"Fight Like Sherlock Holmes"

I came across this interesting article at Time Magazine about a Victorian martial arts:

Sherlock Holmes, of course, is a fictional creation—but, for a long time, the sleuth’s fans thought that his preferred method of hand-to-hand combat was fictional too. In the original Arthur Conan Doyle story The Adventure of the Empty House, Holmes returns from what readers had thought was his death at the end of The Final Problem; he explains to Watson that, contrary to public perception, he didn’t met his end in the treacherous Reichenbach Falls. How then, did he make his escape? Holmes explains that he fought off his arch-nemesis Professor Moriarty by using his knowledge of baritsu, a form of Japanese wrestling.

Although misspelled--the correct spelling is bartistu--the fighting style was real, was created in Victorian England, and combined elements of stick fighting, boxing, and judo. It has been asserted that boxing should be the foundation of any good empty-handed method of combat.