Hello everyone, I was just wondering if there was ever an ancient Siamese fighting style, or Thai art of spying and espionage similar to the ninja or ninjutsu?
Why not? Did Thailand never have spies? Do you know if anyone teaches Ninjutsu in Thailand, or if there is any martial art in Thailand that is similar to guerrilla warfare tactics? Or maybe a Thai style that is more evasive and less physical in nature than Muay Boran?
Martial arts and tactical warfare are two distinctly seperate subjects at this day and age, although may have been linked in the past. Even if there are places that teach them now, they would likely be obsolete tactics because of modern warfare. Every country in Asia at some point or another has likely had a subersive group who's objective it was to steal/kill or otherwise do things that only small subersive units could do. If you want more information recommend e mailing a professor of Asian military history, rather than martial artists. While we can give you some answers, an in depth view may already have been written by someone more knowledgeable.
Spying is probably the oldest occupation, followed by maybe prostitution, so it's been prevalent across many societies and cultures. That being a body of knowledge or skill that is codified and systemic about spying, sabotage, and assasination? That is a lot rarer and it may be (until any other knowledge emerges) that Japan was alone in the world where bodies of men specifically grew up to train in these skills as a profession. This was done out of historical circumstance, culture and any number of distinct reasons. Remember also: yes there were groups Iga men and Koga men, who were famed as being specialist in these skills, but often enough ninjutsu was treated as 'special forces/subterfuge' training for certain samurai as well. Be careful what you 'mean' by shinobi/ninja... To give you an example: the longbow was not a weapon that totally was unique to the British isles it could be found around europe as a hunting weapon, and yet Britain was the only place where distinct bodies of men, acting in regular armies or mercenaries were employed on a regular basis in warfare with a specialisation in the longbow, because again due to history and cultural circumstance - Englishmen/ welshmen were required by royal decree to practice regularly and nobles to provide a certain numbers of trained archers, and the cultural practice actually stuck and because its was difficult to master you had to learn from childhood to stand any chance of using this skill on the battlefield effectively. Skeletons of medieval men show massive deformations on the drawring arm which has been asserted is due to training with this weapon. This has an interesting parralel with ninjutsu because if the writings of Fujita Seiko and Gingetsu Itoh are correct, and when you compare their writings against Takamatsu's own interviews in the 1960's then regarding Ninjutsu, it seems training was passed on at an early childhood age through ascetic training and special physical conditioning that would enable you later on in life to make the most of ninjutsu techniques that would be later taught as an adult. Again this was systemic and was a cultural practice distinct in japan for reasons which I believe had very much to do with the fragmented nature of the various prefactures and clans which vied for power in japan, where knowing where the political balance of power was shifting became a matter of survival, and people/groups/families who excelled in intelligence gathering became prized and passed on their skills to others, thereby broadening and deepening the skillsets with every new member taught. And where there is passing on of skill, there is usually codification of these skills. (Though arghhhhhhhh kuden! Kuden! Dammit!!!!!) Move forward to Europe - 17th century. The french King creates 'le secret du Rois' a network of 36 skilled agents, a secret diplomatic channel of talented individuals who are charged with wandering about european courts, listening out, plotting, stealing information and sending coded medsages back to france, which included not a few skilled swordsmen such as for example cross dressing Chevalier D'Eon, who was probably one of the deadliest duellists in europe to boot. These were spies in effect, all of them had vast ranges of skill in subterfuge and in a few instances self defence. But they were NOT ninja, they were individuals involved in subterfuge. Move forward again: Napoleonic era: During the peninsula war in Spain Wellington had a number of 'exploratory officers' which he picked from his men which had particular skills : horse riding, ability to converse in spanish and blend in with the population if necessary, fast sketchers of geography, fortifications, troop movements, as well as being able to shoot and fight with a blade and pistol on horseback, and use topography to keep out of sight of french scouting parties. Many of these skills are all but identical to what ninjas would have practiced. But it isn't ninjutsu. It wasn't codfied or passed on as a body of knowledge. Futhermore they were not technically spies. Many of them wore a uniform under greatcoats or waterproof mantels in order that they could claim not to be spies if caught ( the penalty for a spy or a frac tireur out of uniform was often summary exercution. If they were lucky....)
the closet thing and its not even close would be like some muay thai chiya some muay boran and krabi krabong but like i said those wouldnt even be close
Closest you would get is to study the pichai songkram the thai manual of warfare, some of the old school instructors teach parts of it.
