I'm a fan of mixed martial arts. I don't so much watch it for the bloodied faces and hammer fists, but instead to appreciate the huge display of martial arts styles that get pitted against each other. I love seeing a karate expert face a muay thai fighter, or a wrestler face a boxer. Fighters have to round out their weak points and create a full profile covering striking, grappling, clinching, and a ground game.
I love the long history and wide international reach of hand-to-hand martial arts. Virtually every society has some kind of martial art, some evolution of many years and adaptation of martial arts from elsewhere. MMA puts those martial arts together in a venue where the only measure of a style's success is whether it subdues its opponent.
I put together a guide that shows the styles with their country and year of origin and laid it out in a quadrant between striking and grappling, east and west. Consider this a tribute to the variety and long history of martial arts.
