Bak Mei — the Style Named After the Traitor
Bak Mei carries the name of the monk who, in the legend, betrayed Shaolin. The documented style begins with one man: Cheung Lai Chuen (1882–1964).
Contents
Bak Mei (白眉, Cantonese Pak Mei, “white eyebrow”) is a singular case among the southern Chinese martial arts: it is the only well-known style named after a traitor.
In the story of the destruction of the southern Shaolin temple, the monk Bak Mei is one of the Five Elders — and he is the one who sides with the Qing and betrays the temple. In the same narrative world, Hung Gar and Wing Chun count as arts of the resistance. That a system should name itself after the opposing figure is remarkable, and schools interpret it in different ways.
Historically the style becomes tangible at a single point: Cheung Lai Chuen (張禮泉, 1882–1964).
History
Bak Mei comes from the world of the Hakka, the population of the uplands around Huizhou in Guangdong province. The Hakka systems form a recognisable technical neighbourhood — close range, solid stances, work along the forearm — and Bak Mei clearly belongs to it.
Cheung Lai Chuen trained first in other systems, among them Lee Gar and Lung Ying (dragon style), before learning Bak Mei. What he did next is the actual historical event: he organised the material into a teaching system, gave it a fixed canon of forms and taught it publicly — in Guangzhou and later in Hong Kong, including in military and police circles. A transmission within a narrow circle became a style with schools, students and successors.
For the period before Cheung Lai Chuen, what holds for most southern Chinese systems holds here: the lineages are transmitted orally, written evidence is absent, and the Five Elders story is a legend with a datable spread rather than a documentary finding. That does not devalue the style — it only shifts what can be claimed about it.
Technical basis
Bak Mei is a pronounced close-range style. Anyone who knows the southern basic posture will find it here in concentrated form: the fight takes place at forearm length, and power comes not from the distance the fist travels but from the body behind it.
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 吞吐浮沉 (tan tou fau cham) | swallow, spit, float, sink — the four directions of power |
| Six powers (六勁) | as the schools give them: teeth, neck, waist, back, hand, step |
| Phoenix-eye fist | fist with the middle-finger knuckle protruding, a small striking surface |
| Bridge hands | forearm contact as sensing, deflecting and striking surface |
| Ghost step (鬼步) | short, low footwork for changing distance |
The pair swallow and spit describes not breathing in a figurative sense but the movement of the torso: drawing in absorbs the opponent’s force and shortens the target, expelling returns it. Float and sink add the vertical. Together this produces a movement picture that looks small from outside and whose effect lies inside the body.
Core techniques
- Short fist at forearm length — the strike begins not from the extended arm but from the already bent one
- Phoenix-eye fist — concentrates the effect on a small surface; it demands a trained hand shape, or it injures the striker
- Simultaneous deflection and strike — one hand clears, the other lands, on the same beat
- Sinking into the stance — a downward shift of weight as the source of power rather than winding up
- Short footwork — changing distance without large displacement, so that close range is preserved
The set of forms is compact and cumulative; the best known basic form is Jik Bo (直步, “straight step”), which runs the principle through in its simplest arrangement.
Connections to other martial arts
- Nanquan — the collective term Bak Mei falls under; the features of the southern systems are especially pronounced here
- Hung Gar and Wing Chun — the same legendary world, but on the other side of the story
- Lung Ying (dragon style) and southern praying mantis — the closest technical neighbours in the Hakka region; Cheung Lai Chuen was trained in dragon style
- Tanglangquan — the northern praying mantis, an entirely different system despite the similar name
- Choy Li Fut — the southern counter-design: wide arcs instead of close range
Today
Bak Mei is taught above all in Hong Kong, Guangdong and the Chinese diaspora, as well as in Europe and North America. It is markedly less widespread than Hung Gar or Wing Chun, schools are correspondingly smaller, and lineage matters more.
Bak Mei did not feed into competition nanquan — which fits its design: a style whose effect lies in barely visible movements of the torso is structurally ill-suited to a discipline judged on visibility.
Anyone starting out should know that close range is the precondition of the training rather than its result: without partner work at forearm length, all that remains of the style is the form.