Came across this site whilst bumbling my way around the net.

http://www.maisters.demon.co.uk/

It occurred to me that nearly EVERY martial-Arts class you come across is an eastern art ( save the odd boxing club )

Is this just because we harbour a secret desire to be Bruce Lee rather than Robin of Locksley?

Or this link for a variation on wrestling

http://ejmas.com/jmanly/articles/2004/jman..._couch_0804.htm

I think a large part of the reason is that European combart arts virtually (if not completely) died out as they became obsolete on the battlefield and less relevant to everyday life (when did it become illegal to carry a sword in the UK?).

By contrast, Japan was the land that time forgot - locked in a feudal system with virtually on influence from the outside world. Whilst the last few hundred years were largely peaceful, the old warrior traditions were deliberately nurtured (if somewhat modified), and the absence of modern weaponry certainly helped. Japan was catapulted into the modern world in the late 19th century which, as we know, was accompanied by further modification of the indigineous martial arts to produce the do systems practiced today.

Mike

i'm gonna go out on limb here and post something i heard...i didn't have chance to look right through those websites, so if it's on there i apologise. but i was told that morris dancing was an old english martial art. i can kind of see it as it could be a kind of kata for stick fighting, but on the other hand it might be a load of...

I went to a tournament a while back where some club did a bunkai demonstration for a bo kata... it looked more like morris dancing than fighting with sticks though

You could probably class "Sword-Dancing" as a nod towards an english Martial-Art, but according to what research I've done, there doesn;t seem to be any written references to morris - or sword - dancing occuring before the 16th century.
The same goes for shin-kicking as well. This died out in the early 20th century, but has been resurrected by a few folk, although in deference to our more civilised age, the competitors are allowed to stuff straw down their trousers to cushion the blows. I'd say this was cheating

Some of the European martial have survived in the sporting form only. Fencing, Archery, Javelin, etc. Some of the Highland games go back to battlefield arts/skills.