The school of Karate Kenyu Ryu was founded by Ryusho Tomoyori (1907- 1977), who was born in the village of Motobu (region of Kunigami- prefect of Okinawa) in Japan. Being very fond of martial arts since childhood, he started learning Karate at the age of six under the guidance of Masters Aragaki and Awane, his relatives. At the age of 15, he reached Naha and trained for about 4 years under the guidance of Chojun Miyagi (1888- 1953) and became one of the best pupils of Kanryo Higaonna (1853 - 1916), who was founder member of the school of Naha-te. Then he moved to Osaka and two years later, in 1929, became the disciple of Kenwa Mabuni (1889- 1953), the Great Grandmaster of Karate and the founder of the Shito-ryu style.

Kenwa Mabuni Sensei unified the Naha-te and Shuri-te style, learnt from his main two masters, Kanryo Higaonna and Ankoh Itosu, harmonizing it with the teachings handed down by the Chinese Master, Go Kenki. Later he added his own kata, such as Juroku, Aoyagi, Myojo and Shinsei, thus giving Shitoryu its uniqueness and highest number of kata.