Wooden Dummy Of WingTsun By Leung Ting

Whether the wooden dummy appeared before the creation of Wing Tsun kung-fu or Wing Tsun kung-fu was created before the appearance of the wooden dummy is a problem difficult to solve and needs laborious research. However, judging from the hearsay within the Chinese kung-fu circle, we might assume the following possibilities. It is so said that there was a "Wooden Dummy Alley" in the Siu Lam Monastery. If the wooden dummy alley did exist, it might have been a row of wooden dummies of different structures for intensive training. It is believed that the earliest form of the wooden dummy might have been a simple erected wooden stake that takes the place of a trainee's opponent. Later, the early founders of Wing Tsun kung-fu gradually improved the device, until it bears three arms and one leg as it looks nowadays. Also exercises with the wooden dummy must have been simple at first, being improved later on, and finally becomes a complete systematic set of movements known today as the "Wooden Dummy Techniques".

It is said that during the early years of Grandmaster Yip Man, when Wing Tsun Style began to develop in Futshan, the Wooden Dummy Techniques consisted of 140 movements, divided into ten sections for

practising purposes.

Later, Grandmaster Yip Man came to HongKong to set up a gymnasium and admitted students. (It must be pointed out here that before this Wing Tsun kung-fu was a secret kung-fu style, and that Grandmaster Yip Man was the first to promote it and to teach students openly). He felt that the movements of the Wooden Dummy Techniques were quite numerous and complicated, therefore he rearranged them into 108 movements. (The number 108 is particularly preferred by Chinese people because it corresponds to the member of a special set of stars).

But, through his experience of years, he found out that the 108 movements did not include the most essential parts of the Wooden Dummy Techniques. Therefore he finally regrouped the techniques into the present 116 movements.