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Mt. Wudang in Hubei. However, it is clear from the early records that he had
nothing to do with the martial arts.^120 Why then did the Huangs, or Wang
Zhengnan, attribute the Internal School to the obscure Daoist?
Zhang Sanfeng’s association with a military god was likely one reason for
his choice as creator of the Internal School. The saint had resided at the Wu-
dang temple complex, which had been dedicated to the cult of a valiant deity,
the Perfect Warrior (Zhenwu) (also known as the Dark Warrior (Xuanwu)).
Beginning in the eleventh century, some Chinese emperors attributed their
successes in battle to the martial god, who was extolled for warding off no-
madic invasions. Moreover, the third Ming emperor Chengzu (r. 1403–1424)
credited the martial deity with his successful usurpation of the throne, for
which reason he embarked upon a massive temple construction on Mt. Wu-
dang.^121 Huang Zongxi, at any rate, explicitly linked the Perfect Warrior’s fight-
ing techniques with the Daoist saint’s Internal School. “That night,” he wrote,
“Zhang Sanfeng dreamt that the Primordial Emperor (The Perfect Warrior)
transmitted the techniques of hand combat to him, and the following morning
he single-handedly killed over a hundred bandits.”^122
Another, more significant, reason for crediting Zhang Sanfeng with sev-
enteenth-century martial arts was his relation to the Ming royal family. The
saint’s hagiography had several Ming emperors seeking his blessing, and in
the popular imagination his miracles were inextricably linked to the glory of
the dynasty’s early days.^123 His residence on Mt. Wudang was similarly tied to
the Ming fortunes. As Yang Lizhi has shown, the Wudang monasteries func-
tioned as a family shrine of the ruling house, being directly supervised by
the imperial palace. Royal birthdays and other family events were celebrated
at the Wudang temples, where the Daoist priests prayed for the dynasty’s lon-
gevity.^124 Writing some twenty years after the Manchu conquest of 1644, the
Huang’s choice of Zhang Sanfeng as the founder of the Internal School—
and of Mt. Wudang as the martial arts’ birthplace—amounted to a political
statement. Huang Zongxi employed the Daoist saint as a symbol of his Ming
loyalism. Douglas Wile is likely right in his assertion that by combining the
mythic figures of the Perfect Warrior and Zhang Sanfeng with the righteous
martial artist Wang Zhengnan, “the Huangs attempted in an environment of
strict censorship to issue a spiritual rallying cry against alien aggression.”^125
Huang Zongxi was among the leading intellectuals of the anti-Qing resis-
tance movement. He served the Ming all through its disastrous retreat to the
South, and throughout his life he remained steadfast in his refusal to join the
new administration. Scholars have interpreted his epitaph for Wang Zheng-
nan as a political manifesto of his Ming loyalism. Huang expressly dispensed
with Qing reign years in his dating of the martial artist, and he voiced admira-
tion for the latter’s vow of vegetarianism that followed the Ming’s demise. Wang
Zhengnan refused to prostitute his fighting skills, declining repeated invita-
tions to serve in the local yamen. In his uncompromising defiance, the illiter-
ate martial artist could serve as a model for the scholarly elite. “Zhengnan gave