Wonder Woman of the Week: Ng Mui
- Aug 17, 2022
- 1 min read
Kung fu films have become an industry standard in Chinese filmmaking, but the martial art that has defined a generation of filmmakers was once at risk of extermination, and- had it not been because of small band of practitioners- it may have disappeared entirely. Ng Mui was born in 1703, but her life has largely become more myth than reality. That means many of the stories about her life are hard to trust as historical fact rather than legend. As the stories go, Ng Mui was a young woman when she joined the Shaolin Temple as a nun and learned the martial arts taught there. When the Qing Dynasty moved in to eliminate the order, Ng Mui was one of only five who survived the persecution- known collectively as the Five Elders.
While in exile, Ng Mui helped train at least one wayward girl desperate to learn self-defense to protect herself from rural bandits. It was during this time that Ng Mui supposedly developed several different approaches to her martial art including the Wing Chun, Five Pattern Hung Kuen, and Dragon styles. It's hard to know to what extent these stories are true, but what is true is that the martial art now synonymous with Chinese action films contrinues to exist today thanks to the efforts of Ng Mui and the other four survivors of the Qing Dynasty Shaolin purge.
Comments