The Origin of TaeKwonDo

Approximately 57 B.C.

Man, by nature, has the instinct to preserve his own life as well as his race.  He therefore engages himself in physical activities all the time either consciously or unconsciously.  Man cannot do without physical motions and he grows and develops them, regardless of time and space.  In ancient times people had no means other than the bare hands and body to defend themselves; so they naturally developed the bare-hand fighting techniques.

Even after arms were developed for defensive or offensive purposes, people continued to enjoy the bare-hand fighting techniques.  They enjoyed building their physical strength as much as they enjoyed showing off through matches at the rituals of tribal communities.

In the early history of the Korean Peninsula, there were three tribes dwelling there. Each enjoyed warrior's martial arts contests during the ritual seasons.

At that time people learned techniques through fighting against the beasts. The beasts defensive and offensive motions were analyzed. It is believed that this was exactly the true grounding of today's Tae Kwon Do. The name Tae Kwon Do, has descended from "subak", "taekkyon", "takkyon" and so on.

In the latter part of ancient times on the Korean Peninsula these tribes became kingdoms and the rituals evolved into rivalries for the hegemony. These kingdoms, Koguryo, Paekje and Silla, all indulged in growing national strength with trained warriors. Korean history tells of military personalities among the well-known prominent national leaders of the three kingdoms, proving the military tendency of ruling hierarchy.

As a result, youth warrior's corps were organized, such as "hwarangdo" in Silla and "chouisonin" in Koguryo, adopted martial art training as one of the important subjects of learning. A renowned martial art book of the days, called "muyedobo-tongji" said; "Taekwondo(the art of hand-to-hand fight) is the basis of martial art, enabling one to build strength by means of using the hand and foot freely and training arms and legs as well as the body to be adaptable to any critical situations. This means Tae Kwon Do was already prevalent in that age.  It can, therefore, be assumed that Tae Kwon Do was originated from the days of tribal communities on the Korean Peninsula.

Silla kingdom was founded in B.C.57 on the southeastern part of Korea and Koguryo founded in B.C.37 on the northern part of Korea along the Yalu River.  Both made great efforts to raise their youngsters into strong warriors called "Hwarang" and "sonbae" respectively.  Certainly both had Tae Kwon Do as a principal component of training.