Pictured left is Chang San Feng a renowned Taoist martial artist who lived in the Ming dynasty the year of his birth being given as 1247 AD by researchers and historians. He is described as La Ta or the "filthy Taoist" because of his untidy and unkempt appearance. Dan Docherty, Tai Chi Chuan master and historian traces the earliest literary reference to 1431 where he is mentioned in the Annals of Supreme Summit Supreme Harmony. Chang is widely accepted as being the founder of Tai Chi Chuan and had also been a practitioner of Nei Jia Chuan and he is closely linked to Wudang Mountain. However the serious student of the history of Tai Chi Chuan would do well to read Dan Dochertys book 'Instant Tao'. In the book Dan delves deep into Chinese history and the anomilies, truth supression, mistakes and falsified records to uncover the most likely truth about Tai Chi Chuan and its development as far back as 1000 years earlier. Dan points out that Taoism and its brand of martial arts existed a long time before Chang San Feng lived. During the Tang Dynasty 618- 960 a documented form of Taoist martial arts existed under the name of 'The Thirtyseven Styles', reputidly founded by a giant hermit Xu Xuan- Ping.

Pictured right is Wu Jian Chuan. He was born into a martial arts family, his father being a bodyguard in the Imperial Manchurian Guard, this ment his father was a professional martial artist thus it was very much a family trade. His father trained with Yang Lu Chan of the 'Yang' style Tai Chi Chuan, and also trained with Yang Ban Hou, Yang Lu Chans son. Wu Jian Chuan became very highly skilled in Tai Chi Chuan, and was also an accomplished archer and equestrian. Despite developing his own style of Tai Chi chuan his relationship with the Yang family remained very close and he would practice with them on a regular basis. He named Yang Cheng Fu his 'third uncle' with whom he trained and pushed hands with on a regular basis. The friendship that continued between Wu Jian Chuan and the Yang family, prompted Wu Jian Chuan to send his son Wu Kong Yi to study Tai Chi Chuan under Yang Shao Hou.

Pictured left is Cheng Tin-Hung, Master of Tai Chi Chuan, historian and author of seminal texts on the subject such as 'An Intensive Examination Into Tai Chi Chuan'. Initially Cheng was taught by his father Cheng Min-Cheung and then more intensively by his uncle Cheng Wing-Kwong, and then being taught as an only student due to the severity of the training regiem by Qi Min-xuan also a Tai Chi Chuan master who taught him Nei Kung. Cheng Tin-Hung competed in and won many full contact fights against fighters of all styles, and he became legendry because of his skill. He has written four books on the subject. In his 'hey-day' he was nick-named 'the defender of Tai Chi', because he would stand up for Tai Chi practitioners anywhere with fist or weapon. Later in his carrere he is famous for training full contact fighters who more often than not smashed thier hard style Kung Fu opponents to defeat. Cheng in the picture opposite demonstrates 'single whip'.

Pictured right is Dan Docherty, Master and historian of Tai Chi chuan. He was born in Glasgow, Scotland in 1954. He served as an inspector in the Royal Hong Kong Police Force from 1975--84. He has represented Hong Kong in full contact fighting, in 1980 winning the Open Weight Division at the 5th South East Asian Chinese Pugilistic Championships in Malaysia. He has been training with Cheng Tin-Hung since 1975. Dan is now one of Europes most sucessfull Tai Chi Masters. He is a founder member of the Tai Chi Union for Great Britian, British Tai Chi team coach, Competitions Director for the British Council of Martial Arts, a regular columist for 'Combat' magazine. He speaks both Mandarin and Cantonese, reads, writes and translates chinese, and clasical texts pertaining to Tai Chi Chuan. Dan has writen one of the finest books in the english language on the subject called Complete Tai Chi Chuan, (Crowood Press).

This is a demonstration of Nei Kung by Dan Docherty. Nei Kung is a set of exercises that produce great inner strength to withstand direct assaults to the body, as Dan demonstrates. The exercises are a unique system of inner cultivation similar in some respects to hard styles of Chi kung, however Nei Kung has a more martial aspect to its practice and application. The system consists of 12 yin and 12 yang exercises and are practiced every day to gain optimal physical benefit from the system.

There exists a belief that Tai Chi Chuan was developed by the Chen family of the Chen village of the Henan province. I will attempt to clarify why this may not be the case through presenting evidence gathered by Dan Docherty and other sources to help the student of Tai Chi history understand the roots of the art. Although the above lineage is thorough, it does and must go back further into the mists of time.