History of fist fights in Russia

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

In Ancient Russia, fistfights were often held; they existed in Russia from ancient times to the beginning of the 20th century. In addition to entertainment, fist fighting was a kind of school of war, developing the skills of the people necessary to defend the Motherland. To designate competitions, in addition to the term "fist fight" were used such as: "fists", "boyovishche", "navkulachki", "fist fighter".

Story

Russia has its own traditions of martial arts. The Slavs were known throughout Europe as valiant wars. Since wars in Russia were a frequent occurrence, every man should have mastered martial skills. Starting from a very early age, children, with the help of various games such as "king of the hill", "on the ice slide" and "heap-small", wrestling and throwing, gradually got used to the fact that they need to be able to stand up for their homeland, family and themselves. As children grew up, games developed into real fights known as fistfights.

The first mentions of such fights were made by the chronicler Nestor in 1048:

“Do we not live like a bastard… morals of all kinds of flattering, dominated by God, with trumpets and buffoons, and gusli, and mermaids; We see more of the merrymaking, and there are a lot of people, as if to shove each other the shame of the business out of the way."

Rules and types of fist fighting

Fistfights were usually carried out on holidays, and the rampant fights began during Maslenitsa. According to the number of participants, they were divided into: “street to street”, “village to village”, “settlement to settlement”. In the summer, the battle took place on the squares, in the winter - on the frozen rivers and lakes. Both common people and merchants took part in the battles.

There were types of fistfights: "one-on-one", "wall-to-wall". Considered a type of fist fight, "coupled-dump", in reality - an independent single combat, the Russian analogue of pankration, a fight without rules.

The most ancient type of combat is a "clutch-dump", which was often called "a clutch fight", "a scattering dump", "a knock-down fight", "a clutch fight". It represented a confrontation between fighters who fought without observing the formation, every man for himself and against everyone. According to N. Razin's mention: "Here one had to possess not only dexterity and a strong blow, but also a special composure."

The most common type of fist fight was wall to wall. The fight was divided into three stages: first the boys fought, after them - the unmarried youths, and at the end the adults also put up a wall. It was not allowed to hit someone who was lying or crouched down, or grab his clothes. The task of each side was to turn the enemy side to flight, or at least force them to retreat. The wall that lost to the "field" (the territory in which the battle was fought) was considered defeated. Each "wall" had its own leader - "leader", "chieftain", "war chief", "leader", "old cholovik", who determined battle tactics and encouraged comrades. Each of the teams also had "hope" fighters, who were intended to break the enemy's formation, pulling out several fighters from there at once. Special tactics were used against such warriors: the wall diverged, letting in "hope" inside, where special fighters were waiting for it, and immediately closed up, not giving passage to the enemy wall. The warriors who met "hope" were experienced masters of self-fighting.

Self-versus-one or one-on-one was the most revered form of combat. It was reminiscent of old boxing with bare hands in England. But the Russian type of combat was softer, since there was a rule prohibiting hitting a lying person, while in England it was introduced only in 1743. One-on-one battles could be organized by a special person, or they could be spontaneous. In the first case, the battle was scheduled for a specific day and time, and the second type could take place in any place where people gathered: fairs, holidays. Fights "on his own", if necessary, served to confirm the correctness of the defendant in the court case. This way of proving one's case was called "field". The "field" existed until the death of Ivan the Terrible. The fighters used only punches - what cannot be clenched into a fist is not a fist fight. Three striking surfaces were used, which corresponds to the three striking surfaces of the weapon: the head of the metacarpal bones (a prick with a weapon), the base of the fist from the side of the little finger (a chopping blow with a weapon), the head of the main phalanges (a blow with a butt). It was possible to hit any part of the body above the waist, but they tried to hit the head, the solar plexus (“soul”), and the ribs (“under the mikitki”). The continuation of the fight on the ground (wrestling on the ground) was never used. There were certain rules, according to which it was impossible to beat a person who was lying down and a person with bleeding, to use any weapon, to fight with bare hands. Non-compliance with the norms was severely punished. Despite the strict rules, fights sometimes ended in tears: the participant could be injured, and there were also deaths.

