Origins - Cuju in China

The Chinese ball game of cuju has a history dating back over 2,000 years, with mythical origins harking back to an even earlier age. Cuju is often written as ts’u-chü and translates literally as “kick-ball”. The name served as a catch-all to describe a number of different versions of a game in which the ball was kicked, many of which coexisted. It is little played today except as a minor tourist attraction and on ceremonial occasions, but its vibrant history lives on, especially in relation to the founding myths of the Chinese nation and people.

Cuju involved a great degree of complexity and changed and developed over time. It could be played competitively or cooperatively, in a team or individually, and was often played for purely aesthetic reasons. The non-competitive version was called baida, with the range of skills that players sought to master known as xieshu. Competitive cuju featured two teams whose object was to outscore one another. One of the best descriptions of a game of cuju dates from the latter stages of the Han dynasty (the period from 25 to 220, also known as the Eastern Han) and is by the poet Li You. Li You’s poem attests that cuju was seen as more than just a form of entertainment or military training. It was regarded as a metaphor for leading a good life. “A round ball and a square wall, Just like the Yin and Yang. Moon-shaped goals are opposite each other, Each side has six in equal number. Select the captains and appoint the referee(s), Based on the unchangeable regulations. Don’t regard relatives and friends, Keep away from partiality. Maintain fairness and peace Don’t complain of other’s faults, Such is the matter of cuju. If all this is necessary for cuju. How much more for the business of life”. Li You

An account of a competitive game of cuju is given in a book written by Meng Yuanlao in 1187, entitled The Eastern Capital: A Dream of Splendour. The book is a memoir of Meng’s daily life in Kaifeng, the capital of the Northern Song dynasty, before it was conquered by invading armies. He describes a royal birthday party at which two professional cuju sides played a game as part of the celebrations. One side wore green, the other red.

Meng relates how the ball was flicked between the players before being passed to the “assistant ball leader”, who juggled it until it was precisely under control and then teed up the “ball leader”, who used his upper instep to try to score through the circular fengliu yan. The winners, although not recorded by Meng, would have been the team who passed the ball through the goal the most times.

A number of manuals on cuju were written over the centuries, some of which have survived. They offer a fascinating insight into the wide range of kicks that could be used, as well as the various movements and body postures involved. There were at least 16 basic types of “kick”, although the meaning of some has yet to be deciphered:

1 – The lian (upper-instep kick) 2 – The xi (knee kick) 3 – The guai (ankle kick) 4 – The da (kick with the tip of the foot) 5 – The bazi (splay-foot kick) 6 – The banlou 7 – The deng (heel kick) 8 – The chao 9 – The nie/nian (instep kick) 10 – The jian (shoulder kick) 11 – The zhuang (kick with the tip of shoe) 12 – The xiudai 13 – The zuwo/zugan 14 – The pai (breast kick) 15 – Zati (mixed kicks) 16 – The kong (stopper)

We do not know if a header is among those not yet identified. The 16 categories above were subdivided into even more specific types and patterns. For example, for the knee kick, there were a further 18 kinds of kicks and kick patterns. Extrapolated across the 16 main categories, this would give around 300 kinds of “kick”!

There were also rules and regulations regarding the movement of the body and permitted postures. For example, one cuju manual read: “The body upright like a brush, as though carrying a stone in the hands, the heart/mind unconstrained and at ease, the feet in a mobile stance. The body upright, and not bent, the hands hanging down, and not flying about, the feet low, and not high, the kicks slow, and not hurried.”

It was clearly a highly complex and exacting game at its height, with the players required to demonstrate a great deal of skill, together with an extremely high level of teamwork.

Cuju was never entirely restricted to men. Women appear to have occasionally played the game informally alongside and against men. An illustration of a woman and man playing together can be found on a bronze mirror dating back to the Song dynasty (960-1279), while a 15th-century painting by Du Jin portrays women playing against each other during the Tang dynasty (618-907). The poem Gong Ci, written by Wang Jian (circa 766-831) during the Tang period, describes girls at the Yichun Academy playing cuju among themselves. During the Yuan dynasty (1271-1368), it is recorded that women played a version of cuju in which eight of them formed a circle around one in the middle and the ball was systematically passed from the middle to the outer players and back.

Later, Li Yu (1611-1680) – not to be mistaken with his aforementioned near-namesake of 15 centuries earlier – wrote a beautiful poem about women playing cuju, which details their outfits (red skirts) and reveals that they are being watched enviously by male youths: “Their sweat-stained faces are like flowers under dew; their fair brows dusty from the toil remind one of willow leaves in the mist. Hidden are their slender fingers in the sleeves, while a pull at the red skirts shows their tiny feet. The ball is kicked time and again, the maids blushing but speechless. They are watched with envy by the gallant youths of Chang’an.” Li Yu (1611-1680) It also appears that women were trained as professional players. Although the oppressive practice of foot-binding for women in this era meant that they could not use their feet to propel the ball, female players employed their hips and probably other parts of the body to demonstrate their skills with the ball. These women were often acrobats or other entertainers, who developed their cuju skills as part of their act.

