it is sooooo improvable that one cannot but call bs on them. And what I saw in their book is really bs. It's a chimera, a poorly constructed one.

[Dsimon3387]

With the massive depopulation, forced relocation and mass migrations experienced by Amerindian nations during the conquest, and a complete loss of the upper classes (warriors and professional soldiers as well as the ruling and priestly classes who were record keepers), it is highly improbable that there is someone with undiscovered, and most importantly, authentic secrets or knowledge from the pre-columbian period.

One good example is in my country, Nicaragua. With the exception of a few tribal nations in the Atlantic coast, every single Amerindian tribe in existance today were formed after the conquest. During the conquest, those who didn't die were relocated, intermingled with people from other ethnicities. Thus, the original national identity was lost (along with much, but not all, of their traditions.)

New population nucleus were formed and new nation/tribal identities were formed. New native languages were adopted, or dropped completely in favor of Spanish (or English or Miskito in the Atlantic coast.)

This process was repeated all over the Americas. Few population centers were able to retain their cohesiveness (either because of cheer numbers as in the Maya, Mapuche or Aymara) or because they lived in remote areas (as in the Amazon basin.)

In Mexico, right after the conquest, Nahuatl (the language of the Aztecs which were pretty much decimated) was used as a lingua franca by the Spaniards. Other nations switched to it, and eventually most of them dropped it in favor of their own version of Spanish.

In Brazil, it was the Tupi-Guarani who became the lingua franca (which made many other ethnic groups adopt it.) In Paraguay, Spaniards and mixed-blood people actually dropped Spanish and fully adopted Guarani as the language.

In Peru, which is the focus of this thread, Quechua, the language of the Inca, was not widespread. After the conquest of the Inca, and after almost a century of fighting and eventual conquest of a remnant Neo-Inca state, the Spaniards adopted, once again, what they deemed a useful lingua franca. In this case, it was Quechua.

It was during that first century after the conquest that people got shuffled and reshuffled, losing their elites, their national identities and part of the historical records (via oral tradition), adopting new tribal or mixed blood (mestizo) identities, and adopting one language, and then another.

And all of these has been perfectly documented, by priests and scholars that came from Spain at that time, and by the few scribes and nobility that survived the conquest and who became literate in Spanish and Latin, writing as much as they could before passing away.

So, in that background, is it possible that after 500+/- years of well-documented cultural reshuffling, all of the sudden we find a previously unknown martial arts tradition, that claims to trace itself back to the Inca (who were pretty much decimated or subject to the cultural reshufling)?

In particular, can that possibly occur in a heavely populated, urbanized area? This claim is not occuring in some obscure village in the middle of the jungle. The Andean Plateau of Peru and Bolivia is choked-full of cities and towns with an indigenous population of millions.

So, is it possible? Yep. However, it is sooooo improvable that one cannot but call bs on them. And what I saw in their book is really bs. It's a chimera, a poorly constructed one.

I bought the book because I like to look into these things myself. It was 10 bucks haha. Just a hobby. Part of the library dedicated to reconstructions of various sorts, downright frauds and so on. Your info makes a lot of sense. I hope people realize as much. And yes the sad reality on most of these things is that they are improbable.

Teach your sons and daughters keep your line going.... Teach your sons and daughters! haha.

[Toby Christensen]

http://ulfhednir.dk/uk/index.html

I would say that THIS is closer to proper historical reconstruction. Not 100%, but close (because after all we can't just ASK people who have been dead for the better part of 1000 years minimum)

Interestingly "Ulfhednir" is a Danish verb meaning "decapitate".

[Don Gwinn]

Interesting. I saw the book at Barnes and Noble a few weeks ago and browsed through it, but I figured it was probably only new to me.

[marcell]

I can't tell if you're serious (I doubt it), but I'll go ahead and answer anyway.

1. Their site, now down, is hosted on Geocities.
2. They do emphasize weapons, the 'spear thrower' and several other useless ones included.
3. No noteworthy hits on the web as far as I could find. Even their Wikipedia article was taken down.
4. Other than the book you mentioned, the only historical 'proof' offered is a newspaper clipping from the 70's.
5. I'm not sure this is the art you're talking about, but I suspect it is. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stojyc8C-eo
Please note the straight-armed, twisting torso, hook-esque punches that are thrown quite often.
6. Ancient MA known to a select few + mysticism = utter bullshit.

