What is capoeira?

Answer 1

[Capoeira is a Brazilian martial art that combines elements of fighting and dancing. It was created by enslaved Africans during the 16th Century in Brazil. The movements are designed so they could pretend they weren´t fighting if the overseer saw them. They could also be done while wearing chains. It is often practiced to music and includes high kicks and gymnastic type moves.]

The formulation capoeira's inception above are largely mythological. Evidence suggests that the game was never actually a means of concealing a martial art, because in instances that a martial art would be forbidden by slaveowners, dances and other rituals were also.

Moreover, documentation seems to suggest that, in as much as manacles were used, slaves were chained by their feet, and not by their hands, so that they might still work, but not be able to escape. This would indicate that modern movements in capoeira mimicking shackled hands are a later construction.

What is know about capoeira is contentious. At present, capoeira is a martial art, dance, game, ritual, tradition, in which two players engage one another in a circle of their peers with kicks, feints, dodges, acrobatic motions, and sometimes more aggressive attacks/counterattacks.

It almost certainly comes from various Central African (Congo-Angolan) ritualized fight-games that incorporate music and dance simply because ritualized activities in Central Africa often incorporate music and dance. It was created in Brazil by slaves from these parts of Africa, and then rapidly hybridized with Yoruba (Nago in Brazil) religious ceremonies as well as a wide variety of fighting arts practiced by different peoples in Brazil (including batuque a leg sweep type of game).