According to a manuscript discovered at Mawangdui, the game of cuju emerged in the third millennium BC during the almost certainly mythical reign of Huangdi, the Yellow Emperor, who used it as a form of military training. After his forces defeated those of his enemy Chiyou in a battle for the control of China, Huangdi is said to have had Chiyou’s stomach stuffed with hair or straw and made into a ball.

In reality, the first recorded references to cuju in Chinese literature occur in the third century BC, during what is known as the Warring States period (475-221 BC). Both the Strategies of the Warring States and the Records of the Grand Historian – the two foundational texts of ancient Chinese history – mention cuju. They refer to the wealthy city of Linzi in the province of Shandong, then the capital of the state of Qi, which was especially known for its love of music, chess and cuju. As the Warring States period came to an end and much of China was brought together under the leadership of the Qi state, the story of the game’s origins offered a unifying narrative for the new nation.

Following the Warring States era, China was ruled by the Han dynasty from 202 BC to 220 AD. The resulting stability led to China’s growing wealth and cultural sophistication, and this provided an environment in which cuju could flourish. The first Han emperor, Gaozu, who lived from 256 to 195 BC, constructed a large court for the game at his palace, and many in the Han ruling classes followed suit.

Cuju was regarded as an important part of military training. Indeed, one of the seven teachings of the Confucian scholar and politician Liu Xin (circa 50 BC – 23 AD) was that the sport strengthened “the fighting power of soldiers”. Huo Qubing, a general in the Han army, allowed his troops to construct a pitch to play cuju when they were guarding the northern borders. However, as a result of the fracturing of the Han empire in 220 AD, cuju endured a slow decline, gradually dropping out of favour with the elite and even ceasing to be used in military training.

The passion for cuju was not confined to the nobility. During the Tang dynasty, the game became part of the folk traditions of the Chinese people and was played during both the Hanshi and Qingming festivals. Originally held in midwinter, the Hanshi Festival was known as the Cold Food Festival because fires were not allowed to be used to cook. Held 15 days after the spring equinox, the Qingming Festival, known as the Tomb Sweeping Festival, grew out of the Hanshi Festival. As a time for people to make ritual offerings to their ancestors, it is still celebrated today and was made a public holiday in China in 2008.

Wang Wei (699-759), arguably the Tang dynasty’s most famous artist and poet, recounted how cuju balls were “floating above birds” at one Hanshi Festival.

Cuju was also a popular game for children, as evidenced by the number of paintings produced in the seventh century in a genre known as the “one hundred children”, which depicted brightly dressed young kids playing various forms of the sport.

During the Song dynasty, China reached new heights of economic, cultural and social development. The populations of the cities of Kaifeng and Hangzhou rose to over a million, a national postal service was put in place, gunpowder and movable-type printing were invented, and education and social welfare programmes were established by the government. Literature, art and science prospered.

Against this backdrop, cuju reinforced its position as an important pastime and cultural institution, not least at the royal court. Emperor Taizu himself was reputed to be a highly talented player and was painted playing the game several times, notably by the artist Su Hanchen, who painted at the imperial art academy from 1120 to 1160. Across the rest of society, cuju became part of the rich leisure culture that was taking root in China’s urban centres.

As China’s social fabric grew more complex and leisure activities expanded, especially in the cities, cuju societies emerged to organise the game. Known as yuanshehui or qiyunshe, these societies organised matches, instructed players in the arts of the game and acted as associations for professional players. They also undertook tours in which they would demonstrate their skills in the palaces of the nobility and at public celebrations.

Cuju societies saw themselves as a force for social harmony, bringing together young men of many backgrounds and adopting something of a communal lifestyle, with members sharing clothes, money and food. There is no evidence that women were allowed to join. The societies also produced instructional manuals that not only explained the techniques of the sport but also promoted it as beneficial for physical and mental health. Their belief that the game helped to build muscles, reduce weight and delay the onset of ageing would not look out of place in a football handbook today.

During the Song dynasty, the importance of cuju also led to a handful of players becoming famous for their skills with the ball. Meng Xian and Lu Bao are two players who achieved national prominence and whose names were recorded for posterity. A national championship known as Shan Yue Zheng Sai was also held, although we have little idea of how it was organised or who was allowed to enter.

The increasing popularity of cuju was also demonstrated by the employment of instructors by cuju societies to teach the game and the emergence of professional players. Like other professional entertainers such as musicians, actors and dancers, cuju professionals would tour the country giving exhibitions of their skills and teaching them to others. Such was the level of organisation in the sport that players could only qualify as professionals after passing examinations, in which they had to demonstrate their mastery of the wide variety of kicks without errors.

Training was intensive and arduous, taking place over many years. This was not the only way that players could make a living from their skills. Members of the nobility also retained their own professional players. In the classic novel Water Margin, the future Emperor Huizong, who reigned from 1100 to 1126, employs the messenger Gao Qiu because of his great skills as a cuju player.

