Custom Drunken Fist Chinese & Japanese Calligraphy Wall Scroll

Drunken Fist is a traditional Chinese martial art / technique of Kung Fu. It is a northern style of martial art that imitates a drunk person in its movements. Many staggering movements serve to deceive the opponent and keep them off-balance. Some consider it to be among the harder styles of martial arts due to the need for powerful joints and fingers.

This is a certain school or style of Tai Chi (Taiji). The characters literally mean "Five Elements Tai Chi Fist".

Notes:
In Taiwan, it would be Romanized as "Wu Hsing Tai Chi Chuan" - see the standard Mandarin method above in the gray box (used in mainland China and the official Romanization used by the Library of Congress).

The last three characters are sometimes translated as "Grand Ultimate Fist", so the whole thing can be "Five Elements Grand Ultimate Fist" if you wish.

I have not confirmed use of this title in Korean, but if it is used, it's probably only by martial arts enthusiasts. The pronunciation is correct as shown above for Korean.

This is a common theme used by various schools of martial arts.

The first character means "iron", but in some cases, can mean "indisputable".
The second character is fist.

Some schools use the older/Taiwanese way to Romanize the iron fist, so you may have seen it spelled "Tieh Chuan" instead of "Tie Quan". Neither way is technically incorrect.

Note that in Mandarin, the first part of the first character actually sounds like the English word "tea" blending into a soft "-eh" sound. The second character sounds a lot like "chew on", but as if it is one syllable.

After WWII in Japan, the Kanji for iron was simplified. This new Kanji form is shown to the right. If you want this modern Japanese version, please click on the Kanji to the right, instead of the button above. The characters shown to the left would still be considered the old or ancient Japanese version of this title.

The first two characters mean "fist law" which is Romanized from Japanese as "Kenpo" or "Kempo".

The last two are a secondary way to express "karate".

Notes:
The more common way to express "karate" is literally "empty hand" (meaning "without weapons in your hand"). This version would be translated literally as "Tang hand" (as in the Tang Dynasty) or "China hand" (sometimes "Tang" means "China" in Japanese). Even though the character for "Tang" is used instead of "empty", it's still pronounced "kara-te" in Japanese.

This is not commonly used in China - so please consider it to be a Japanese-only title.

Many Japanese people will say the last two Kanji are the old and antiquated way to say Karate. This fact does not stop this title from existing, as these four characters are often seen in Kenpo / Kempo Dojos around the western world.

This literally means what you think, it's the "Monkey Fist" school of Kung Fu. A style that mimics the punches and movements of monkeys and apes.

Becoming popular during the Qing Dynasty, this style can trace its origins back to as early as the Song Dynasty. Some of the romance and popularity of this style comes from the novel "Journey to the West" which features the Monkey King and his fighting skills.

This novel and martial arts style has spawned a stream of Hong Kong movies featuring the Monkey King, and other Kung Fu style variations such as "Drunken Monkey" and "Monkey Stealing Peaches" (a technique of disabling your opponent by grabbing and yanking on his testicles).

Note: This kind of makes sense in Korean Hanja and Japanese Kanji, but probably unknown by all Koreans and Japanese except those who have an interest in this form of Kung Fu.

This is the title for the "Wing Chun" school of martial arts, but with the addition of the character for "fist" on the end. So this is "Wing Chun Fist".