Our style of karate, stemming from the pen name of the art's founder. Literally means Pine Waves

School of Japanese Karate founded by Gichin Funakoshi. The name dreives from Funakohsi's pen name Shoto. It is probably the most widely practiced style of Karate in the world.

Shotokan (松涛館 Shōtōkan), literally, the house of waving pines, is a school of karate, developed from various martial arts by master Gichin Funakoshi (1868-1957) and his son Yoshitaka. Funakoshi was the man who 'officially' brought karate from Okinawa to mainland Japan, although Kenwa Mabuni, Motobu Choki and other Okinawans were actively teaching karate in Japan prior to this point. "Shoto" was the pen name Funakoshi used in his poetry, which means "pine waves" (Funakoshi, Gichin (1981).