Reflexive Perspective: Turkish Oil Wrestling

Here is something I wrote a while back. This was based on wrestling. It was something I started, but this will be a part of Reflexivity for grappling is an art form in culture. Enjoy the read and the videos. i hope you like it.

Grappler's Quest: Turkey  
History & Analysis of Yagli Gures

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The sport of wrestling is a national sport in Turkey, which represents its history and its culture in every shape and form of Turkish culture. This year's 2011 World Wrestling Championships in Freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling will be held in Istanbul on September 12 - September 18. There will be men and women from countries all over the world to compete for the prize of being a world champion in the three different style (Women only compete in freestyle while the men compete in Freestyle and Greco-Roman) and a chance to compete in the Olympics. This year's tournament will determine the wrestlers who will compete in the Olympics. The video promo below is what the host country of Turkey will provide for the competitors in Istanbul this coming September. Too note: The 2012 Olympics will be held in London, which is only 2496 Kilometers from Istanbul (about 1551 Miles).

HISTORY

The sport of "oil wrestling (a.k.a. Yagli Gures)," camel wrestling, and Olympic wrestling (Freestyle & Greco-Roman) are the disciplines practiced in Turkey. The Kirkpinar Yagli Gures is held annually in late June to early July in a town called Kirkpinar near the city of Edirne, Turkey (which is about 250 km west of Istanbul); long ago, the city of Edirne was the hub of the Ottoman empire, which borders Bulgaria and Greece. 

There are many stories surrounded around when the sport started in Turkey. For instance, the sport of Yagli Gures traces back to 2650 B.C. in Egypt and Assyria. As techniques and styles were developed by the many different Turkish ethnic groups traveling in and out of Turkey from Central Asia to Western Asia-Anatolia; the introduction of  the olive oil and leather clothing Kispet (hand-made leather pants required for this style of wrestling) was brought by the Seljuk turkas who conquered Anatolia. Thus, the style of Yagli Gures was permanently affixed to Turkish culture.

This story behind how this annual tournament began in Kirkpinar; again my research led me to this online article about Yagli Gures entitled, "Beauty and the Brawn" from an Hong Kong Student "English-only" publication called "The Standard." This article dates back to September 16, 2006. In this article, here is what was written:

[In]1360 when Suleyman, grandson of Osman Gazi - founder of the Ottoman Empire - returned with 40 of his troops from a successful battle to capture Rumelia. En route back to Constantinople (Istanbul), they rested overnight at Samona, now part of Greece. 

As burly warriors did in those days, they wrestled to pass the time, fighting in pairs on a "winner stays on" basis. The final two were clinched in a fight for hours, as conceding even in a friendly grapple was as dishonorable as retreat during war. It was a long drawn-out affair and eventually even their mates drifted off to sleep.

But when they awoke the next morning, they were shocked to discover that both men had died in a deathly embrace while fighting. As wrestling is deemed to be the perfect preparation for battle and, therefore, honoring Allah, they were considered as martyrs and buried on the spot.

One year later, their friends returned to the spot to pay their respects and were astonished to find that 40 freshwater springs had appeared in the meadow where the graves should have been.

They named the area Kirkpinar - Turkish for 40 springs. After Edirne was conquered in 1361, wrestling was performed annually to honor the two wrestlers, making it arguably the longest-running annual sporting event in the world.

This story is the heart and soul of the sport in Turkey. The existence of Yagli Gures in Turkey is a sport that traces back in history of the culture's existence from Central Asia to Western Asia to Anatolia to Africa and parts of Europe during the Ottoman empire rule. Too note, Yagli Gures remains as one of the oldest running sporting competitions in the world, today. However, what is Yagli Gures?

ANALYSIS

System of Yagli Gures

 

Yaglis Gures is a wrestling system that is based on the domination of an opponent. The matches between the pehlivans (competing wrestler  in different categories) had no time limits until 1975. In 1975, there was an time limit added for the baspehlivans (head wrestler) matches that are limited to 40 minutes; if  no winner is declared within the 40 minute time limit, then the wrestlers continue for an additional 7 minutes with scores recorded. Whoever can score the most points in this extra 7 minutes will be declared a winner, but if, no point is scored then there will be a sudden death-type match "golden point." For the other pehlivan weight categories, the time limit is 30 minutes, and the same rules apply as the baspehlivans, when there are no points scored in the 30 minute and in the extra 7 minute period, then a "golden point" match will decide the winner.

Uniform

The pehlivans are required to wear a kispet, and are covered in olive oil from head to toe. Once dressed and dosed in olive oil, the pehlivans take to the field in a large stadium in Kirkpinar in a ritual dance, similar to what Mongolians and Japanese wrestlers do as pre- and post-match ritual dances. These ritualistic movements are warm-ups prior to pehlivan's match.

