HEMA vs Modern Fencing.

[Gav]

Hmmm.

I don't quite get the reply.

It's obvious to me but because of the replies I've been forced to read I don't think it's obvious to everyone on here.

[Gav]

It seems to me as if you are saying that modern epee is a bit shit in all the ways Matt describes except for at the highest level.

This is actually a very interesting comment.

Sport exists at all levels - from the mundane to the sublime - I think we can all agree on that.

So while I imply that low level epee fencing is a bit shit (it generally is) that doesn't mean that there's a sudden step up for it to be good. It's a function of different levels of ability, expectations, time, fitness etc. Not everyone who fences can be a Kolobkov or Tagliorol. After all no one can just step onto the piste and be instantly brilliant. It takes hard work, sacrifice and dedication.

Low level epee isn't actually always bad in the way's that Matt lists. But it can be.

I'm certain you guys don't expect your beginners to be awesome. Olympic fencing is no different.

Note: Edit for clarity...

[Gav]

This highlights something I’ve always thought of the sport side. It’s really just a distance game. I’ll move it to sabre again, and you definitely see the same thing. Both contestants jockeying back and forth to get the other guy ‘out of position,’ once they are happy, extend the arm and go. The blade is so whippy that you can not effectively command a line and control your opponents blade or do a proper parry or expulse his blade. It is impossible to close your line and approach your opponent because the blades don’t work that way. In other words you can’t ‘close under cover,’ even if closing was in the rules.

Of the distance game, the skilled ones are obviously superb at it. But pick up a heavy blade and now you must manage distance and line.

Yes fencing is a distance game - and that is why I say emphasise your footwork and athletic ability. However you cannot fence without actual blade technique.

One doesn't exist in a vacuum without the other.

The rest of your assertion about lack of understanding the line, parrying or otherwise blockng out our opponent is patently nonsense.

[Thearos]

Hmmm.

I don't quite get the reply.

It's obvious to me but because of the replies I've been forced to read I don't think it's obvious to everyone on here.

The point about epeeists moving their feet by "millimeters" in order to gain position. sounded like something out of a post- Spinal Tap documentary-- just reread your post (and please don't answer "But it's true, you don't know anything etc'. Which is true: I know nothing, I freely admit).

Mind you, a "Spinal Tap" or "best in show" type mockumentary about HEMA would be pretty funny too.

I am quite curious about MrAdmin's idea: fencing with heavier (say 1860s etc gym-style) blades, circular piste and modified rules about hits, call it "military-style" or "hard-core historical" fencing, sounds pretty fun. It also seems to me rather easy to set up. I'd find it historically very interesting to watch.

[Gav]

The point about epeeists moving their feet by "millimeters" in order to gain position. sounded like something out of a post- Spinal Tap documentary-- just reread your post (and please don't answer "But it's true, you don't know anything etc'. Which is true: I know nothing, I freely admit).

Honestly you're not the first person who has made this observation. Fencing is so full of characters that a Spinal Tap mockumentary would be hilarious. Oh the stories I could tell.

What I was really saying was that it's not uncommon for for there to be no action on the surface. To show a video of that I'd have to do some hunting but there are plenty of examples. To the layman it's not obvious that anything is happening however invariably it's just two cautious fencers. Happens much more in the lady events than the mens.

Mind you, a "Spinal Tap" or "best in show" type mockumentary about HEMA would be pretty funny too.

There's a couple of films that spring to mind right now along those lines that back you up. One of the obvious ones are the LARP (I know it's not HEMA) sections of Role Models which I found not only hilarious but sweet natured.

So I agree fencing (of any stripe) mockumentaried would be hilarious.

I am quite curious about MrAdmin's idea: fencing with heavier (say 1860s etc gym-style) blades, circular piste and modified rules about hits, call it "military-style" or "hard-core historical" fencing, sounds pretty fun. It also seems to me rather easy to set up. I'd find it historically very interesting to watch.

It's actually not a new idea.

We've toyed around with circular pistes. The thing about moving in circles is that it is not efficient. You waste energy and it tends to open you up to your opponent. People tend to move more linearly after a while anyway... It probably makes sense in non-light weapons [or] where people are using shields but that is just me speculating. Two points spring to mind: 1. The area we fence on isn't a line - it's a rectangle. Fencers do make use of the lateral as well as the linear - it's just not very pronounced. 2. The layout of the piste didn't spring from nowhere.

