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Kettlebell Why is a Turkish get up called a Turkish get up

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Not mentioned in the linked thread, but the story I heard from Steve Maxwell directly, if memory serves, was that in Turkey, if a boy was interested in wrestling, they'd explain the getup and tell him to come back when he could do it with 100 lbs, at which point they considered him ready to begin wrestling training. I'm remembering this from 2003 so no guarantees that I got it right.

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Steve Freides said:
Not mentioned in the linked thread, but the story I heard from Steve Maxwell directly, if memory serves, was that in Turkey, if a boy was interested in wrestling, they'd explain the getup and tell him to come back when he could do it with 100 lbs, at which point they considered him ready to begin wrestling training. I'm remembering this from 2003 so no guarantees that I got it right.

-S-
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I read a similar story in one of Pavel's books, but it was Circus Strongmen, not Wrestlers. When training apprentices they would first teach them the TGU and then tell them to only come back for further training when they could do it with 100lbs. It would take the apprentice strongmen months to achieve this, which not only developed the strength for more advanced training but also self-discipline.
 
NormanOsborn said:
I read a similar story in one of Pavel's books, but it was Circus Strongmen, not Wrestlers. When training apprentices they would first teach them the TGU and then tell them to only come back for further training when they could do it with 100lbs. It would take the apprentice strongmen months to achieve this, which not only developed the strength for more advanced training but also self-discipline.
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Testimony to the GPP nature of the getup.

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Papa Georgio said:
I have a feeling we've been down this road before
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watchnerd said:
Same poster, in fact.
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Folks, I read the earlier thread - thank you for the link - but I feel we didn't really answer the question then, and we are answering it now.

Repeated topics are inevitable on our forum. One of the things it's nice to do, if you are aware of earlier threads on a subject you wish to start a new thread about, is simply include links to some of those earlier threads in your post.

Thanks, everyone.

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Giving a carefully selected foreign label to an exercise or system of training can make it seem more exotic. Thus, the foreign label can be a form of marketing. When modern style yoga group classes were invented in the early 20th century to promote Indian nationalism to the rest of the world, the founders borrowed freely from areas like British gymnastics. And in the US, basic fighting technique will sometimes be given a foreign gloss. When I was a child, I bought a self defense book from an ad in the back of a comic book. The book took basic western boxing techniques and presented them as exotic Asian secrets. I respect yoga and martial arts and the Turkish Get Up, but the names/labels given to these practices are less important to me than what I can achieve by practicing them.
 
Calling it the Get Up in no way changes the effectiveness of the exercise anyway. I mean, most of us abbreviate Simple and Sinister to just S&S. ;)
 
I'm VERY interested in history, and in fact teaching it is part of my profession. From the start I've wanted to find out where both the move and its name came from. The only _reliable_ way to go about this is to find the earliest depictions, descriptions and mentions of the move, and find out what it was called at the time and where. If someone has this information, I would LOVE to have it! By the way, the first _recorded_ evidence for the move and its name does not mean that this is actually the origin of it, just that it's the best we can do as far as approaching its origin. I certainly have my thoughts though, this move being a near daily part of my life and passion for the past 4+ years!

1. Exotic names are given to things you do in your own culture simply to label them in some way. Maybe they originate in the other culture and maybe for some reason people in your culture _think_ they originate in the other culture. Think of things like "French kissing", "The English Vice" (sorry, trying to be humorous here...), I quite doubt these things have much or anything to do with specific countries! The Turks were a mighty power in Europe for a thousand years, so associating some impressive feat of strength with them would "fit" now wouldn't it! But "Greco-Roman" wrestling was never practiced by either a Greek or a Roman. I kind of doubt that the Turkish Getup really has anything to do with Turkey. If it did, I think we'd already have plenty of evidence right from Turkey explaining this, but this evidence certainly isn't jumping out at us... so I kind of doubt the Turkish connection.

2. The move seems very "performance" oriented. It's the kind of thing you need if you're doing a gymnastics or acrobatic display holding something in your hand no matter how heavy or light! If you're holding a ribbon in your hand, you'll still have to use this move to get up from lying on your back right up stiff onto your feet without using the gripping hand to balance yourself on the ground! I'd thus attribute this move to circus performers and acrobats. You can even do it with a (lighter) human replacing the kettlebell! I also doubt that this move was associated specifically with the kettlebell, but I don't think anyone is making this claim anyway. In Brazilian Jiu-jitsu you do this move as a kind of get-up defence against an attacker! I actually doubt they learned it from gymnasts - it's just common sense!

