Encyclopedia of Jiu-Jitsu
🏛️Culture, Memory and Curiosities
History, traditions and curiosities of those who live the sport.
For decades, Jiu-Jitsu was portrayed almost exclusively as a male universe — in posters, academies, competition photos. This reality changed rapidly in recent d...
The guard is the position most associated with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu's identity — the idea that it is possible to attack and defend from below, without needing to...
Asking "which team are you from" is almost a ritual of introduction among Jiu-Jitsu practitioners. That is because teams — far beyond simple academies — carry d...
Those entering a Jiu-Jitsu academy for the first time often leave the first class with a strange feeling: it seemed like everyone was speaking a parallel langua...
One same name, two applications that do not always go together in everyday practice: Jiu-Jitsu trained to compete under a point system and Jiu-Jitsu trained for...
Ask any veteran practitioner why they still train, and the answer is likely to go far beyond "to compete" or "to defend myself". For a significant part of the c...
Almost every Jiu-Jitsu practitioner has heard this acronym — in tournament posters, in regulations posted on the academy wall, in the gi that needs to be "withi...
If the IBJJF is the federation that organizes most Jiu-Jitsu competitions with points, the ADCC is the event that many elite competitors consider the most prest...
You've heard (or shouted) "Oss" on the mat hundreds of times—but do you know where the word comes from and why it became the universal greeting of Jiu-Jitsu? It...
Not every high-level Jiu-Jitsu match happens within a bracket with points. There is another format, more like a boxing or MMA event, that helped transform the s...
World, Pan-American, European, Brazilian: four names that any Jiu-Jitsu competitor recognizes immediately, but that raise questions in those just starting to fo...
"Welcome to the gentle art" is almost a welcome ritual in Jiu-Jitsu academies around the world. But the nickname is not just affection: it is, in large part, a...
Before it became an Olympic sport, academy culture, and a global phenomenon, Jiu-Jitsu was a combat system developed by Japanese warriors, refined by an educato...
It is one of the first phrases every beginner hears: "in Jiu-Jitsu, strength does not matter, only technique". The phrase has a seed of truth — but, taken liter...
He was born in a small town in northern Japan, learned judo directly from Jigoro Kano's school, and spent more than a decade traveling the world seeking challen...
No family marked the history of a martial art as much as the Gracie family marked Jiu-Jitsu. From a business meeting in Belém do Pará to the UFC octagon, four g...
The early UFC tournaments, won by Royce Gracie against much larger opponents, became instant legend — and, over time, this legend became too absolute a phrase:...
Three names that sound similar, three intertwined stories — and three very different martial arts in practice. Understanding where each comes from helps explain...
It is one of the most repeated legends in locker room conversations and videos of questionable origin on the internet: that Jiu-Jitsu would have been born with...
Every submission has a technique behind it, but few carry a story as intense as the Kimura: an arm lock that gained a proper name after a 1951 match in Rio de J...
It is one of the most used comparisons by commentators and instructors to explain Jiu-Jitsu to those who have never trained: "this here is human chess". The met...
It is the most famous choke in Jiu-Jitsu, taught in the first week of any student — but its name, so Brazilian and so dramatic, hides an origin that no one can...
Almost everyone has seen a swollen, wrinkled ear on some veteran Jiu-Jitsu black belt — and maybe has wondered if it hurts, if it is permanent, or if it is "nor...
A simple hand touch can be confused with a position adjustment. Three repeated, firm, and clear taps leave no doubt: it is submission. Understand why mat etique...
Few movements divided opinion as much as the berimbolo: for some, a technical revolution that reinvented guard play; for others, a symbol of "sports Jiu-Jitsu"...
Decades before an octagon existed, the Gracie family already proved the effectiveness of their Jiu-Jitsu in the most direct way possible: by publishing newspape...
The most recognizable image of Jiu-Jitsu is perhaps the white, blue, or black gi, tied with a colored belt. But why does the sport train in a gi anyway — and wh...
The colored belt tied around the waist seems like an ancient thing, almost timeless — but the system we know today took decades to form, crossed two countries,...
In 1993, a slim man without a fighter's appearance entered an octagon to face much larger opponents — and won, one after another, using almost no move that the...
With a gi or without a gi: this is one of the oldest and most discussed divisions within Jiu-Jitsu itself. What started as a simple difference in uniform became...
Before weight categories, championship belts, and regulated MMA existed, Brazil experienced decades of real rivalry between two schools of ground wrestling: Jiu...
