Jogo do Pau, which means Game of Staff / Stick, is the traditional Portuguese system of combat and self defense, with its origin and main focus being combat in outnumbered scenarios.

Before the creation of fire arms, the conquest and defense of one’s territory involved battles between hundreds of individuals who resorted to swords, arrows and any other weapon or instrument that could be used in battle in these times of medieval survival. 

Therefore, and needing to develop a combat system with weapons not very light (such as swords and wooden and iron objects) to face hundreds of opponents who attacked simultaneously and from anywhere, rotational attacks covering 360 degrees and with great power, as well as the strategic principals for their application against a higher number of opponents were developed. These attacking techniques were not only used as attacks, but also as parries – in motion guards.

One on one duels that arose in non military social contexts were fought and overcome by applying the same combat contents developed for combat in outnumbered scenarios, the origin and essence of this noble art.

This medieval fencing combat system was substituted in its military used by fire arms. Therefore, and since the written documents on it are almost inexistent, it only survived and reached our recent generations due to the fact that Portugal always placed enormous limitations on the acquisition of fire arms by civilians. Hence, in a country which until relatively recent times (less than 100 years) the rural environments were prevalent over the urban ones, the walking staff was maintained and, at the same time, used as a self defense weapon.

It was due to these events that this art, previously applied to all the medieval weapons and any other daily life instrument easily accessible, such as agricultural tools, came to be identified exclusively with staffs, reaching a point that even the name created for it transmitted this same idea: Jogo do Pau (Game of Staff / Stick).

This perspective about the origin and history of Jogo do Pau was developed not only from a logic, although subject, interpretation that we conducted on the relationship between the social environments and the creation of combat techniques, but also due to the objective fact that in the XVth century Portuguese King D.Duarte’s book on jousting and knightly conduct, the names and trajectories that he presents for the strikes with the sword, are the same still used in Jogo do Pau today. 

About the designation Jogo do Pau (Game of Staff / Stick), which I view as hurtful for the art’s identity, I consider that it may have been come about due to one or several of the following situations:

1. In the past it was common to use the verb Jogar (to play) also to designate the action of throwing something. Therefore, it is possible that the activity of knowing how to throw (jogar) the staff towards the opponent came to be known as Jogo do Pau;              
    
2. It was also possible that people might have wanted to deliberately mask the art’s combat essence, since these very useful skills that enable one to overcome conflicts and other dangerous scenarios as such, are easily labelled as grotesque by those fortunate to have lives that protect them from having to deal with such environments; 
    
3. It was also possible that it was just a wrong term that was created and never questioned by anyone, thus persisting over time, like so many other terminology errors in the sports and physical activity area. An example of this is the exercise wrongly termed as squat. Since the prime movers during the positive phase of the movement are the extensors and, at least to my knowledge squat means lowering (flexing) one’s stance the name commonly used is incorrect. If we were to be coherent, the exercise named and biceps would be termed triceps.                            
    

After the creation of big urban centres, as a consequence of the industrial revolution, Jogo do Pau took up a different social function in these locations, being practiced as a leisure activity.

Consequently, it was mainly practiced as a one on one combat system, thus bring about some new different parrying techniques (the direct short range parries) and defensive strategies, such as the cutting counter attacks, in order to allow higher effectiveness in this type of combat.

Additionally, Master Nuno Curvello Russo’s school, in order to maintain the art’s self defense essence and, simultaneously, continue the work initiated by the late Master Pedro Ferreira, conducted the study of the art’s application to more urban type weapons such as the walking cane and the police combat and self defense baton.