One of the most popular martial arts weapons currently in use is the Bo Staff. The Bo staff appears to be one of the most simplistic weapons and has a long history. Its Japanese origins have insured its use across many different Japanese styles in including forms such as karate and jujitsu. Various $Chinese martial arts also employ similar staffs.                            

Despite its simple low tech appearance, the Bo staff can be one of the most effective weapons available to the well trained martial artist. Like any weapon, the training can be quite arduous to achieve a sufficiently proficient level of practicality. 

Incidentally the Bo Staff is used extensively in Jujitsu kobudo weapon training. Here it makes use of a number of important techniques which include forms, footwork, as well as distancing and control.

The Bo staff, unlike other martial arts weapons,  gives the trained student an incredibly  long range . This feature can enable the attacker the luxury of keeping his opponent at bay since he or she has the superior reach. Bo staffs can vary from 36 inches to 72 inches and the thickness typically depends on the length. The existence of a staff weapon has limited comparability in Western cultures who typically found javelins, or spears or halberds preferable. Asian martial artist have taken this weapon and turned it into an art form.

An expert student could use their Bo to out maneuver a heavier armored opponent.  The inability to conceal the weapon might be considered a downside, but its presence on the battlefield must have certainly caused consternation to an opponent unfamiliar with it or not armed in similar fashion.

While the weapon has been used informally for centuries, the art kobudo which emerged from the Japanese island of Okinawa in the early 1600s first made this weapon famous.  Part of the reason for its rise in Okinawa lies in the fact that peasants were banned from carrying or having weapons. The  ban’s existence eventually  gave the simple staff its much deserved place among the classical martial arts weapons of all time.