Why a Seventeenth Century Guard is Muddling Your Decision Tree and Losing You Fights As a preface, this article is intended more as a practical lesson on how to avoid a common mistake while fencing than it is a scholar piece deciphering what the original authors meant. The topic of this is one of theContinue reading “Guardia Mista? More Like Guardia Missed Ya!”
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The Anonimo and Marozzo or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Spada Dui Mani
Today I would like to focus on two specific texts from the Bolognese fencing tradition. More specifically, I’d like to do a case study peering into the Anonimo Bolognese and Achille Marozzo’s Opera Nova. My hope is that this will help elucidate some broader thematic differences between how the two authors want us to fight.Continue reading “The Anonimo and Marozzo or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Spada Dui Mani”
Two Takes on the Lunge
In rapier, lunging is THE foundational movement. Sometimes we do a little less, such as throwing a half cut or performing a firm-footed lunge, and other times we do a bit more by following it up with a remise or a passing step. The basic unit of measurement, however, remains the same. So with that,Continue reading “Two Takes on the Lunge”
A Handy Guide to Understanding Tempo
Out of the three main building blocks of Italian swordsmanship (structure, measure, and tempo), tempo is by and far the most elusive of the bunch. Both structure (how well your bones are lined up) and measure (how far apart things are) are things I, as an instructor, can just point to in space. We canContinue reading “A Handy Guide to Understanding Tempo”
To Turn or Not to Turn? That is the Question
In our modern way of teaching Italian rapier, the default is generally to teach the passing step with the left foot remaining turned out. This allows for the maximum amount of reach in a single step as it allows you to continue forwards while staying profiled and not having to do much to turn theContinue reading “To Turn or Not to Turn? That is the Question”
How to Search the Manuals: A Scholar’s Journey
Sometimes you have a question, but you don’t yet have the tools to answer it. That’s where I found myself this week when after a discussion with Guy Windsor, I found myself trying to find out when the period Italian masters moved from the idea of gioco (play) to the idea of mesura (measure). TheContinue reading “How to Search the Manuals: A Scholar’s Journey”
Thoughts from Vancouver Part I
Back in February I had the pleasure of attending Academie Duello’s level I instructor intensive and I can’t recommend it highly enough. Over the course of five days, we spent 50 hours not only learning the fundamentals of rapier and longsword from the school’s founder, Devon Boorman, but also how to teach it all toContinue reading “Thoughts from Vancouver Part I”
The Fundamentals Are Everything
Today I relearned how to hold a sword, again. You’d think that after twelve years of rapier fencing, dozens of tournament wins, and having had the pleasure of studying under several of the world’s greatest instructors, I would have something so basic as “how to hold a sword” down at this point. And here weContinue reading “The Fundamentals Are Everything”
Dueling Class Notes
Here is the video of and my own personal outline for the class I just taught through RUM (Royal University of the Midrealm). They pull largely from Tom Leoni’s chapter on dueling in “In the Service of Mars Part I” and Ann Tlusty’s book “The Martial Ethic in Early Modern Germany”. I highly recommend checkingContinue reading “Dueling Class Notes”
The Duel In Sixteenth-Century Italy
As a note, this was my final thesis for my undergraduate degree. It was written almost six years ago and my study of swordplay, period combat, and writing as a whole has evolved since then. That said, I still find this to be a useful resource to look back on. As such, it seems theContinue reading “The Duel In Sixteenth-Century Italy”
Fool of Swords 