Your weapon of choice

[Subu'atai]

^ I doubt we can ever be as good as our ancestors having been trained at a very young age. But I guess some level of proficiency isn't bad heh.

Yes, the katana has a very interesting feel to it. I can't really describe it, but just wielding one makes me wanna slice something in two. I can't say I felt the same 'feel' when wielding a zweihander. As a child I owned 3 swords, a katana, a zweihander I made myself, and a scimitar.

For fun, me and my mates once played a sort of 'baseball' where the 'baller' would throw an apple and the 'batter' (aka me with the katana ;D ) would slice it in half. The first time I did it, it was a clean cut straight through the middle of the apple O.O - unfortunately I got distracted by my own success and wasn't able to repeat such a feat! My friends however weren't very proficient, and we actually stopped playing the game when one of friends ended up hitting the apple but lost the grip on the sword dangerously throwing it.

[mongol194]

hmmm i hold swords in high regard. I would probably best deploy a saber or a katana. however a pirate style cutlass/scimitar is probably the most versatile weapon for a swordsman.
proficeincy in weapons like these though takes many years even a lifetime! ;D

As for archery few people today bother so much with that though i've always been a fan.

Whats really funny though is that north chinese iron forearm kung fu was probably inspired by a steppe martial art practised long before the so called civilized tang dynasty stole it! ;D

doess anyone know the turko-mongol name for some of the grappling and striking arts of the steppe?

In India the Sikhs and Muslims practised a ferocious martial art known as gatka. however this art is not that well known. What we do know is that it wasn't native to india and is either an ancient persian swordwielding art or a steppe art. Gatka is commonly practised using quarterstaffs and swords. however an unarrmed version is also documented as well as some sort of pre fight dance which was all practiced by my grandfathers. It has always been my belief that this martial art may have originated in the region of transoxiana and was formally practised by the eastern turks who invaded Afghanistan and India.

Much has been lost about the warlike combat sports of these people but i'm convinced that Gatka, like Bushkazi was a turkic steppe intruduced martial art which has since been lost by the sponge of time wiping the slate of history clean.

[H. İhsan Erkoç]

Even if the steppe peoples had martial arts (they probably had), we don't have any records about these

[sarmat]

It's no doubt that Steppe people had and still have Martial Arts. How about traditional Mongolian, Kazakh, Bashkir, Tatar and Turkish wrestling?
All these are Martial Arts (MA). The definitions of MA could vary but even Boxing is called MA now.
All the styles of the Steppe wrestling mentioned above were incorporated in the new Russian Combat MA "Sambo." Which has been taught to the Soviet/Russian special forces for many years.

It's proved that Sambo based on the steppe Martial Arts' traditions is perhaps one the most effective if not the most effective MA in the world - commonly regarded as the best fighter in the world and absolute Mixed Martial Arts champion, Fedor Emelianenko was trained in Sambo.

There are also records of some more "traditional" MA, like for example Kazakh "Jekpe-jek," "Kalyshtasu" which included mandatory training with numerous weapons, but it's unfortunately not being practiced any more

[H. İhsan Erkoç]

Well in that case, both horseback riding, horse archery, archery and wrestling are all Steppe Martial Arts

[sarmat]

They are, of course. :-)

[Subu'atai]

From the experiences of my youth I guess I've learnt that any martial artist who focuses on only one school is not as skilled compared to another who is trained in many different styles/forms of fighting. A striker needs a distance, a grappler needs to close in, so it is wise to combine the two, and be creative allowing yourself to implement your own techniques which works. You can survive 8 years on the streets without being stabbed once, or defeated in a fight.

Heh memories, then again, it was life and death during those days, I don't know if I can really say in the end whether it was skill that kept me alive or just the instinct to live that kept me alive.