Fist fight

In 1274, Metropolitan Kirill, having assembled a cathedral in Vladimir, decreed, among other rules: "to excommunicate those who participate in fistfights and stakes battles, and not to have the funeral service for those killed." The clergy considered fistfights a disgusting deed and punished the participants according to church laws. This condemnation led to the fact that during the reign of Fyodor Ioannovich (1584 - 1598), not a single fist duel was recorded. The government itself usually did not encourage, but did not pursue fistfights either.

The real limitation of fist fights began in the 17th century. On December 9, 1641, Mikhail Fedorovich pointed out: "which all sorts of people will learn to fight in China, and in the White Stone City and in the Earthen City and those people to have and bring to the zemstvo order and impose punishment." On March 19, 1686, a decree was issued prohibiting fist fighting and appointing punishments to the participants: “The people who were taken away in fist fights; and for those people, for their guilt, for the first drive to beat the batogs, and to have money for the first time according to the decree, for the other drive to beat with a whip, and to have the drive-in money twice, and in the third, to fix a cruel punishment afterwards, to beat with a whip and exile in exile in the Ukrainian cities for eternal life."

However, despite all the decrees, fistfights continued to exist, and the participants now began to choose from their midst a sotsky, ten, who were entrusted to monitor the implementation of all the rules of the battle.

There is information that Peter I liked to arrange fistfights "in order to show the prowess of the Russian people."

In 1751, fierce battles took place on Millionnaya Street; and Elizaveta Petrovna found out about them. The Empress tried to reduce the number of dangerous fights and adopted a new decree preventing them from being held in St. Petersburg and Moscow.

Under Catherine II, fistfights were very popular. Count Grigory Orlov was a good fighter and often invited famous fighters to measure strength with him.

Nicholas I in 1832 completely banned fistfights “as harmful fun”.

After 1917, fist fighting was attributed to the remnants of the tsarist regime, and, not becoming a sports type of wrestling, passed away.

In the 90s of the XX century, attempts began to revive the schools and styles of Slavic martial arts, including fist fighting.

Fist fights in Russia Fist fights, history, wall to wall

Fist fighting in art

In the "Song about Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich, the young oprichnik and daring merchant Kalashnikov" M. Yu. Lermontov describes a fist duel between the king's oprichnik Kiribeyevich and the merchant Kalashnikov. Stepan Paramonovich Kalashnikov won, defending the honor of his wife, insulted by Kiribeyevich, and "standing up for the truth until the last", but was executed by Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich.

The artist Mikhail Ivanovich Peskov reflected the popularity of fistfighting during the time of Ivan the Terrible in his painting “Fistfight under Ivan IV”.

Sergei Timofeevich Aksakov described the fistfights he saw in Kazan, on the ice of Lake Kaban, in his Story about Student Life.

Viktor Mikhailovich Vasnetsov painted the painting "Fist fight".

Maxim Gorky in the novel “The Life of Matvey Kozhemyakin” described the fistfight as follows: “The townspeople are fighting with tricks … sides, trying to crush the enemy. But the suburbanites are accustomed to these tricks: retreating briskly, they themselves cover the townspeople in a half-ring …"

Wall to wall is an old Russian folk pastime. It consists in a fist fight of two lines ("walls") with each other. Males from 18 to 60 years old take part in the groaning battle. The number of participants varies from 7-10 to several hundred people. The purpose of such fights is to educate young people in masculine qualities and to support the physical form of the entire male population. The most massive wall-to-wall battles are held at the Pancake House.

Wall fight

Wall fighting or wall to wall battles is an old Russian folk pastime. It consists in a fist fight of two lines ("walls") with each other. Males from 18 to 60 years old take part in the wall fight. The number of participants varies from 7-10 to several hundred people. The purpose of such fights is to educate young people in masculine qualities and to maintain physical fitness in the male population. The most massive wall-to-wall battles are held at the Pancake House.

Fundamental rules

The walls are built in several rows (usually 3-4) opposite each other at a distance of 20-50 meters. At the command of the judge, they begin to move towards each other. The task is to push the enemy wall out of the initial position. During the access, strikes to the body and to the head are allowed, or only to the body. Kicking and attacking from behind are prohibited.

