Though the history of ju-jitsu may well be considered to have begun in the first or second centuries B.C., its renaissance or golden age was undoubtedly during the Edo or Tokugowan era, (1602-1867 A.D.). It was during this period that the major schools of the art flourished and were correlated into a specific and identifiable martial science. There were however prior to and during the rise of the Tokugawan Shogunate (military government), many school of bu-jutsu (martial arts) which developed their own methods of grappling and methods of striking, which were known as Atemi.

One of the last grappling schools to be founded in Japanese history was the Takenouchi ryu in the June of 1532. Takenouchi primarily used the term Koshi-no-mawasi (to encircle the loins or hips) to denote his school.

Takenouchi Ryu as a grappling or bu-jitsu art being classified as a Ju-jitsu ryu, did not exclude the ryu usage of weapons. Prince Chumutake Hissamori Diasuka Takenouchi was a landowner in the providence of the present day Okayama, at a place called Mimasaku. Here Takenouchi owned a castle by the Asaki river. Takenouchi was a man of extremely low stature. He was so small that when he wore this Odashi (long sword) his compatriots would comment on a long sword taking a short man for a walk. Takenouchi laughed all this off and was as skillful and courageous a warrior as any other. In 1532, Takenouchi made a pilgrimage to the Samnomiya shrine where he prayed, meditated and practiced some yawasa techniques that he had devised.

Legend has it that he drove himself to the utmost limits of his strengths and endurance, practicing and praying for seven days and nights until he collapsed on the seventh night. During his period of unconsciousness there appeared to him in a dream, a samurai who demonstrated one by one the techniques that were to be the syllabus for his new school. The phantom warrior underscored the principles that were to be main stays of the Takenouchi teaching. Phantom bushi or not, teaching here until he died at the age of fifty-one, Hisamori Takenouchi established one of the best known and respected tradition of Japanese Ju-jitsu.

Within the 725 officially documented Ju-jitsu systems that developed in Japan, there grew, organized methods of what later became known as Atemi. Atemi are methods of assaulting the weak points of the enemy's body. Atemi systems of China, were pioneered and developed early by military men. Atemi was restricted to the warrior class as part of the Chuan-Fu (first method) system of China.

Ju is a Chinese character meaning pliable (submission, harmonious, adaptable, or yielding). The common translation of Ju as 'gentle' is usually misinterpreted by western man. The vital issue in Ju-jitsu is effectiveness in combat. Ju-jitsu is the ability to move from one technique to another, as quickly and as often as necessary to control an attacker. Each technique is designed to teach a specific principle.