[Gav]

Gav, Any chance you could link something that you consider good epee? Assuming you have time. I can go and search youtube but would not really have a clue what I was looking for.

Took me a while but here's Tagliorol's gold medal performance at Beijing. I remember watching this from the Olympic training centre in Hungary. Happy Days.

http://youtu.be/BoESlHlWxC8

I know there's a ton of stuff in there that many of you will hate but that last hit... Dare I say it? That's an Italian with panache!

CyrusOfChaos is another youtube account that I think is worth checking. He finds good (US) national level fencing as well as the International stuff.

[Thearos]

I just stared at a photograph of two epeeists for five minutes.

[Gav]

I just stared at a photograph of two epeeists for five minutes.

lol.

Told you they didn't just "attack attack attack"!

[Gordon L]

And alternative of flicks is that, if duelling was to first blood, and the blades were whippy (and dwelling blades were, much whippier than current blades typically are) then the flick that drew blood would have been valid.

I'm confused by this comment, Gordon, as all of the epee de combat that I have seen had very stiff and thick blades more akin to 'double-wide' modern epee blades, and of course smallswords are very stiff - that was the whole purpose of having a triangular-section blade. Or do you mean duelling sabres? If so, then I don't really agree there either - original duelling sabres are generally far stiffer than modern sport sabres.

Modern épee (de combat) blades are generally* stiffer than originals, particularly electric ones.

Period advice for buying (post-colichemarde] smallswords was to reject a blade unless you could bend the tip back to the guard without causing any permanent effect on the blade - i.e. if it broke, reject it; if it even went past its elastic limit at one short section of the the blade and had a slight kink, reject it.

Early and mid-20th century recommendations are to buy stiffer blades to compensate for the heavy tip weight, otherwise the point becomes to hard to control with accuracy. This is especially true once the somewhat-agricultural early electric pointes d'arrete come in, in the mid-1930s.

For smallswords, certainly in London and iirc in Paris too, the Solingen blades were bought in batches at candle auction by cutlers, to set into hilts. We know, from the Ministry's blade tests for military blades, that the Solingen blades had quite a high variability in temper, spring, etc.

So the blades are variable and they are bought in batches, in candle-lit rooms. This is why there is buying advice telling purchasers what to look for in a blade.

But the cutlers still have to sell the remaining blades of the batch, to rich people wanting their man-jewellery in this season's style.

* This is not to say there were no stiff smallsword blades around, or no whippy training épée de combat blades around. What I'm talking about is advice for discerning buyers, in both cases.

'Modern' sport sabres, i.e. light sabres, are not whippy in the plane of the cut, nor have they ever been. They are deliberately bendy (and resilient) off-plane, to provide for the training of thrusting actions.

[Gordon L]

So, to be clear, are you arguing that thrusting someone in the toe 0.3 of a second before they thrust you through the face is 'realistic' or 'martial', or are you arguing that in 1900 fencers taking part in first-blood duels would have done that anyway?

It's important to note that 'realistic' and desirable are two entirely separate things.

It's very realistic - lots of duels ended in double defeats.

It's never desirable, which is why the training versions of duelling weapons are conventional weapons.

It's also why épéeists in the modern era still train thrusts that would look entirely familiar to period rapieristas. You show me épéeists that train, currently, to thrust without covering their line (so as to invite a counterthrust), and I'll show you an épéeist who is training to set up their opponent for a parry-riposte. NOT someone training to get hit.

(The specific timing is the same as the difference in timing between reaching the wrist and reaching the upper arm or chest, at a fast lunge. I'm convinced this is not coincidence, and my long, long to-do list includes trying to get period confirmation.)

[Gordon L]

The 0.25s is ... a surprisingly long time.

I guess my main argument is that it is not long enough. If the time were increased (to one fencing 'tempo' (or an equivalent time), which is what we use and what was used in the 16thC)

It is one period of fencing time - it's 'surprisingly long' to a competitive fencer, remember.

Also remember that one period of fencing time is the time taken to perform one action of blade, hand or foot. And this means that the length, measured against the clock, of one period of fencing time varies from person to person. So you end up choosing a period of clock time, based on some notional average period of fencing time.

and doubles could result in a more permanent penalty, such as being both disqualified (as we do in HEMA)

Originally in tournament épée, one double-hit resulted in a double defeat for the (one-touch) bout.

