Rewriting 1 May: The Counter-Legend of the “Moleque Cyrillo”

WHY THIS ARTICLE

The battle of communication precedes the battle of the rings. Before crushing the capoeiras in the arena, their historical proof had to be destroyed. This 1930 document is the birth certificate of the Gracie war against capoeiragem — and a textbook case of counter-legend fabrication.

An academy short of pupils

The carioca entrance of the Gracies begins with a commercial admission. After São Paulo — where the Carlos Gracie–Omori exhibition of 28 April 1929 “would have been arranged at the Gracie family’s initiative,” a pre-arranged draw “against an important remuneration” (Serrano) — Carlos opens a jiu-jitsu academy on Formosa street, directed by Donato Pires dos Reis. A few weeks later, on 7 September 1930, a long promotional article gives the floor to the director: “I must tell you, with a certain bitterness, that there are still today very few Brazilian pupils. Foreigners give much more importance to this magnificent means of personal defence than we do. We are still in a period when it is believed that capoeira is the most beautiful thing in matters of personal defence.”

The commercial enemy is named. There follows the argument of authority: “I am jiu-jitsu instructor of the police of Bello Horizonte and I must tell you that the strongest and most robust individuals, in particular the skilful capoeiras, were completely disarmed in a few minutes.”

The “legend of the Moleque Cyrillo”

But the central obstacle remains a memory: 1 May 1909, on which “rested the entirety of the system of proofs of the partisans of capoeiragem.” The article attacks it frontally, in a chapter entitled “the legend of the Moleque Cyrillo and the Japanese”: “The Japanese delighted in making the Moleque Cyrillo fall agreeably. At a precise moment, the Moleque Cyrillo took advantage of the opportunity (because the Japanese was thanking the public), and no more no less, launched a rabo de arraia at the head of the Japanese, who, naturally, taken by surprise, was on the ground… National patriotism vibrated! Moleque Cyrillo — in an unconfessable gesture — defeated the Japanese, winning 500$. Well, the Japanese then challenged Cyrillo, offering him 1,000$, 2,000$, up to 10,000$, to repeat the blow… Cyrillo, despite his victory (?), never again sought the Japanese…”

A treacherous blow during the salute, a comfortable purse, a flight from the rematch: in three strokes, the feat becomes a swindle.

The archives’ denial, piece by piece

The thesis confronts each stroke with the sources of 1909. The context of the fight? The public was riled against the Japanese “because he had at first refused to fight against Cyriaco, certainly on account of his skin colour.” An “atmosphere somewhat electric, thus certainly not conducive to airs or to saluting the public in the middle of the fight” — and the source of 2 May describes two rabos de arraia, with an adversary who rises between the two.

The 500$? Cyriaco received “18 mil reis” — he says so himself to the Gazeta de Noticias — “notably thanks to the coins thrown by the spectators at the end of the fight.” The man was in a situation so precarious that, to finance his return to Campos, he had to organise a paying demonstration in the courtyard of the medical school, with the students’ help. The flight from the rematches? “In need, if he had been offered an important purse to face Sada Miako again, he would not have hesitated a second.” And the archives show that after his victory, Cyriaco was to fight the Senegalese Dierry and the Japanese Raku. A man who flees does not multiply challenges.

Verdict: “the accusations of cheating and cowardice supposedly shown by Cyriaco, unfounded in view of the facts, are to be understood as the will of the jiu-jitsu academy professors to destroy the positive image capoeiragem enjoyed.”

Two essentialisms mirrored

A last observation of the thesis avoids Manichaeism: the two camps “held the same discourse.” For some, jiu-jitsu was superior by nature; for others, capoeiragem — each brandishing its proof-fights, each believing that “the method made the man, independently of training, experience or physical condition.” It is this symmetry that made 1 May so dangerous for the newcomers: as long as the adverse proof held, theirs did not suffice. So 1909 had to be rewritten. The rings would do the rest.

SOURCES

“O mais admiravel meio de defesa pessoal: - O Jiu-Jitsú,” Diario de Noticias, 7 September 1930; “Jiu-jitsu vencido pela capoeiragem,” Gazeta de Noticias, 9 May 1909; “Cyriaco o homem do ‘rabo de arraia’ visita a faculdade de medicina,” A Noticia, 17–18 May 1909 — National Library of Brazil. — Serrano, M., Géo Omori. O Guardião Samurai, 2009. — Malo, O., La capoeira et les arts de combat noirs : histoire effacée, techniques invisibles (1905–1984), doctoral thesis, Université des Antilles, 2020, Part II, chap. A.1–A.2.

IN THE CORPUS

→ The Champion Who Refused to Fight a Black Man

→ The Fight Everyone Cites and No One Has Read

HOW TO CITE THIS ARTICLE

MALO, Olivier. Rewriting 1 May: The Counter-Legend of the “Moleque Cyrillo”. In: Black Combat Arts Institute — Articles [online]. No. 46. 2026 [accessed date]. Available from: https://www.blackcombatarts.com/articles/rewriting-1-may-the-counter-legend-of-the-moleque-cyrillo. Adapted from the author's doctoral thesis, Université des Antilles, 2020.