Coupe Opale 2013 Savate Assaut

Full fight: Coupe Opale 2013, Sian-Marie Clark (London Savate) v Sabine Olivier

This was one of the weirdest encounters I've had with arbitrage: a referee who talked to us throughout, a DO who even talked across the ring in the third round (!) and force warnings for a contact level lighter than I adhere to with my beginner students in class... Intriguing...

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Savate takes its name from the French for "old boot" (heavy footwear that used to be worn during fights; cf. French-English loanwords sabot and sabotage and Spanish cognate zapato). The modern formalized form is mainly an amalgam of French street fighting techniques from the beginning of the 19th century. There are also many types of savate rules. Savate was then a type of street fighting common in Paris and northern France. In the south, especially in the port of Marseille, sailors developed a fighting style involving high kicks and open-handed slaps. It is conjectured that this kicking style was developed in this way to allow the fighter to use a hand to hold onto something for balance on a rocking ship's deck, and that the kicks and slaps were used on land to avoid the legal penalties for using a closed fist, which was considered a deadly weapon under the law. It was known as jeu marseillais ("game from Marseille"), and was later renamed chausson ("slipper", after the type of shoes the sailors wore).