So why did they change that? [Answer at foot of post]

I believe what we see in modern epee fencing would be much more similar to what was being taught in the late-19thC and what I would class as 'realistic'.

In the late 19th-century, mostly what was taught was foil. You used épées, and taught foil. Épée built up as a teaching, training, and competition weapon due to the perceived inadequacies of the foil as a smallsword/épée de combat training device, i.e. they themselves saw their training as unrealistic, and changed it. Épée reached the UK in May 1900.

That isn't a massive change in the rules - have you guys ever tried anything like that? Do you see a reason not to do it like that, for experiment or fun if nothing else?

Yes, lots of folk experiment with lots of different rules. You should try one of the duelling épée events sometime Matt. Or to the open competitions I sometimes run where there are judges awarding points for technical merit and the style the moves are made in.

Experimenting with timing in épée is more difficult. I'll reply in a separate post.

Scoring apparatus is not evil.

I'm not fundamentally against electronic scoring devices, though I think they would not necessarily be a good thing for HEMA because they discourage the judges from more actively imposing common sense and guiding the techniques rewarded (as they still do in kendo and as we attempt to do in HEMA)

.

And they still do in foil, and in sabre. And in iaido.

Here's what history has implicitly decided - if you want to reward technique, compete with training weapons, such as foil, shinai or light sabre. Have conventions on what to reward and what to punish.

If you want to compete on pure combat technique, compete with a combat weapon, like épée de combat or kkatana. Use protective equipment, blunted weapons, pulled blows, "kata" tempo, or some combination of these.

All four affect how people fight. The unintended outcomes of these effects prevent it being fully realistic fighting.

. Having said this, if the rules are good enough (and I believe we are getting closer to the perfect HEMA rules) then many electronic scoring could assist judging.

I'm sure I've seen this cycle before.

=============
Answer:
They raised the number of hits per bout to avoid people winning with fluke hits, or strange technique like the fleche. Because they wanted to retain the realism of the duel.

But that's hard to do when you are, at the same time, also attempting to minimise the occurrence of death and minor injury.

[Gordon L]

The principal reason in recent history not to experiment with changes to timing to distinguish simultaneous hits from consecutive hits in épée in recent history, has been the fact that the timing was locked in, in the box.

For several reasons:
Variable timing was more expensive to engineer into analogue electronics than one single fixed time - extgra design time and effort, extra parts costs.

You can't market a box with just any old timing as being an official FIE ruleset compliant box. Which restricted the market for your more costly kit.

The old mains-powered boxes had to be designed and built to rigorous safety standards - no-one wants to be electrocuted by a faulty scoring box's mains electricity supply.

Battery powered boxes needed big expensive batteries, and also would begin to give unpredictably erratic scoring results as the battery drained. And the batteries seldom lasted long enough.

Scoring boxes were really expensive.

I am looking forward to the new generations of programmable logic controllers and the open source movement generating more homebrew scoring boxes, with easy-to-change, quick-to-change settings for things like timing. You can also have affordable self-sensing of battery charge, so they are much more reliable for scoring.

With LED lights, battery-powered scoring boxes can run much longer between battery changes, and can use smaller cheaper batteries. So they are much more affordable to run.

Wireless data signalling - bluetooth and wifi - can mean that there are many fewer safety problems with mains-powered scoring boxes.

The cheapness and ease of electronic design and manufacture also means that you can target niche markets with scoring boxes, rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.

[Gordon L]

... jockeying back and forth to get the other guy ‘out of position,’ once they are happy, extend the arm and go.

Consider the alternatives:
1) leave the other guy in position, remain unhappy and go
2) do not jockey for position, and do not go.

They both end better for the other guy.

The blade is so whippy that you can not effectively command a line and control your opponents blade or do a proper parry or expulse his blade. It is impossible to close your line and approach your opponent because the blades don’t work that way. In other words you can’t ‘close under cover,’ even if closing was in the rules.

All of this is simply untrue. As I am sure I will eventually tire of saying, the blades are not whippy in the plane of the cut or the plane of the parry.

To command a line, to control an opponent's blade, to parry properly, to close a line, to force his blade, all are possible.

