Bassai Dai Lineage to GKR

The first to teach the kata (as ‘Passai’). As he taught this to students from different cities of Okinawa it is now practiced by many different styles. In each style, the basic pattern of the kata remains the same but over the years the techniques (and even stances) have changed greatly from style to style.

A student of Sokon Matsumura’s, taught the kata to his student – Gichen Funakoshi. Yatsutsune also developed a sister kata (‘Passai-sho’), and changed the name of the original ‘Passai’ to ‘Passai-dai’. He also altered the appearance of Passai-dai.

Founded Shotokan karate (incorporating both Passai kata, but changed the name ‘Passai’ to ‘Bassai’). The kata itself was altered again. And over the next few decades altered greatly. For example, many of the crescent kicks were once foot sweeps.

While Bassai-dai shows up in almost all karate styles, GKR derives its Bassai-dai from Shotokan karate.