Northern Kung Fu Styles — A Field Guide

A short field guide to the Northern Chinese martial arts (北派) — enough to tell them apart and know what you're watching. Northern styles tend toward longer stances, expansive footwork, kicks and leaps, and long-range entries. They divide loosely into internal-leaning (Bagua, Xingyi) and external (外家) systems.

The internal-leaning three

Bagua Palm 八卦掌

Circle-walking. You continuously walk a circle changing palms, training spiraling whole-body power, evasive footwork, and constant change — the Yijing's eight trigrams made into movement. Founded by Dong Haichuan in nineteenth-century Beijing; main branches Cheng (程) and Yin (尹). Core practice: circle-walking plus the Eight Mother Palms.

Xingyi 形意拳

Straight-line intent. The most direct internal art — advancing, blunt, decisive power built on the Five Elements (splitting, drilling, crushing, pounding, crossing) and twelve animals. Rooted in the standing post (三體式). Hebei, Shanxi, and Henan (Muslim 心意) branches.

Baji 八極拳

Close-range demolition. Explosive short-power driven by a ground-stamp and whole-body shock — "eight extremes." From Cangzhou/Mengcun, Hebei; famous for bodyguards. Trained small-frame → large-frame → the Six Big Openings, and classically paired with Pigua for long range.

Praying Mantis 螳螂拳

A Shandong system imitating the mantis's snatching and hooking, fused onto northern long-fist footwork — famous for the cocked-wrist mantis hook and a dense mix of "seven long, eight short" striking. Branches: Seven Star (七星), Plum Blossom (梅花) and Taiji-Plum, Six Harmony (六合), and Eight Step (八步). Signature first form: Beng Bu (崩步). The Wang Lang origin tale is legend; the documented art crystallized in nineteenth-century Laiyang.

The external canon

Tongbei 通背 / 通臂

"Power through the back" — long, relaxed, whipping arms snapping from the spine like a flail, with ape imagery (five-element 通背).

Chuojiao 戳腳 + Fanzi 翻子

Chuojiao ("poking feet") is a kicking art of paired, low, fast kicks; Fanzi ("tumbling fist") is dense, rolling, continuous short blows. They are usually trained together as 戳腳翻子.

Pigua 劈掛

Long-arm "chop-and-hang": huge circular whip power and a supple waist — the long-range complement to Baji (the Ma family fused the two as 通備).

Cha 查拳 + Hua 華拳

Premier long-fist systems from Shandong (Cha from the Hui Muslim community): extended graceful postures, big stances, clear stop-start rhythm, kicks and leaps. Roots of modern competition wushu长拳.

Tan Tui 彈腿 / 潭腿

Not a style but the foundational drill-set under many northern schools: short linear sequences each built on one springing front kick. Two lines — ten-road (Jingwu) and twelve-road (教門 Muslim).

Northern Shaolin 北少林

The umbrella long-fist tradition: big frames, springy footwork, leaps, and the standard Tan Tui plus the classic Shaolin forms.