Chinese Martial Arts: From Antiquity to the Twenty-First Century

Name: Chinese Martial Arts: From Antiquity to the Twenty-First Century
Author: Peter Lorge

Peter Lorge · 2012 · Cambridge University Press

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Why it is on this list

The academic history of the field Mo Pai claims to belong to. Shows how internal-power claims and prestigious founding ancestors have functioned in Chinese martial culture for centuries.

Also on the “The martial context” shelf

The Shaolin Monastery: History, Religion, and the Chinese Martial Arts

Meir Shahar · 2008 · University of Hawai'i Press

A model of what serious scholarship does to a famous origin story. The Bodhidharma legend does not survive it, and the actual history that replaces it is more interesting than the legend was.

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