There are many sayings about eighteen kinds of martial arts, but there are also many weapons without written information: spear, yellow, steak, generation and century.

A traditional term of China Wushu, also known as "eighteen weapons" and "eighteen weapons", is commonly found in ancient China operas and novels, and refers to the skills and techniques of using various martial arts instruments. The contents and forms of eighteen kinds of martial arts are very rich, which largely reflect the development of martial arts in that era. Modern people's understanding of "eighteen martial arts" refers to various weapons or skills.

20 1 1 On May 23rd, eighteen kinds of martial arts were approved by the State Council to be included in the third batch of national intangible cultural heritage list.

As a military term, "Eighteen Martial Arts" appeared in military books, which was first written by Hua Yue in the Southern Song Dynasty. There are seven records in this book, "There are eight martial arts in ten, and the bow is the first", but the specific content of "eighteen martial arts" is not given.

At the end of the Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the second episode of the Water Margin of the Ming Dynasty: "Shi Jin asked coach Wang to guide 18 kinds of martial arts every day, teaching them from the beginning one by one. Eighteen martial arts? Spear, hammer, crossbow, spear, mace, sword chain, axe halberd, card stick, spear fork. "

During the Wanli period in the late Ming Dynasty, the specific content of "Eighteen Martial Arts" was expressed in a new way: "One bow, two crossbows, three guns, four knives, five swords, six spears, seven shields, eight axes, nine cymbals, ten halberds, eleven whips, twelve mallets, thirteen picks, fourteen scorpions, fifteen forks, sixteen palladium heads and seventeen cotton." "Fighting in vain" means unarmed combat, and boxing has always been valued by people in martial arts practice. Qi Ming and Ji Guang once pointed out in Ji Xiaoxin's Book Boxing Classic: "Boxing in wartime seems unpredictable, but in fact it is the door for beginners to enter the art." Since then, although the contents of eighteen martial arts have changed, they are basically the same.

Since the Qing Dynasty, there are four main theories about the Eighteen Martial Arts:

1. refers to "knives, guns, swords, halberds, shovels, sticks, forks, rakes, whips, maces, hammers, axes, hooks, sickles, rakes, crutches, bows and arrows, rattan cards".

2. It's the same as arrangement, except that the last three items become: generation, judgment, bow and arrow.

It means "nine long and nine short". Nine are guns, halberds, sticks, cymbals, forks, spears, hooks, shackles and rings; Nine short ones are knives, swords, crutches, axes, whips, mallets, hammers, clubs and pestles. In this arrangement, the bows and arrows of long-range weapons and the cards or rattan cards of defensive weapons disappear, which is also a reflection that modern martial arts practitioners are not good at learning bows and arrows and only teach routines.

4. Refers to 18 kinds of weapons, which are called knives, guns, swords, halberds, axes, cymbals, hooks, forks, whips, mallets, hammers, grasping, boring, clubs, sticks, crutches and meteor hammers in modern drama circles. This is also an arrangement accepted by most people today.

It can be seen that the so-called "eighteen styles" are not limited to eighteen weapons, but a summary of various ancient martial arts. In fact, many weapons were produced in the era of cold weapons, and the number far exceeded the "eighteen martial arts". During the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China, "Eighteen Weapons" became the necessary furnishings of martial arts schools and became one of the symbols of martial arts and martial arts schools in China.