Wall Fights history

The so-called wall hand-to-hand fighting, which has survived to this day, was especially loved in Russia. The popularity of the wall-to-wall form of fist fighting, the so-called wall-to-wall battles, is evidenced by the memories of eyewitnesses - Pushkin and Lermontov, Bazhov and Gilyarovsky, as well as the research of the first Russian ethnographers, descriptors of folk life - Zabelin and Sakharov, lines of police reports and state decrees. The archives contain a decree issued by Catherine I of 1726 "On fist fights", which determined the rules of hand-to-hand fights. There was also a decree "On non-existence of fist fights without the permission of the police chief's office". The decree stated that those wishing to participate in fist fights are required to choose representatives who must inform the police about the place and time of the fight and be responsible for its order. An excerpt from the memoirs of M. Nazimov about fistfights in Arzamas explains the significance of these decrees and how they treated fistfights in the provinces at the beginning of the 19th century.

“The local authorities seem to look at this … custom through their fingers, probably not having in mind the positive instructions of the authorities, and maybe they themselves were surreptitiously spectators of such massacres, especially since many significant people in the city, champions of antiquity, considered these fun is very useful for the development and maintenance of the physical strength and warlike inclinations of the people. Yes, and it was tricky for the Arzamas mayor, that is, the mayor, to cope with the help of 10-15 security guards and even a full disabled team of 30-40 people with a gathering of fighters, which, in addition to the numerous spectators that provoked them, extended, according to eyewitnesses, up to 500 people.

The decree on the widespread and complete prohibition of fistfights was included in the code of laws of Nicholas I in 1832. In Volume 14, Part 4, Article 180 concisely says:

"Fist fights as harmful fun are completely prohibited."

The same was repeated verbatim in subsequent editions of this code of laws. But, despite all the prohibitions, fistfights continued. They were held on holidays, sometimes every Sunday.

The name "wall" comes from the traditionally established and never changed in the fistfights of the battle order, in which the sides of the fighters lined up in a dense line of several rows and walked like a solid wall against the "enemy". A characteristic feature of wall fighting is linear formations, the need for which is dictated by the task of the competition - to push the opposing party out of the battlefield. The retreating enemy regrouped, gathered new forces and, after a respite, again entered the battle. Thus, the battle consisted of separate fights and usually lasted for several hours, until one side finally overpowered the other. The wall constructions have direct analogies with the constructions of the Old Russian army.

The scale of the massive fistfights was very different. They fought street to street, village to village, etc. Sometimes fistfights gathered several thousand participants. Wherever fistfights took place, there were permanent traditional places for fighting. In winter, rivers usually fought on the ice. This custom of fighting on a frozen river is explained by the fact that the flat, snow-covered and compacted ice surface was a comfortable and spacious area for fighting. In addition, the river served as a natural border dividing a city or region into two "camps". Favorite places for fist fights in Moscow in the 19th century: in Moscow - the river at the Babegorodskaya dam, at Simonov and Novodevichy convents, at the Sparrow Hills, etc. In St. Petersburg, battles took place on the Neva, Fontanka, at the Narvskaya Zastava.

There was a leader at the "wall". In different regions of Russia he was called by different names: "head", "head", "headman", "battle headman", "leader", "old cholovik". On the eve of the battle, the leader of each side, together with a group of his fighters, developed a plan for the upcoming battle: for example, the strongest fighters were allocated and distributed to places along the entire "wall" to lead individual groups of fighters that made up the battle line of the "wall", reserves for a decisive strike and camouflage in the formation of the main group of fighters, a special group of fighters was allocated in order to knock out a certain fighter from the enemy's side from the battle, etc. During the battle, the leaders of the sides, directly participating in it, encouraged their fighters, determined the moment and direction of the decisive blow. P. P. Bazhov, in the tale "Broad Shoulder", is the instruction of the head of the head to his fighters:

“He placed the fighters as it seemed to him best, and punishes, especially those who used to walk in the bud and were reputed to be the most reliable.

- Look, no pampering with me. It is unnecessary for us, if you, with what Grishka-Mishka, for the amusement of girls and pawns, will begin to measure up in strength. We need a broad shoulder for everyone at the same time. Act as said."