was a

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

martial artist, born as in 1897 on Kume island in the

Ryūkyū The , also known as the or the , are a chain of Japanese islands that stretch southwest from Kyushu to Taiwan: the Ōsumi, Tokara, Amami, Okinawa, and Sakishima Islands (further divided into the Miyako and Yaeyama Islands), with Yonaguni ...

archipelago.

Early life

He was the second son in a family of three boys and one girl. He was given up for

adoption Adoption is a process whereby a person assumes the parenting of another, usually a child, from that person's biological or legal parent or parents. Legal adoptions permanently transfer all rights and responsibilities, along with filiation, from ...

as a child (not an uncommon practice in old Japan). In his early life he took on his mother's maiden name of Taira. Taira worked in the

sulfur Sulfur (or sulphur in British English) is a chemical element with the symbol S and atomic number 16. It is abundant, multivalent and nonmetallic. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with a chemical formula ...

mines in Minamijima. He suffered a badly broken leg when he was trapped in a

mine shaft Shaft mining or shaft sinking is the action of excavating a mine shaft from the top down, where there is initially no access to the bottom. Shallow shafts, typically sunk for civil engineering projects, differ greatly in execution method from ...

collapse, which caused permanent damage to his leg.

Karate

In 1922, after traveling to

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.468 ...

to find work, he was introduced to

Gichin Funakoshi was a japanese martial artist who is regarded as the founder of Shotakan karate, perhaps the most widely known style of karate, and is known as a "father of modern karate". Following the teachings of Anko Itosu and Anko Asato,Funakoshi, Gichi ...

, a fellow Okinawan and

karate (; ; Okinawan language, Okinawan pronunciation: ) is a martial arts, martial art developed in the Ryukyu Kingdom. It developed from the Okinawan martial arts, indigenous Ryukyuan martial arts (called , "hand"; ''tii'' in Okinawan) under the ...

instructor. In 1929, Taira began his studies of Ryūkyū kobudo under Moden Yabiku. In 1932 after studying kobudo for three years and karate for 10 years, he received permission from his masters to open his own

dojo A is a hall or place for immersive learning or meditation. This is traditionally in the field of martial arts, but has been seen increasingly in other fields, such as meditation and software development. The term literally means "place of the ...

. Taira began to teach karate and kobudo in the springs resort town of Ikaho, Gunma Prefecture. In 1934, Taira became a student (deshi) of

Kenwa Mabuni was one of the first karateka to teach karate in mainland Japan and is credited as developing the style known as Shitō-ryū. Originally, he chose the name Hanko-ryu, literally "half-hard style", to imply that the style used both hard and soft ...

. In 1940 Taira opened a kobudo dojo in

Naha is the capital city of Okinawa Prefecture, the southernmost prefecture of Japan. As of 1 June 2019, the city has an estimated population of 317,405 and a population density of 7,939 persons per km2 (20,562 persons per sq. mi.). The total area i ...

, Okinawa. He also opened dojo in Kantō and

Kansai The or the , lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshu, Honshū. The region includes the Prefectures of Japan, prefectures of Nara Prefecture, Nara, Wakayama Prefecture, Wakayama, Kyoto Prefecture, Kyoto, Osaka Prefectur ...

, two major districts of central Japan.

Taira's legacy

In the post-war era, even in Okinawa, the number of kobudo students was much lower than the number of karate students. To revitalize Okinawan kobudo study, in 1955 he established the

Ryūkyū Kobudo Hozon Shinkokai Ryukyu Kobudo is the branch of Okinawan Kobudo developed and systemized by Taira Shinken under thRyukyu Kobudo Hozon Shinko Kaiassociation. Ryukyu Kobudo uses the following weapons: Bō (in various lengths), Sai, Eku, Kama, Tinbe-Rochin, T ...

as a continuation of Moden Yabiku's Ryukyu Kobujutsu Society. Taira was in 1960

Shihan is a Japanese term that is used in many Japanese martial arts as an honorific title for expert or senior instructors. It can be translated as "master instructor". The use of the term is specific to a school or organization, as is the process of ...

for the Nihon Kobudo Kenkyujo and in 1963 vice-President of the International Karate Kobudo Federation. On July 1, 1964, he was promoted to

Hanshi The Japanese language makes use of a system of honorific speech, called , which includes honorific suffixes and prefixes when referring to others in a conversation. Suffixes are often gender-specific at the end of names, while prefixes are att ...

by the Japan Kobudo Federation. He was the first president of the Ryukyu Kobudo Preservation and Promotion Society(July 1970). After his death in September 1970, Taira was succeeded in Ryūkyū Kobudo Hozon Shinkokai in Okinawa by Eisuke Akamine and in mainland Japan by Inoue Motokatsu. Taira created the nunchaku kata taught in Ryukyu kobudo 'Taira no Nunchaku'. Taira is credited with composing Maezato no Tekko, a kata using metal horse stirrups. The name Maezato relates to his birth name. He continued his studies in kobudo cataloging over 40 traditional weapons kata from around Okinawa.

References

External links

kobudo.com Taira Shinken HanshiBiography of Taira Shinken by Mario McKenna
1897 births 1970 deaths Japanese adoptees Okinawan male karateka Okinawan kobudoka People from Okinawa Prefecture {{Japan-karate-bio-stub