Hand Combat 135
Manchu conquest, he was reported to have said that bare-handed fighting
was more appropriate than armed combat for peaceful times. By the eigh-
teenth century, at any rate, Ji’s Xingyi Quan had been transmitted to Henan,
where a local substyle emerged. One of the earliest extant Xingyi treatises,
Mind-and-Intent Six-Harmonies Fist’s Manual (Xinyi Liuhe Quan pu), was likely
authored in Henan, where it was discovered by Tang Hao in the early twenti-
eth century. The manual carries four prefaces—dated 1733, 1735, 1754, and
1779—all by Henan authors.^62
According to some Xingyi manuals, Ji Jike had spent more than ten years
at the Shaolin Monastery, where he studied—and even taught—fighting.^63
However, this claim should be treated cautiously. Whereas the fighting style’s
Henan connection is certain, its founder’s personal affiliation with the monas-
tery should be questioned, if for no other reason than because it is a suspi-
ciously recurring motif in the hagiographies of numerous martial artists.
During the Qing period, a Shaolin connection appears to have become a pre-
requisite in the mythology of the martial arts, as the inventors of new fighting
styles were supposed to have traveled to the monastery and mastered its tech-
niques before creating their own superior ones. The legendary founder of the
Internal School (Neijia), Zhang Sanfeng (fl. 1400?), is said to have thoroughly
studied the Shaolin style before “reversing” its principles.^64 Similarly, Wang
Lang (fl. seventeenth century), presumed creator of the Praying Mantis Fist
(Tanglang Quan), is believed to have resided at the Shaolin Monastery, where
he was repeatedly defeated by its outstanding martial artists. Leaving the mon-
astery in despair, Wang spent several years on the road, until he happened one
day upon a praying mantis catching a cicada. Imitating the insect’s forelimbs,
he invented his unique style, whereupon he returned to Shaolin and finally
overcame his monastic rivals of old.^65
If we turn our attention from the consideration of individual styles to the
examination of literature, we are again struck by Henan’s significance. Even
though, as we will see below, important bare-handed treatises were composed
elsewhere, some of the most influential ones were authored within a day or
two’s mule ride from the Shaolin Monastery. Chang Naizhou (fl. 1740) penned
his martial arts treatises at Sishui, some thirty miles north of the monastery,
and Wang Zongyue (fl. 1780), albeit a Shanxi native, probably authored his
theoretical Taiji Quan essays either in Luoyang or in Kaifeng, where he resided
in the 1790s.^66 Likewise, Chen Changxing (1771–1853) and Chen Xin (1849–
1929) compiled their Taiji manuals in Henan,^67 and, as we have seen, Yang
Bing (b. 1672) authored his Plum Flower one in the province’s Neihuang
County (see map 4). The Xingyi manual Mind-and-Intent Six-Harmonies Fist was
probably written in the province as well. We may conclude, therefore, that
Shaolin hand combat prospered in a region that had played a major role in the
evolution of Chinese bare-handed fighting.
The late Ming and the early Qing were pivotal periods in the history of Chi-
nese hand combat. Drawing on earlier, Ming period quan techniques, the seven-