Coreeda

Australian Traditional Wrestling. Archived content from the now inactive coreedaoz.com

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Coreeda as a sporting activity is divided into two equally important components, coreeda dance and coreeda combat. The dance component, which is mostly based on traditional kangaroo dance steps, is the intitial warm up ritual and gives competitors an opportunity to display their abilities in strength, speed and agility. Divided into three one minute segments the idea is that the competitors can only touch the ground with their hands & feet and must stay within the boundary of a 4.5m diameter yellow 'sun' circle.

The first segment continues unless one of the competitors falls, crosses the line of the circle or they cease maintaining continuous motion. The second segment allows competitors to try and trip, sweep or bump into their opponent again while maintaining a continuous one minute motion and has been likened in appearence to the Brazilian combat dance of capoeira. The third segment is more like a sumo match in which competitors try to push each other outside the circle or make the other touch the ground with any part of their body other than their hands or feet. The dance is important for detirmining which position the competitors will take in the combat component.

Coreeda combat is divided into four rounds or quarters, each lasting a maximum of two minutes. The winner of the dance component can choose which position they will start with, inside the circle, known as the defender, or outside the circle, known as the attacker. The role of the attacker is to try and force the defender outside the boundary of the sun circle by means of pushing, throwing or rolling them, all within a time limit of twenty seconds. Naturally the role of the defender is to restrain the attacker within the sun circle for longer than the twenty second time count. Such a victory, known as a decider, ends the quarter but a point score is collected during competition which is accumulated for the two minutes in case no decider is scored. Competitors swap positions each quarter and the point score is maintained until the end of the match.

One other thing that differentiates coreeda from most other styles of wrestling is that it is a team sport and competitors add to the total team score with the points they have achieved in their match ups. Teams are made of six competitors representing each of the weight divisions, which are named after a species of macropod; pademelons <60kg, potoroos <70kg, wallabies <80kg, greys <90kg, reds <100kg and boomers in the open weight division. Teams are further divided into two moeties, black and red, which are the colours on the Aboriginal flag and the uniforms signify this. Coreeda is a fast and effective combat sport that not only builds reflexes to prepare the body for potential conflict but is also great fun to play. 

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Coreeda is an exciting sporting development that is bringing awareness of the traditional martial arts of Australia.

[coreeda-coreeda]

'Coreeda' wrestling is an ancient martial art, practised today. What was developed along a timeless aboriginal storyline, Ancient Coreeda wrestling has inspired me, and I only feel obligated to share it. Please Enjoy!! & Spread the Word!!

[wrestlingroots]

Coreeda

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Coreeda is a style of wrestling based on Aboriginal dance, kangaroo fighting and cultural combat.

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From the Dreaming to the Dreamers : The Australian Wrestling Tradition

Two unarmed men face each other across a circular arena ready to do battle in the world's oldest sport. They are fighting for honour, love, country or a myriad other reasons. It's a sport that has survived from long before the Ancient Greeks right through to the modern Olympics.

Australian wrestler and coach Gavin Dickson knows the sport from inside and outside the ring. He follows the grapplers down the centuries and in every corner of the globe in a fascinating historical study of a subject written about for the first time from an Australian viewpoint.

His enthralling account ranges over indigenous wrestling, the colonial era, unarmed combat in Europe, the Americas and the Orient, the ancient Egyptians and even the odd world of professional wrestling tailored for television. He takes us inside the world of Olympic wrestling and the numerous martial arts practiced in Australia long before the white man brought his version of the sport.

Gavin writes as much for the general public as for wrestling enthusiasts in a story sure to change perceptions of a long ignored, yet fascinating sporting tradition.

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Could there be an Australian answer to karate, taekwondo or jiu-jitsu?

Broome resident Brenton McKenna hopes a new sport developed after a decade observing animals' aggressive behaviour will help revive Indigenous self-defence.

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You can break our bones and kill us

Bring us to our knees

Take away our children

Against a mother's pleas

But you stop the Dreaming never

The Dreamtime is eternal, forever

 What is Coreeda?

As much as it is a fun sporting activity, Coreeda also sends out a spiritual message that as you read this I hope you are receptive to. The human heritage of Australia is ancient and it is often said we have the oldest continuous living cultures on the planet. This is as true for our martial arts as it is for our song and dance forms or even our storylines and folklore, therefore describing customs as 30, 40 or even 50,000 years old is a valid scientific claim. At the Coreeda Association we believe we are reviving a sporting tradition with an antiquity that stretches back to the beginning of a human presence on the Australian continent but also we are actively building links with indigenous cultures from across the world through the universal activity of traditional wrestling. If you are proud to call yourself an Australian and can accept that as a people our heritage extends back further than 1788 then we invite you to join us in this journey. Together we can change perceptions and break down the barriers that presently divide us.  As the Buddhist saying goes, "if you want to know your past, look into your present conditions, if you want to know your future, look into your present actions" and the best way to understand the current status of Australian wrestling is to know its history. You can do this by reading the first ever book written about the Australian wrestling tradition "From the Dreaming to the Dreamers" which covers the history of the sporting genre from the most ancient times to the present day. With chapters dedicated to the pre-colonial and colonial periods, as well as the history of Professional Wrestling, Olympic Wrestling, Judo and the wide array of traditional wrestling styles that have been played in Australia, it is available online at Sid Harta Publishers;

http://sidharta.com/books/index.jsp;jsessionsid=4661FE2FEE062C33175E26F44DE8442?uid=66

