Pankration

Pankration, Greek's martial art, possibly the mother of all existing martial arts in the world. Developed in Greece about 4,000 years ago, it is most probably the oldest martial art in the world. Pankration, literally means "everything", symbolizes its moves that comprising punches, kicks, joint locks, elbows, knees, and 'everything'. It's influence can be found throughout all martial arts in the world, thanks to Alexander The Great with his mighty army, as well as the Spartan warriors who spread it through Greek's vast ancient empire. Probably when conquering India, Alexander must have left the legacy of pankration to the conquered Indians. When Bodhidharma visits the Shaolin temple in China, there, he thought the Buddhist monks there a form of martial art of what we call today as 'Shaolin Kung Fu'. Shaolin Kung Fu can be considered as the oldest and the most complete form of Chinese kung fu. Other martial arts also contains traces of pankration as well, like Muay Thai, Silat and Karate. All of those can be considered as the descendants of pankration. Of all these, surprisingly, karate has the most similar movement with pankration, despite Japan its distant location from Greece.