So what happens during a "parry" ?

[Simon A]

...(many reenactors seem to think that if a sword balances closer to the hand then it is obviously a good thing).

Oh. I kind of assumed that as well [n00b] Why's it not good ? [/n00b]

[admin]

Where you want the sword to have its centre of balance is entirely dependent on what you want to do with it. Clearly a falchion that balanced near the hand would be self-defeating. A 1796 light cavalry sabre balances very far from the hand, yet is a light sword. This, together with blade width, is what gives it such a high reputation as a chopper. The same is true of most tulwars.

You could, with a heavy enough pommel, make any sword balance right in the hand... But clearly that would make for a pretty awful sword. Generally, the closer you balance a sword to the hand, the worse it will become at cutting. Try holding a sledge hammer by the wrong end and hit something with it .

Rapiers and smallswords can balance pretty close to the hand if intended mostly or entirely for thrusting, but even with those it is still preferable to have the POB in front of the hand, in order to make them able to parry blows and engage another blade with strength.

Generally, a cut and thrust sword will want a point of balance at least 3 or 4 inches up from the guard.

Reenactment swords are often the worst possible combination of stats for a real sword - overweight with a POB near the hand. That might work well for a shotput, but not a sword.

[John H]

Or to summarize the further out the CoB the more power it has in a cut, the closer the CoB the less power in the cut but the better control in a thrust. Like Matt said take a sledge hammer and swing it from the wrong end, it will have nothing in the connection, but the hammer end is devastating.

It’s good to hear others are realizing this, I hear too many people complain the blade feels 'dead' with a CoB past 5 inches, but it figure it has to come from another Sabre guy. We have a guy who brought in a longsword with a CoB at about 1 - 2 inches out, so I started using it like a Rapier, he wasn’t amused, but it handled better that way IMO, it had nothing in a cut.

Considering what most re-enactors are doing it’s probably a good thing they are using blades with a thrusters center of balance. This will effectively not allow them to strike with the center of percussion, thus their strike doesn’t have as much force as it would have if they were using a proper blade. If you give them a sword with a cutting swords center of balance they will end up doing some serious damage, or you can just give them a baseball bat.

[the_last_alive]

Considering what most re-enactors are doing it’s probably a good thing they are using blades with a thrusters center of balance. This will effectively not allow them to strike with the center of percussion, thus their strike doesn’t have as much force as it would have if they were using a proper blade. If you give them a sword with a cutting swords center of balance they will end up doing some serious damage, or you can just give them a baseball bat.

Going by most of the re-enactment blades I've handled, they have no CoP due to the rigidity of them, they are built to take a beating across many years. Whereas a 'real' sword is designed to not take a beating IMO.

[Cutlery Penguin]

I don't personally think there is a distiction between parry and block, without getting into semantics. A parry is a defensive movement, as is a block.

This. Though I'd add ward into the mix as well. Not that it has a different meaning, just another option for saying the same thing.

[Simon A]

Thanks for clearing that up for me, chaps. Of course it all makes perfect sense once it's 'said out loud', as it were.

[Wolfgang Ritter]

There is no reason why reenactors should not parry instead of blocking, most of the time. In fact, there are reenactor groups for e.g. the C15th, no ? (for instance Gerry Embleton's group ? The Company of the White Rose ?). Do they practice HEMA style parrying, or Viking-reenactor-style blocks ?

There are a lot of safety reasons - if your parry keeps the point forward at the opponent's face, for example, it's not appropriate for an open helmet reenactment environment. Blocking is a lot safer for the attacker, which is necessary for reenactment and not useful for the original art.

-andy

I second, please be aware that most of the reenactment fighting is intended to give a show for an audience. Safety is a major rule there.

(OT, but for clarification:) Gerry Embleton was one of the founding members and a major driving force of the Company of Saynte George for many years, but is no longer a member.

There has been a definite increase of HEMA training on Company events over the last couple of years, but the COmpany does usually not join the typical reenactment battle events. On a typical public event we do drills for both staff weapons, handgonners and canon crew AND training sessions with HEMA techniques; mainly because there are more COmpany members who practice HEMA. But the focus is still on halberd blocks rather than one-on-one combat.
Cheers
Wolfgang

[admin]

I don't personally think there is a distiction between parry and block, without getting into semantics. A parry is a defensive movement, as is a block.

This. Though I'd add ward into the mix as well. Not that it has a different meaning, just another option for saying the same thing.

Yes.

To elaborate for some of the readers; the words block, parry, ward, cover etc etc have pretty much all been used in period sources for generic defensive actions. The only sources I know of that use parry in a specific way aside from this are some 18th-19thC sources that use parry/parade specifically for the circular parry against a thrust (as taught in smallsword and foil). But other sources at the same time use parry for blocks against cuts.. so in other words, a handful of authors used parry for a specific thing, but many did not - and in modern English we accept parry and block to mean the same thing.
Of course someone can block/parry in a variety of ways (edge, flat, forte, medium, false edge, percussively, passively, point in-line, point off-line, circular, deflection etc), but those different methods do not have specific words - we need to add a descriptive words such as 'edge parry with the forte' or 'hanging cover' etc.