Capoeira: The History of an Afro-Brazilian Martial Art

THE CONTEXT OF THE BLACK ATLANTIC 55
Morengy in Madagascar also counts on bare-knuckle boxing as a basic fighting technique. Many styles
exist among the over 40 different ethnic groups of the island. The additional use of the feet is only permitted
in some regions, for instance in the variety known as watsa on the northwestern coast. In some other areas
only fighting with feet is permitted. 118
Moringue was practised on the island of Réunion until the 1950s and was revitalized after 1989. It is also
attributed to the slaves who came to the island to toil on French plantations. According to Jean-René
Dreinaza, one of the island’s authorities on the topic and the main person responsible for the art’s recent reemergence,
moringue started with the clenched fist challenge, the earth ritual consisting of smearing mud or
rubbing dust on one’s body before fighting, and the ritual chest butt as a test of strength. Contrary to most
of its cognates on Comoros and Madagascar, moringue only uses kicks, but not punches. Many of its
movements strongly resemble those of capoeira. For instance, the strike with the heel of the foot, the talon
zirondelles, corresponds to the technique known as the rabo de arraia in capoeira. Powe acknowledges an
original link with the local religion maloya, but also how the art became increasingly profane. Prize matches
have thus been central to its practice. As in Brazil, the social background of moringue adepts expanded
substantially during the nineteenth century to include other social and ethnic groups (Indians and the mixed
population). The social context of moringue in former times also varied accordingly: sometimes it happened
in front of a store, sometimes in the back of a market, in the ring destined for cockfights. It was perceived as
a creole art and for that reason attacked by authorities and francophile elites. 119
This cursory review of the main martial art form in the African Indian Ocean allows some conclusions.
First, one has to acknowledge the variety of techniques: some variants use only fists, others only the feet
and many use both resources. This is matched by the variety of social contexts and cultural meanings.
Religion—if it once was—does not now seem to be a central feature in most cases, although combat games
are preceded by rituals invoking spiritual protection. Prize-matches with referees instead seem to constitute
the central aspect in all of them, and in many instances a modern band has replaced the original drums.
Furthermore, the association of these arts with slaves in both Comoros and Réunion (and in Madagascar
eventually with ethnic groups proceeding from Mozambique) suggests that moringue and mrengé are the
result of the slave trade and the plantation economy. Despite their location in the Indian Ocean, these arts
belong therefore to the combat games of the Black Atlantic. Like their Brazilian cognate capoeira, they are
already creole developments. Thus once again, a rigid distinction between ‘African’ and ‘creole’ is not
helpful for understanding their historical development.
This is also the case of bassula, another twentieth-century Angolan combat game for which some basic
documentation exists. Câmara Cascudo, even though taking on board the theory of n’golo as the ancestor of
capoeira, discussed bassula, practised by the Auxiluanda people, as another possible origin of the Brazilian
martial art. 120 He even suggested that bassula might have derived from n’golo, although he admittedly
never saw either of them performed, but only heard or read descriptions of combat games. The Axiluanda
resulted from the ‘centuries-old intermingling of Bantu cultures and peoples, mainly Bakongos and
Kimbundus’. 121 They settled along the coast, in fishing villages from Barra do Dande to Corimba (now the
Mussolo) isthmus. Popular at least until the 1960s along that section of the coast, and also in some
muceques (slums) of Luanda, it faded away since independence (1975) and is now considered to be extinct.
Recent iconographic sources suggest that bassula ressembles more a type of wrestling, where opponents
hold each other by the elbows or by the body. Movements include throws and immobilizations, but also
capoeira-like rasteiras.
According to Mestre Kabetula, boys had to learn bassula from their fathers or relatives as a means to face
challenges in their social or professional lives, for instance when fixing fish prices with Portuguese traders,
or resisting assaults by Congolese fishermen. Weapons were also used in the fights, including truncheons,