The words of jiu-jitsu
Kimura, ezekiel, berimbolo: where technique names come from, and who really coined them.
Who names jiu-jitsu techniques
Almost never the people who invented them. Often not even the people who used them. Behind the names of these holds sit four rules that have been repeating for more than seventy years.
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Why it's called the kimura
The most famous hold in jiu-jitsu carries the name of the man who used it against Hélio Gracie, not of the man who invented it. And it is a defeat the Gracies were the first to tell.
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Why it's called the ezekiel
The sleeve choke carries the name of a judoka who was only passing through jiu-jitsu. He invented nothing: he brought in something nobody there was using.
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Why it's called the omoplata
It is the only name in the series that is not somebody's surname. It simply means “shoulder blade” — and out of it came a suffix that produced five more.
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Why it's called the d'arce (and why in Brazil it's called the brabo)
Two names, two continents, the same family of chokes. And at least four people claiming a piece of it — without any of them being entirely wrong.
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Why it's called the berimbolo
The name does not come from the capoeira berimbau. And it was not even born in Brazil: it arrived later, from America, when the position was already almost ten years old.
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Why it's called the gogoplata
“Gogó”, in Brazilian Portuguese, is the Adam's apple. The rest of the word is a piece broken off another word — and it does not mean what everybody thinks.
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Why it's called De La Riva guard
Before it was De La Riva guard it was the “pudding guard”. The surname was given to it by the newspapers, after a win nobody expected.
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Why it's called the twister
It is the only case in the series where the man behind the technique could have put his own name on it and chose not to. He had a practical reason.
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Why it's called the baratoplata
The name is half a cockroach and half a rulebook. This is the technique that exists because a rule banned another one.
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Why it's called the estima lock
Born in a preparation session and used in competition for the first time in a world semi-final. It is also the only technique in this series that made a rulebook change.
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