| Also known as | Pak Hok Pai (Alt. Cantonese), Bai He Pai (Mandarin) Closely related to: • Lama Pai (喇嘛派) • Hop Ga Kuen (俠家拳) |
|---|---|
| Country of origin | China (Qinghai and Guangdong) |
| Date of formation | 15th century |
| Creator | Adatuo (阿達陀, Ah Dat To), also known as the Dai Dat Lama (大達喇嘛) |
| Famous practitioners | Sing Lung (星龍), Ng Siu-chung (吳肇鍾), Chan Hak Fu (陳克夫), Kwong Poon Fu (邝本夫), Luk Chi Fu (陆智夫) |
| Ancestor arts | Lion's Roar (獅子吼) |
| Tibetan White Crane | |||||||||||
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| Traditional Chinese | 西藏白鶴拳 (白鶴派) | ||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 西藏白鹤拳 (白鹤派) | ||||||||||
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Tibetan White Crane (Chinese: 西藏白鶴拳, "Tibetan White Crane Fist"), also known in Cantonese as Bak Hok Pai (白鶴派, "White Crane Style"), is a Chinese martial art with origins in 15th-century Tibetan culture that has developed deep roots in southern China.[1] Tibetan White Crane became so established in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau by the twentieth century that it was accepted as a local martial art in that region. From there it has spread around the world.[2]
Lama Pai (喇嘛派) and Hop Ga Kuen (俠家拳) are closely related branches of the same lineage descending from the same original art, which the founder called Lion's Roar (獅子吼).[3] This style is not related to Fujian White Crane (福建白鶴拳), which developed independently in Fujian Province within the Southern Shaolin Five Animals tradition.[4]
Tibetan White Crane played an important role at a key pivot point in Chinese and worldwide popular culture, when a 1954 charity match between a master of that art and a master of tai chi attracted massive attendance and avid media coverage, generated broad acceptance and celebration of Chinese martial arts, and resulted in new waves of wuxia (martial hero) literature and kung-fu film that continue to this day.[5]