Cuju was associated with enjoyment and happiness. The cuju player “does not aspire to fame and profit, but delights in strolling around at leisure”, according to one writer from the Song period. Another states that the sport “releases tension, raises the spirits and helps one to forget the pains and troubles of the busy world. It dissolves hardened energy and matter – qi – and causes the virtuous heart to become gentle and beautiful.”

The members of the cuju societies contrasted the hardship, toil and grief of the daily grind with the peace of mind and contented heart – xin – of a cuju player. It was further argued that cuju strengthened the body, helped digestion and combatted obesity, and was also good for invigorating the body in old age. It was likewise said to be a remedy for emaciation and consumption.

Cuju seems to have been regarded as a sort of panacea for all kinds of ills, having a profoundly positive physical, mental and even spiritual impact. The game also appears to have had a moral and ethical aspect. Most of the cuju societies promoted the key Confucian virtues of benevolence, propriety, courtesy, wisdom and sincerity.

One cuju manual did, however, point out the dangers of “chattering, gambling, quarrels and fights, self-opinionatedness, rudeness, deceitfulness, bad-temperedness, litigiousness, debauchery, alcohol and womanising”. This suggests that these might have been problems associated with the game! There are also examples of cuju being linked with entertainment and drinking, and the literature reveals that there were many informal games that were perhaps more like a park kick-about among friends.

The Hongwu Emperor, the first Ming ruler, went as far as banning cuju altogether because it was a distraction from work and military training. Those caught playing could pay a heavy penalty: having a foot cut off.

With the emphasis on military training, cuju all but disappeared in official contexts, as sports such as horse riding were preferred as an adjunct to such training. A form of cuju played on ice also seems to have been encouraged at this time, but did not prove to be popular. Given the severity of the punishment for playing cuju, it is perhaps not surprising that the long tradition of playing the game during the Hanshi and Qingming festivals also died out, as did the cuju societies. Even so, just as has been the case everywhere else in the world where football and other sports have been banned, records show that people still continued to play cuju informally.

Following internal rebellions and foreign invasions, notably from Western empires, Chinese society became fractured. The social stability that had allowed cuju to flourish in previous centuries disappeared completely. As the Western occupiers became more influential in China from the mid-19th century, they also brought with them Western sports, including athletics. Cuju became little more than a traditional folk memory.

Cuju’s place in the cultural heritage of China is reflected in both poetry and stories. One famous example is the short story Wang Shixiu, one of the 431 written by Pu Songling (1640-1715) in his “Strange Tales from Liaozhai”. The story features Wang and his father. Natives of Luzhou, both of them were skilled cuju players, but when Wang’s father was 40 years old, he drowned while crossing the Qiantang River. Eight or nine years later when Wang was on his way to Hunan, he anchored his boat on Dongting Lake. Listen to the story by clicking on the play button below…

Modern sports such as association football, athletics, basketball and table tennis dominated the Chinese sporting scene from the early 1900s, not least due to the influence of the Young Men’s Christian Association on China’s education system. In the late 1950s, a few Chinese historians began to unearth the history of the ancient game, but it was not until the 1980s that significant research into cuju was undertaken at Chinese universities. As China sought to become a major force in world football, it revisited the history of cuju and the Linzi Football Museum was opened in 2015, showcasing the culture of the game.

To the modern eye, cuju appears to be a fusion of contemporary sports – basketball, football and volleyball all spring to mind – and the fact that an ancient game can bear comparison to modern sports is perhaps one of cuju’s greatest historical legacies. But simply drawing parallels with modern sports does little justice to the role that cuju played in Chinese society for the best part of two millennia. There was no single, definitive form of cuju played during that time and, depending on the version, the purpose could be either to win a match or merely to demonstrate ball skills. But aside from unravelling the mechanics of the game, our interest also lies in the culture of a people that allowed ball sports to flourish over such an extended period of time. While no case can be made that cuju influenced any of the modern ball games codified in the 19th century, its adaptability and enduring appeal show an innate desire within humans to play games with a ball. Cuju also demonstrated that, given the right conditions, this innate desire could lead to an extraordinary level of sophistication. That cuju was able to develop into such a sophisticated game is a reflection of China’s long history. Extended periods of political stability and economic prosperity saw the game flourish and embed itself into the popular culture of both its rulers and its people, so that even after periods of instability and decline, it was able to re-emerge. Even today, after 400 years in the shadows, its cultural value is once again a source of pride for the Chinese nation and since 2015 cuju now even has its own museum.

<h2 data-gtm-vis-recent-on-screen-1381128="" data-gtm-vis-first-on-screen-1381128="" data-gtm-vis-total-visible-time-1381128="" data-gtm-vis-has-fired-1381128="">CARE FOR MORE?</h2> Travel the world and discover the fascinating pre-histories of football in ancient Greece and Rome, Meso-America and Japan by clickling on the button below.