- Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Monday, 27th October 2008
Next weekend James Marwood will be teaching a short Bartitsu class at the Swordfish event in Gothenburg. There’s a fair bit of interest, including this (translated) quote from a Swedish MMA magazine:
Bartitsu is particularly exciting, because had it not been for the
books about Sherlock Holmes, we would most likely not know anything about the first time western martial arts where mixed with Japanese
jiu-jiutsu,” explains, Annika Corneliusson, head of GHFS.Sherlock Holmes and the suffragettes Sir Arthur Conan Doyle mentions “Baritsu” in one of his books, when the famous detective tells of his knowledge in self defense. Bartitsu, which is the real name, was created as a hybrid between jiu-jiutsu, western wrestling, boxing, savate (French kickboxing) and cane fighting by the English engineer Edward William Barton-Wright, who had spent a few years working with railways in Japan. Now these techniques are taught for the first time in Sweden by self defence instructor James Marwood from London, UK.
“This is actually a very important part of the European history, not
just because of Sherlock Holmes, but also because the suffragette
movement trained Bartitsu to be able to defend themselves against
attacks by the police,” says Annika Corneliusson.