WTF was those sounds in the background? It reminds me of that episode of South Park with all the turkies that go crazy and attack the townfolk, same sound.

[tamunangero]

rumi maki

Hello all
it my first post. just got a phd in anthropology doing fieldwork in Venezuela studying garrote de lara I am interested in the many different martial art traditions in Latin America . I just received and read the book on rumi maki and i would like to make a few respectfull comments about it.

Teh Gran Macho makes some very relevant and historically accurate remarks. However, as my research in Venezuela shows that while the conquest and miscenegation of indigenous groups with other groups as well as European and African popualtions has gone on until today, making the idea of a 'pure tribe ' or nation unlikely, I would argue that in many parts of Latin America much of the population can still be considered hispanicized and proletarianized indians. That is while they may dress , look and work like poor farmers or laborers, there still is a great deal of indigenous blood and life ways in them. This is what I have found in parts of Venezuela, Brazil and Peru.

In the case of Venezuela it seems likely that the indigenous popualtions that were forced to work on the plantations, ranches and urban centers learned, stole, copied, added on to their own existence of combative systems, other comabtive systems or weapons brought by immigrants from Africa, Europe, and the Carribean. These systems would then be used in a very voliatile environment where competition for land ,political power and a highly sensitive notion of honor would mean that these systems would be utilized and refined throughout the centuries to meet real threats. In the case of Venezuela,many of the garroteros would talk to me about the time of the 'guapos'. These were just bad ass fighters who went around looking for fights on saturday night or sunday afternoon at a time when most all rural men had to carry a walking sized stick with them. These types of men died out slowly in the 1950's when carrying sticks in public was finally banned and the ban was able to be enforced. With this move, juvenile delinquents and criminals became more commonly assocaited with the use of weapons in the public eye.

It is this type of atmosphere in Venezuela that makes me believe that arts such as Rumi Maki could survive. As far as it is from the time of the Inca, that is only about 400 years ago. So to cast doubt on rumi maki would mean casting doubt on the roots of capoeira and many kung fu styles (a valuable endeavour in itself). And it may just be an 'invented tradition' of men trying to find pride and honor in a long past age. Looking over the techniques shown and the film clips, I would support the idea that it is a true combative tradition from the andean highlands, (see scholarly works on Tinku in Bolivia). Looking at the men fight, they got heart and are willing to mix it up and and trade hard blows. That is an aspect that is key to any combative art. As the garroteros used to tell me that the attitude of "palo por palo' was quite valued among men, the ability to stand there and trade blow for blow.

I for one am looking forward to meet this man or his students, I think he has a lot to offer

[metushtal]

sorry but the fight in the vid just looks like a bad kickboxing

[Teh El Macho]

metushtal, what you say is perhaps so, but that's irrelevant. Please stick to the subject at hand.

Here is MABS, in this particular section of the website, and for this thread in particular, what's relevant is the accuracy of the historical claims made by the proponents/exponents of Rumi Maki.

There are other sections in this website where you are more than free to criticize from a technical level, or even ridicule if you wish. So, if you can help explore, study or criticize the historical accuracy of Rumi Maki's claims, please do so. If not, then...

This goes not just to you, but to the others as well. Thanks.

tamunangero, thanks for your long, well written post. I'm looking forward to hear more from you, in particular about your studies in garrote larense.

So, do you think it is possible that Rumi Maki is an autochtonous system, however unrefined it would be? Perhaps its claims to be directly descendent from an Incan tradition are nebulous, but if it's trully autoctonous and not just some recent new-age concotion, that's something I would like to see and read more.

I'm quite skeptical due to so many frauds and inventions we see today that claim a connection with pre-columbian pasts, which do a great disservice to the preservation of our history. But, I'd be more than happy to hear about things that are for real.

Thanks.

[Toby Christensen]

El Macho,

From what I've read you seem to have heritage from around the country you speak of, so why not find the legitimate representatives of said culture? In this day and age we have the Web.

That's how I found the Ulfhednir society and learned of the Danish War Museum. Surely Peru has an equivalent. Rumi Maki may well be to Peruvian culture what Stav is to Scandinavian culture. It doesn't mean legitimate stuff doesn't exist.

[DCS]

I've just emailed a peruvian friend asking about this. Let's see if he can provide first hand info.

@AngrySpastic,
El Macho is from Nicaragua, Peru is "a bit" at the south from there.

[Toby Christensen]

Oh.

I thought El Macho was from Peru. My mistake. I know where both countries are.