Of the distance game, the skilled ones are obviously superb at it. But pick up a heavy blade and now you must manage distance and line.

You must manage distance, line, timing and the plane of the cut whether with a heavy blade or a light. Or a singlestick - the precursor to light practice blades.

One of the often-remarked weaknesses of practice with the singlestick was the lack of a defined plane of cut. One period work-round was to mark a chalk line down one part of the stick, so as to designate that as the true edge.

[Gordon L]

If only the 90th centile or above are any good then it isn't a worthwhile system in my opinion.

IMO, systems of fence are to teach you to be one of the skilled guys, so that you can survive an encounter with an untrained guy.

I was only ever an okay competitor - fighting against other trained practiced competitive fencers, my slow speed-of-response was an issue.

Against unpracticed opponents, or opponents of less experience, my technique could always see me through without trouble.

At Olympic level, there is no disparity in level - the people with poor technique have been winnowed out. So you're up against a champion fighter. Even if you are a champion fighter yourself, this means that he can capitalise on any error of yours as much as you can capitalise on any of his.

Things can and will go wrong when you are pushed to your limit. After all, no plan survives contact with the enemy and plenty of real duels ended in double defeats.

This is why sparring, assaulting and bouting are all such a vital part of training, along with individual lessons from a Master.

Groupwork and drills are purely to get you to the standard where you can usefully participate in the vital training.

[knirirr]

...the blades are not whippy in the plane of the cut...

In the case of the fairy sabre this is simply untrue; the reason is that the plane of the cut is not necessarily the same plane as the edge/back of the blade. It was common practice back in my day for sabreurs to bend their wrist back and flick the "cuts" in at their opponent, giving them a blade which curved slightly towards their opponent and was very whippy. This was excellent for whipping over the guard to hit the wrist, or to evade a parry which would have stopped a stiff blade. My instructor at Dundee used to encourage this sort of technique, and even boast of his successes at whipping people on the back of the neck or across the nipples in competition by striking with what to a HEMAist would be the flat. The judges turned a blind eye to fairy sabre whipping; if they saw the light come on that was good enough for them. If you wish to ascribe this style of play to bad fencing then I would agree, but it would mean that bad fencing was so endemic in the Scottish club and university competition circuit of the early 90s that it very much defined the sport.

N.B. The little singlestick fencing that went on in St. Andrews did not involve this whipping technique, for the sticks weren't whippy on the flat (obviously) and in any case the basket hilts prevented the bending of the wrist required for whipping. Therefore, it was very much classical in style, and consequently much more enjoyable.

Ultimately, whether sport fencing was, or is now, good or bad doesn't really matter to me - I find it mostly boring and don't want to do it and I no longer have to. But, those who like it are welcome to it. I would only be worried about it if it somehow impinged upon the fencing I want to do, e.g. if there were somehow pressure upon me to take a sport fencing qualification in order to be able to run my little school.

[Gav]

All of this is simply untrue. As I am sure I will eventually tire of saying, the blades are not whippy in the plane of the cut or the plane of the parry.

To command a line, to control an opponent's blade, to parry properly, to close a line, to force his blade, all are possible.

It's also funny to me because the line is essential in current sabre to the extent you cannot actually say you can fence it without understanding the line. Point attacks are extremely important at the moment.

It's really easy to get a point to come up with a hit anywhere on the forearm - you need to be able to block... Can't parry? You are screwed.

[admin]

This is Olympic sabre fencing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Et6xWqC1A8

Just so the historical fencers know the kind of thing they are missing.

[admin]

Gordon, I'm very confused by some of your comments regarding the stiffness of smallsword blades. I collect antique swords and have probably handled over a hundred original smallswords (as I'm sure others here have as well) and most 18thC smallsword blades are extremeley stiff. They are usually wider than a modern epee blade at the forte, thicker in the foible and significantly more hollow-ground.

Like this:

http://popartmachine.com/artwork/2016-C ... -print.jpg

Are you perhaps talking about 19thC court/dress swords, which were not generally intended for use?

[Jose_Pereira]

I can't really imagine a thrusting weapon not being rigid

[Gav]

This is Olympic sabre fencing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Et6xWqC1A8

Just so the historical fencers know the kind of thing they are missing.

And we're missing HEMA sabre.

http://youtu.be/cB-gm9RYVmE