Or if you contact us directly at this site an autographed copy can posted to you for the low price of $30 plus P & H but please hurry because it is a limited edition and stocks are now low.Coreeda is an exciting sporting development that is bringing awareness of the traditional martial arts of Australia. Initially we are doing this through a sport that combines Aboriginal dance with a unique wrestling game, similar to the sports that were played in pre-colonial times. Eventually we will be introducing weapons use into the curriculum under the guidance of experienced traditional practitioners but for now we are focusing only on unarmed combat training. We consider coreeda to be the traditional form of wrestling of Australia, much as sumo functions in Japan, schwingen in Switzerland, ssireum in Korea, glima in Iceland, bukh in Mongolia or any of the traditional cultural combat sports from around the world and we are wanting to grow the sport around the whole continent of Australia. The Coreeda Association also intends to act as a pivot to encourage the people involved in the multiple styles of grappling combat sports in Australia to work together for mutual support and become a kind of "Community of Wrestlers" in which a greater degree of communication can be achieved between the organising associations, federations and unions. Coreeda as a sporting activity is divided into two equally important components, coreeda dance and coreeda combat. The dance component, which is mostly based on traditional kangaroo dance steps, is the intitial warm up ritual and gives competitors an opportunity to display their abilities in strength, speed and agility. Divided into three one minute segments the idea is that the competitors can only touch the ground with their hands & feet and must stay within the boundary of a 4.5m diameter yellow 'sun' circle. The first segment continues unless one of the competitors falls, crosses the line of the circle or they cease maintaining continuous motion. The second segment allows competitors to try and trip, sweep or bump into their opponent again while maintaining a continuous one minute motion and has been likened in appearence to the Brazilian combat dance of capoeira. The third segment is more like a sumo match in which competitors try to push each other outside the circle or make the other touch the ground with any part of their body other than their hands or feet. The dance is important for detirmining which position the competitors will take in the combat component.  Coreeda combat is divided into four rounds or quarters, each lasting a maximum of two minutes. The winner of the dance component can choose which position they will start with, inside the circle, known as the defender, or outside the circle, known as the attacker. The role of the attacker is to try and force the defender outside the boundary of the sun circle by means of pushing, throwing or rolling them, all within a time limit of twenty seconds. Naturally the role of the defender is to restrain the attacker within the sun circle for longer than the twenty second time count. Such a victory, known as a decider, ends the quarter but a point score is collected during competition which is accumulated for the two minutes in case no decider is scored. Competitors swap positions each quarter and the point score is maintained until the end of the match.  One other thing that differentiates coreeda from most other styles of wrestling is that it is a team sport and competitors add to the total team score with the points they have achieved in their match ups. Teams are made of six competitors representing each of the weight divisions, which are named after a species of macropod; pademelons <60kg, potoroos <70kg, wallabies <80kg, greys <90kg, reds <100kg and boomers in the open weight division. Teams are further divided into two moeties, black and red, which are the colours on the Aboriginal flag and the uniforms signify this. Coreeda is a fast and effective combat sport that not only builds reflexes to prepare the body for potential conflict but is also great fun to play. In April 2012 the SBS TV Aboriginal Affairs Program "Living Black" produced a story about Coreeda that gives a good indication of the activity, which you can watch via this link;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjuZ-DLDnPI

 This Vimeo production by Michael Copp also gives a good basis for coreeda and you can watch it via this link;

http://vimeo.com/18814133

 Some of the boys that attended a Coreeda Seminar in 2012 put this video together and I think it captures the spirit of the sport well;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nMjKh66xCM

Also a great friend of the Coreeda Association, the photographer and ethnographer Christopher Samuels put together this wonderful presentation in 2013; christophersamuel.com.au/the-way-coreeda-australia/ 

In January 2014 we travelled to Mornington Island in the Gulf of Carpentaria to introduce the sport to the kids up there and a film crew from NITV follow us for this story  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejOOj4bOqJ0

 In March 2014 the International TV Sports Journal Trans World Sport did this story on us

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXquEqXu1LM

 In September 2014 a man on an international martial arts quest Sascha Wagener included us in his documentary series, No Journeys End

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oInhDv2LC1k

Are you interested?

To find out more about coreeda explore this website, learn about the genuine history of Australian martial arts, discover where you can watch performances or even enrol in a class. For any Australian who is interested in reconnecting with their own cultural identity, an identity that extends back before British colonisation, coreeda is the perfect way of doing this. At the same time you get fit, learn to defend yourself and make new friends in an absolute win win situation.