3 Counties Shotokan Karate Club

The two Chinese characters Kara and Te make up the ideographs in Japan for the word Karate, and thus denote that it is of Chinese origin. It appears that this evidence points towards the fact that Karate was practiced in China 1st before it was ever practised in Japan or the Ryukyu Islands. It is known that in the 6th century an Indian Buddhist Monk, Bodhidharma, journeyed from Asia to China. His role was to establish the Zen School of Buddhism. Bodhidharma travelled to the Shaolin Temple where his teaching started. Many of the monks were very weak and found such physical exercise too exhausting.