3. Acrobatics and gymnastics were a highly cultivated art in virtually every civilization on earth from the Mayas to the Egyptians to the Chinese to the Romans to the Hindus. Basically put, people made a living entertaining others with amazing acrobatic feats. The TGU is one of those acrobatic feats, one of the basic ones - how to get up gracefully from your back holding something in your hand. More recently, this move seems to be associated with acrobatic circus-type performances and there are stories of apprentices of either weight lifting or acrobatics or even wrestling being told to master the movement on their own before coming in for more formal training.

4. In any case, the movement itself is a performance-acrobatic one, like I said above: one of getting up off your back gracefully holding something in your hand, so my suspicions put it in as one particular acrobatic move that got noticed by more strength-oriented people, maybe indeed when strong men rubbed elbows with acrobats in 19th Century circuses, and it has more recently been taken note of by Pavel, and now we're doing it DAILY!

5. I do not think it is a new move in any way. I would strongly suspect all cultures with performance gymanstics/acrobatics had the move all the way from prehistoric times.
 
Timmer C said:
Giving a carefully selected foreign label to an exercise or system of training can make it seem more exotic. Thus, the foreign label can be a form of marketing. When modern style yoga group classes were invented in the early 20th century to promote Indian nationalism to the rest of the world, the founders borrowed freely from areas like British gymnastics. And in the US, basic fighting technique will sometimes be given a foreign gloss. When I was a child, I bought a self defense book from an ad in the back of a comic book. The book took basic western boxing techniques and presented them as exotic Asian secrets. I respect yoga and martial arts and the Turkish Get Up, but the names/labels given to these practices are less important to me than what I can achieve by practicing them.
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Don't worry, judo and kendo have plenty of Western wrestling and fencing intentionally put into them!
 
NormanOsborn said:
I read a similar story in one of Pavel's books, but it was Circus Strongmen, not Wrestlers. When training apprentices they would first teach them the TGU and then tell them to only come back for further training when they could do it with 100lbs. It would take the apprentice strongmen months to achieve this, which not only developed the strength for more advanced training but also self-discipline.
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Yes - Pavel mentioned it in ETK- that became my driving force to complete a full set (5 on each side) of TGU's with the Beast - took a long time but well worth the journey.
 
Not sure about the full history. But from what I gathered over the years is that this was originally developed by Persian wrestlers. But they did not stand up with it. Do this side to side rolling with what can best be described as doors turned into exercise equipment. It's possible that over the centuries of wars between the Persians and the Turks, the Turks learned about the Persian wrestling practices and exercise and modified it.... And it would seem like the USA has then taken it and made even more modifications...

but this is all conjecture.
 
cwheeler33 said:
Not sure about the full history. But from what I gathered over the years is that this was originally developed by Persian wrestlers. But they did not stand up with it. Do this side to side rolling with what can best be described as doors turned into exercise equipment. It's possible that over the centuries of wars between the Persians and the Turks, the Turks learned about the Persian wrestling practices and exercise and modified it.... And it would seem like the USA has then taken it and made even more modifications...

but this is all conjecture.
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I know that, and other variants, are the common origin story -- a vaguely Indo-Persian wrestler training move.

But I always thought it was just as likely that the "Turkish" nomenclature was invented in the days of leopard-skin-wearing circus strongmen to make an exotic descriptor for this Eastern-origin move.

"What sounds best? Egyptian get up? No, we already have too many Egyptian theme things with the mummy exhibit. Persian get up? But the magician's trick cat is a Persian cat....hey, what about Turkish? "
 
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cwheeler33 said:
Not sure about the full history. But from what I gathered over the years is that this was originally developed by Persian wrestlers. But they did not stand up with it. Do this side to side rolling with what can best be described as doors turned into exercise equipment. It's possible that over the centuries of wars between the Persians and the Turks, the Turks learned about the Persian wrestling practices and exercise and modified it.... And it would seem like the USA has then taken it and made even more modifications...

but this is all conjecture.
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The persian roll-up move with the exercise shield/board is a real thing, but I doubt there is any link between this and the getup.
The getup is a performance gymnastics move. They'd have had it in Persia amongst performance gymnasts, if they had any.
 
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