Kyan Chotoku II

 

John Sells text "Unante - - The Secrets of Karate.

On page 184, we begin to get a vision of the background of Kyan Chotoku.”

“One old karateka who can be credited with preserving some of the kata of Tomari was Kyan Chotoku. This student of so many great masters disseminated in his time the tomari-chonto, wnasu and several versions of the tomari passai. Kyan introduced ananku kata into Okinawan Karate. He also taught the seisan, gojushiho and seisan as learned from Mtsumura-as well as Yara's kusanku kata. Of course each form has Kyan's own innovative stamp. This brings to light the fact that most of the old masters taught kata differently at different times in their lives. They also sometimes taught dissimilar versions to different students. Because of this factor we now have a plethora of variations of all the above kata. While this "kata customization" is often associated with Kyan, the same could be said of Matsumura himself and certainly too, of Kyan's contemporary, Funakoshi."

 Historie Du Karate - L’ecole shorin.ryu

from my translation of Kenji Tokitsu's work.

All errors of translation are proudly my own fault.

Unfortunately I translated this decades ago, no longer can find the original source, and admit the use of French for those living in France was very different from the French that was taught to me, which probably explains my translation problems.

Instructions for combat, by C. Kiyan

1. Before acting, it is necessary to discern the capabilities of the opponent. If he is powerful, he will inevitably rely on his strength and will have the tendency to attack. Then I would make an effort to parry so that he uses more and more force, and I will launch my attack at the time where he reveals a vacuum [an opening].

It is a technique by which one borrows the force of the opponent.

2. If the opponent isn’t powerful, he will be on the defensive and multiply the movements and the shifts while often moving back. In this case one should not launch an attack of a sudden strike. It is then necessary to use blows of the fist and the feet to bring him to back up and attack all from a strike. Then when I take the initiative of the attack I must take guard of unexpected responses (counters).