Was "submission catch" just another myth?

Almost all the leglocks come from jiu jitsu, most any kind of leglock was referred to as a "japanese" leg lock, other than the stopper toe hold,of course, so called because the match was soon to stop if you hit it. Some other things like the crucifix, crooked head scissors and the double actually went the other way, migrating from the west to the east

Things must have flown both ways Ray, as you said. While Ju Jitsu may have formalised a lot of the moves, I can't believe that in the last few thousand years, arm locks, chokes and joint manipulation were not discovered and taught in all sorts of places.

UWF was great, I agree, on Channel 4.

Well 35 interesting comments later here are my thoughts. Thanks for posting those great vids Debraco. The first time I saw footage of UWF I was blown away. A most realistic style of working. Regarding submission catch, I'm pretty sure that most of the locks can be traced back to jujitsu but I also think that the old time wrestlers would, like all other fighters and especially where money was involved, have had plenty of dirty tricks up their sleeves that included painful joint locks. But we should not be blinded to the true nature of the game. Karl Gotch, Bert Assirati, all those Wigan shooters that we love to go on about. They were working wrestlers at the end of the day. That is not to say that they were not very hard men indeed but what they said frequently required a pinch of salt.

Love your story of of Japan Saxon. Back in the late 70s Early 80s there were a number of martial arts instructors looking for a way to combine grappling and striking arts. Many of us returned to our roots in schoolboy boxing and wrestling. When MMA came along it provided a way to test what worked and what did not.

One conclusion I arrived at was that not only had jujitsu influenced pro wrestling

but there had been a flow in the opposite direction and much that was being taught in the dojo were working moves that had little use in combat. Smoke and mirrors.

Were you at London Shootfighters during the time Lee Murray was training there? One far out cat, that lee.

Interesting stuff.

I went to see Shooto back in the early 2000's, on my first visit to Tokyo (on business), at that time I was learning MMA and had trained briefly with London Shootfighters https://londonshootfighters.com/ before a club opened up in my area, where I then trained twice weekly (plus another club on Saturdays).

Anyway, at the time, I was 6ft 2 and around 17 stone (240 pounds) of (mainly) muscle. As I walked into the building, as one of only a handful of western foreigners, I got a lot of looks from the rest of the audience. They obviously thought I was a fighter.

I sat up in the Balcony and watched the matches, and about half way through the event, after a fighter had won, and was taking in the applause of the crowd, he looked up, into the balcony, and in my general direction. He wasn't looking at me, and probably would not have a clue I was sat there, but it appeared to everyone else that I was in his line of sight.

The people sat around me all started standing up and turning around and staring at me, rapidly talking to one another and getting their camera's out. I can only imagine that they thought I was a foreign fighter and they must have assumed I was about to stand up and call out the fighter in the ring, to face me at the next event, pro-wrestling style.

Of course, I just sat their, and they slowly sat back down. Hope I didn't spoil their evening!

Someone might find this interesting, The honorary "Big 'un from Wigan", Yoshiaki Fujiwara with a demo of the style he learned from Karl Gotch. Funaki and Suzuki, both apprentices of fujiwara, also demonstrate a few moves. Funaki and Suzuki would later go on to found pancrase.

The lineage,

Billy Riley-Billy Joyce-Karl Gotch-Yoshiaki Fujiwara-Masa Funaki-Minoru Suzuki

The bottom right hand picture of the Sayama instructional thumbnail, shows the famous Wigan "pillow" lock, while the bottom left picture shows the banana split as demonstrated in the 1930 book by Coach Henry Stone of UC Berkeley.

One of Sayama's 100% legitimate shooto events, titled "the shooting" from September of 1988. Fine Year, That! Interesting to note that Sayama was using the medieval trial by combat venue of an octagonal enclosure, 5 years prior to the debut of the UFC.

I do apologize for being snippy with ruslan. My nerves are frayed from a health issue and i lash out inappropriately as a reflex.

Satoru "Sammy Lee" Sayama, the original Tigermask, with an instructional from 1983, this was right after he told inoki and NJPW to pound sand and started the Tiger Gym to train legitimate "shooters", and joining the much more "shoot" oriented UWF. This all traces straight back to Billy Riley, Billy Joyce and Wigan, via Karl Gotch, with whom Sayama was a live in student in Odessa Florida. Sayama and Karl had a falling out over Karl believing that Sayama was favoring the stand-up striking skills too much in his 100% legitimate promotion, Shooto. Sayama had learned the hard way with his first few events in the mid 80's, that just as the dynamite kid had predicted, no-one was going to pay to watch them just shoot on the floor for half an hour.

^ William: Pip!, release me from this bothersome neck hold at once!!!

Pip: I am privey to the ways of combat, william. And intend to show as such. Now good day to you, sir!(squeezes harder)

Coach Henry Stone of the University of California, Berkeley. Wrestling: Intercollegiate and olympic. 1939

^Now days this is called a crucifix, when you run back, he'll either lay flat or die.

^This is called a banana split now days. He either lays down for the pin or gets his groin muscles ripped out.

A 1905 Spaulding reprint of the 1892 book originally published by triangle publishing

LOL, The C&E practised here and largely in lancashire didn't use the harness, Even in my fathers time, in the early 20th century there were still scuffling bees held on mill days, when the locals brought their corn to the local spring branch mill to be ground. My great uncle was the winner of many a scuffling bee in southern mo and northern ark. No-one here used the straps and hadn't since the days they landed in Pa, imported to squash the wild indians. That's what it is, i've spoken to many old timers who actually participated in these contests, so you can take you imperious attitude and use your imagination on what to do with it.

Dear Friends,

HIGHLY RECOMMEND TO READ THIS ARTICLE BY MY FRIEND AND COLLAR AND ELBOW WRESTLING AND HISTORY EXPERT RUADHAN MACFADDEN.

If anyone has any questions or concerns re CE history or techniques PLEASE CONTACT HIM DIRECTLY: macfadden@collarandelbow.ie.

Debraco, my friend, and what is this:

"that was a typical kind of pin in lancashire and C&E"???

Thanks,

Debraco thanks my friend, what is this?

^that was a typical kind of pin in lancashire and C&E.

Below is an interesting article from the late 90's written on various british/celtic styles by ken pfrenger(RIP). Ken used some of my piles of ephemera that i generously refer to as my "reference material" in compiling this. I had posted thousands of newspaper articles from the last couple hundred years that went kaput when tinypic sank.

I've been contemplating a trip to Barra for a good many years to check it out.

From a 1930's book written by coach E.C Gallagher of Oklahoma state-Stillwater

This is a good insight into the old carnie wrestling. Billy is only one degree of separation from Farmer Burns. He was trained and worked for Henry Kolln, who was part of Farmer Burns stable. Burns, along with another of his stable, the aforementioned toots mondt, were instrumental in adding the handa style of taro miyake, who was a good friend of toots, to catch.

The double from the 1928 NCAA rules guide published by Spaulding

there are a lot of submission holds in old lancashire, they were only used to make the opponent turn to his back, which is a submission, just instead of "tapping out", they have to lay flat on the mat from the pressure. The entire legal pain series is based around this concept, this is from an issue of the February 1947 boy scout publication, boys life,

the 1/4 with a chin strap is brutal, as is the crucifix, interestingly they show a top wrist lock, which is absent from lancashire prior to the jiujitsu/judo influence, also the double appears in no early jiu jitsu or judo books either, the top clearly came from japan, and the double from europe. The double is in every medieval fight book known.