Jackie Chan and Jet Li played kung fu hero Wong Fei-hung in film, but what’s the story behind the legend?

The no-photo claim is contested, and even the date of his passing has been called into question. What is not disputed, however, is the outsize effect this man from Guangdong has had on Chinese culture over the past 100 years. As a master of the southern style of kung fu, hung ga in particular, Wong passed on teachings still followed by hundreds of thousands of students across the globe, “but what do we know about him as a man?” asks Po.

“We don’t know much, so I guess that allows people to create whomever they want from him.” Most agree Wong was born around 1847 in the village of Luzhou, in Guangdong province, into a family deeply rooted in martial arts. His father, Wong Kei-ying, was one of the “Ten Tigers of Canton”, a group of martial artists who traced their skills and teachings back to the legendary Southern Shaolin monastery, said to have existed in the Tang dynasty (AD618-907).



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