 

Furthermore, an interesting theory of the olive oil covering the pehlivans bodies date back to the fall of Roman Empire. According to English philosopher Bertrand Russell, there was a spread of malaria that cause the fall of the Roman Empire; he speculated that: 

  

The principal cause of this was an infestation of mosquitoes carrying malaria. To live at sea level during those times was considered a death wish. Many different remedies were utilized to combat against these mosquitoes infestations. However, the people of Anatolia would apply oils to their body for protection from these mosquitoes thus, the style and the art of Turkish oil wrestling was born.

 
Regardless of Bertrand's story-theory, there is still the lingering question of why the pehlivans rub olive oil on each other prior to there matches? What if, there is any culture or spiritual significance to this pre-pehlivan match ritual?

Tekke

During the Ottoman Empire, wrestlers were trained in a Tekke, which is schools where pehlivans learn the art and the philosophies of the sport of Yagli Gures. The training was in wrestling technique, and in character building a pehlivan must develop while they compete and aren't competing in a way as to represent the way of Yagli Gures. The basic understanding of Yagli Gures is that a man must find harmony and balance inside and outside of competition; henceforth, the oil rubbing ritual prior to the competition symbolizes the mutual respect and balance, which fortify that in Yagli Gures, "man is not just matter, but is a spirit."

Before these pehlivan compete at Kirkpinar, they compete in other competitions prior to the major festival event at Kirkpinar. The referees, at these various competitions, will study each and every pehlivan's techniques, so that they can categorize them into certain groups, not weight categories. For your information, the traditional pehlivan will have an apprentice (criak) to train with until they retire from "the arena of the brave" then the apprentice will take their master's place in competition.

Prizes & Titles

The winning pehlivan at the annual tournament in Kirkpinar in the baspehlivan (head wrestler) group receives a cash prize of $14,000 Turkish Lira (which is roughly over USD $8,622.54 ) and a giant gold medal; yet, the increasing popularity of the Yagli Gures (second to football) in Turkey has made it a lucrative sport. A good pehlivan could earn $4,870,950 Turkish Lira a year (US $3 million).

The funding, cash prizes for the Kirkpinar tournament are provided by a bank or municipality (mainly Edirne Belediye) . But, the Aga (usually a wealthy landowner) will provide sponsorship and prize money for the tournament through the municipality. On the final day of the festival, there is a bidding war over the symbolic Ram attended by Agas from all over Turkey. The Aga are dressed in the ancient Ottoman outfits with a sword, knee-high boots, and a fancy embroided jacket.The highest bidding Aga will become the number one sponsor for next year's tournament. This Aga will welcome guest and house them at a hotel, have a big feast, and organize the festival. In addition, the Aga in Edirne has the decision making power to stop matches, disqualify pehlivans, and cancel the event if Aga deem it as necessary.

My Conclusion

I have gained more of an understanding of the sport from a Turkish culture perspective in my own journey as a grappler while studying the various cultures and styles practiced in the world. There exist this intrinsic code of conduct and lifestyle that attracts the pehlivan to their sport of Yagli Gures. All these men, young and old, are participating in a sport rich in the roots of Turkey, and staining every root in the grass fields of Turkey with the blood, sweat, and tears of the past pehlivan heroines of Yagli Gures. 

This ancient art of combat that has traveled from various Turkish cultures to its central Mecca in Kirkpinar; this combat requires its combatant to be bathed in oil with his fellow opponent in a baptism of chivalrous, rivalry, and superioity in the human spirit to be forge onto the very ground, grass fields of mother earth. Where every man who walks the field before a match a pehlivan touches their hand to the ground an back to their forehead as a blessing to the earth in respect for providing them with the resources necessary to grant them the strength and the vigor to compete in Yagli Gures on this very arena.

When the opportunity arrives for me to travel, to witness, to experience, and to take in every morsel of this cultural experience of Yagli Gures tournament in Kirkpinar. It will be, as if, I have become a part of history and gain a deeper perspective on my goal, my quest, and my vision as a wrestler. I have studied some videos of the unorthodox techniques performed in Yagli Gures by pehlivans young and old. There are some similarities to American folk style, Freestyle, and Greco-Roman styles of wrestling. Also, I see there are parts of sambo or judo that have range in their technical system.

The discipline instilled in each pehlivan is the goal any grappler in any discipline should aspire to. The accolades will be provided as time grows with the cultivation of skill, of will, and of spiel. For many centuries, and numerous decades this sport has existed and continued competitions without fail in its country of Turkey. Thus, stapling the power that it hold in Turkish culture with the Turkish people. I hope to have a heart, a soul, and a character as solid and as strong as these pehlivans who battle on the grass fields and stadiums in Turkey every day of their lives from youth until retirement. A life without the grass field is a life lost in Turkish Yagli Gures; yet, the grass fields and stadium in Kirkpinar will forever live on as the crowds anticipate and the pehlivan escalate unto the grass fields; so will the growth of the history of Yagli Gures remain in Turkey as a document to the strength of culture in a world dying in cultural validity.

FOOTAGE OF YAGLI GURES 2012