page_title: Pradal serey
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Pradal serey / History
caption_attribution_description: English: ancient khmer bas-relief of elbow strike.
context_page_description: Pradal Serey or Kun Khmer is an unarmed martial art and combat sport from Cambodia. The official Khmer name of the sport is Kbach Kun Pradal Khmer. In Khmer, pradal means fighting or boxing and serey means free. Thus, pradal serey may be translated as "free fighting" or "free boxing". The sport consists of stand up striking and clinch fighting where the objective is to knock an opponent out, force a technical knockout, or win a match by points.
  Pradal Serey is most well known for its kicking technique, which generates power from hip rotation rather than snapping the leg, Pradal Serey consists of four types of strikes: punches, kicks, elbows and knee strikes. The clinch is used to wear down the opponent. In the clinch, opponents battle for dominant position for short range strikes by way of elbows and knees. Cambodian fighters tend to utilize more elbow strikes than that of other martial arts in the region. In pradal serey, more victories come by way of an elbow technique than any other strikes.
context_section_description: Fighting has been a constant part of Southeast Asia since ancient times and eventually led to organized combat systems. In the Angkor era, both armed and unarmed martial arts were practiced by the Khmers. Evidence shows that a style resembling pradal serey existed in the 9th century, which may be one of the reasons why the Khmer Empire was such a dominant force in Southeast Asia. The Khmer Empire used an early form of pradal serey along with various weapons and war elephants to wage war against their main enemy, the principalities of Champa, and later, Siam.  Re-enactments of elephant battles are still recreated at the Surin Elephant Round-up.
  At this time, the Khmer Empire dominated and controlled most of what is now Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. As a result, Cambodia has influenced much of Thai and Lao culture. This leads the Khmer to believe all Southeast Asian forms of kickboxing started with the early Mon-Khmer people. On top of oral stories from their ancestors, the basis of this argument are the bas-reliefs left behind by early Khmers in the ancient temples of the Bayon and other Angkor temples. Much of the writing on ancient Khmer art has been destroyed by the invading Thai armies when the Siamese sacked and looted Angkor.
  During the colonial period, martial arts like pradal serey were considered by the European colonists to be brutal and uncivilized. The French turned the art into a sport by adding timed rounds, a boxing ring and western boxing gloves in an attempt to lessen injury. Originally matches were fought in dirt pits with limited rules while hands were wrapped in rope. Some matches had boxers wrap seashells around their knuckles to increase the damage that could be inflicted. In the 1960s, Cambodian boxing promoters held inter-martial art exhibitions.
caption: Elbow strike in khmer martial art
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