You will find that a majority of kicks in Clasiscal Karate and Okinawan Kata etc were original taught to delivered no higher than Gedan (Lower) level, Chudan (Middle) was a "rare" technique in Kata/Karate.

I believe, please correct me if I am wrong, that it wasn't until the popularity of Tae Kwon Do did Japanese Karate start to add Chudan (Middle) and Jodan (High/head) Kicks to its arsenal.

I also believe that Tobo Geri Waza (Jumping Kicks) again was a quite recent development within Traditional/Modern Karate

Funny Ken, my old TKD teacher once said that at the beginning of the 20th century there were hardly any known Martial Artists who had the ability and know-how to kick head height.

I've read that Gigo Funakoshi, son of Gichin Funakoshi (founder of Shotokan) was widely credited with "nipponizing" his fathers karate by blending it with Kendo movements and adding in higher kicks. TKD was based on Shotokan, so perhaps that is where it stems from?? I don't know enough about it so all I can do is speculate.

Shotokan Origins

<< Gigo Funakoshi, son of Gichin Funakoshi (founder of Shotokan) was widely credited with "nipponizing" his fathers karate by blending it with Kendo movements and adding in higher kicks. >>

Did you just imply there are kicks in Kendo?

Lol! No. Not unless I've been watching the wrong Kendo. Certainly I think some of the stances of Shotokan may come from Kendo, but I'm not an expert in Karate or Kendo history. Where the high kicks come from, who knows? I've came across Gigo Funakoshi's name in the past regarding additions to modern Karate, such as high kicks.

I thought many of the high the kicks in TKD came from styles like Taekyon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taekyon

Further on from this would anyone use a Jodan Mawashi Geri (Round kick to the head) or a Tobi Ushiro Mawashi Geri Jodan (Jumping spinning back round kick - made famous by Jean Claude Van Dame) in a fight/street situation

A paid stunt man would

I think someone on here (Fileboy possibly, but don't quote me on that) used a head kick against an attacker before.

There are a few examples of professional MMA fights whereby fighters have won with head kicks. That may not have been the "fight" you had in mind though Ken!:

There are those that will say that the roundhouse kick at any level wasn't really included in the beginning in Okinawan karate.This will probably anger some, but in the beginning it was low level mae geri and yoko geri.This isn't to say that the roundhouse isn't a great and effective, but it's use came into play when karate got "sportized."I'm not saying roundhouse kicks are bad but the evolved out of competition karate.

Mark

I have been told that some okinawan style only taught the front kick. This fall my Okinawan instructor taught us several different types of front kick based on the "old" way of doing things.
If I remember correctly they were all done with the big toe-proper conditioning required. He can literally get up on his toes and walk across the room.
One kick involved raking across the leg with the intend of cutting the skin with your toe nail. The nail being dirty and these techniques being before the development of anti-biotics the chance of infection was good.
Another involved curling the toe over and behind the crease of the junction between the leg and lower torso hitting a nerve that hurts and makes you want to sit down.
It would be interesting to know the history of the roundhouse kick. Did it start as a slapping kick (with the instep) then evolve into a toe or ball of the foot kick, was it the other way around or did it evolve differently depending on where it was "invented".


Duane