Modern judo has its origins in jujitsu, a fighting art that can be traced back over a thousand years into Japanese history. Judo itself, however, is a relatively recent synthesis and owes it existence to the genius of one man: Dr. Jigoro Kano.

(Dr. Jigoro Kano)
Jigoro Kano was born in the seaside town of Mikage in 1860. He and his family moved to Tokyo in 1871. Mr. Kano studied politics and literature at Tokyo Imperial University. He became an instructor of the Gakushuin in 1882 and eleven years later, he was appointed the Headmaster of the Koto Shihan, a teachers' training school. In 1909, Professor Kano became the first Japanese member of the International Olympic Committee and two years later, he founded the Japanese Athletic Association and became its first president. Because of his many contributions in the field of athletics, Professor Kano is called the "Father of Physical Education and Sport" in Japan.

Professor Kano is internationally known for the development of judo. Until he was 18 years of age, Jigoro Kano was physically weak. He resolved to improve himself by studying at two jujitsu schools. He soon realized that each school had its strengths and weaknesses. Because there was unnecessary roughness and crudeness in the jujitsu techniques, and because it was difficult to practice without injury he began to reconstruct jujitsu. As he states in his own words: "...so by taking together all the good points I had learned from the various schools and adding thereto my own devices and inventions, I founded a new system for physical culture and mental training." Kano called his new system Kodokan Judo to differentiate it from the jujitsu forms. "Judo" means "the gentle way" and "kodokan" generally means "a school for studying the way", "the way" being the concept of life itself.

Again, in Kano's words:" "There are two reasons why I avoided the term 'jujitsu'. One is that there were jujitsu schools which often indulged in violent and dangerous techniques in throwing or twisting arms and legs. Seeing these things, many people came to believe jujitsu was harmful. Again, in an exercise hall where supervision was inadequate, the senior pupils would wantonly throw down juniors or pick quarrels, so that jujitsu was despised as something that made rowdies of young men. I wished to show that what I taught was not a dangerous thing, and would not needlessly injure any person, that it was not the jujitsu as it was taught by some people, and that it was "judo", an entirely different thing.

"The second reason was that when I began to teach jujitsu had fallen into disrepute. Some jujitsu masters made their living by organizing groups composed of their followers, and putting on exhibition matches to which admission fees were charged. Some went so far to stage bouts between professional sumo wrestlers and jujitsu men. Such degrading practices of prostitution of martial arts were repugnant to me, so I avoided the term jujitsu and adopted judo in its stead."