Chicago Swordplay Guild and Selohaar Fechtschule issue Declaration of Fraternity

A thread from swordforum, which I thought was particularly classy and cool.

http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread.php?p=1001406&posted=1#post1001406

Best quote from the declaration:

Item: That there is but one Art of the Sword, and all who take up its study become Brothers in Arms, regardless of nation, race or creed.

I think some of our threads here reflect that idea.

Best regards,

-Mark

 

I would have said that the following would be more accurate ...

Item: That there is but one Art of the Sword, and all who take up its study become family ... but some families are dysfunctional, hate each other and dont have a civil word to say about THAT side of the family.

Perhaps not as cool as issuing a declaration of fraternity ... but substantially more accurate.

 

Heh. Yeah, I've seen the catty side of HES myself. However, I feel that it's better to build bridges than to put up crennelations in this small field. With any luck, I'll be able to build a bridge between Calgary and Glasgow within the next year. The more people I train with, the less I suck, and the more drinking buddies, the better.

Best regards,

-Mark

 

Ahmen to that one buddy.

regards koyo

 

My sword brothers are those who stand beside me and have proven their worth. Picking up a sword and calling yourself a scholar is meaningless to me. I would have 5 true brothers than a 1000 chattering fools.

The Bear.

Nation, race or creed but obviously not sex. Are there sword sisters or is it a boys only club?

 

Well I'm glad they have finially came to that conclusion. For years ARMA has been saying that there is only one European swordsmenship art.

 

Well for years I have been saying there is only one martial art for all humans but people laugh that off.

The Bear.

 

Please elaborate.

Peace favor your sword,
Kirk
--
FREE historic Western Martial Arts manuals:
http://www.lulu.com/lawson

Western Martial Arts - http://cbd.atspace.com/

"...it's the nature of the media and the participants. A herd of martial artists gets together and a fight breaks out; quelle surprise."
-Chas Speaking of rec.martial-arts

 

For years the people on SFI have argued that Fiore's art is a completely different system from the German art.
ARMA position has always been that their are two different descriptions of the same art.

 

Ah. I understand.

I assume that you were making that statement tongue-in-cheek then?

Peace favor your sword,
Kirk
--
FREE historic Western Martial Arts manuals:
http://www.lulu.com/lawson

Western Martial Arts - http://cbd.atspace.com/

"...it's the nature of the media and the participants. A herd of martial artists gets together and a fight breaks out; quelle surprise."
-Chas Speaking of rec.martial-arts

 

So is the japanese katana the same art as german longsword?

The Bear.

 

No. It's more akin to the statement that Shinken taught by two different ryuha is, at it's core, the same. Simply different expressions with similar lineages leading back to a common root. At times, even suggesting that the two ryuha only appear to be different ryuha but are actually the same simply taught in different geographic locations.

I'll leave the debate over whether or not it's true alone. I don't think anyone who's already got an opinion will be swayed by the opposing side and, frankly, I don't really care that much about the question anyhow. Just too far off of my personal interests.

I asked the question of Ran because I wasn't sure of the exact position being espoused and I wanted clarification, not because I wanted to start a flamestorm.

Peace favor your sword,
Kirk
--
FREE historic Western Martial Arts manuals:
http://www.lulu.com/lawson

Western Martial Arts - http://cbd.atspace.com/

"...it's the nature of the media and the participants. A herd of martial artists gets together and a fight breaks out; quelle surprise."
-Chas Speaking of rec.martial-arts

 

Nope, I agree with SFI (for the moment). The seem to have the same root but they aren't the same art. They, like everything else separated by distance, evolved in parallel but different paths.... like marsupials and mammals.
Bob Brooks (over on SFI) has investigated the theory that Fiore dei Liberi (ca. 1350s - 1420s) was a pupil to Johannes Liechtenauer (early 1300's - 1380ish). If true then we have our root. Unfortunately 'the Swabian' Fiore speaks of is never identified.
Personally I like the neatness of this (unlikely thought it probably is) ... thus lending even more amusement value to taking the mickey out of the italian school.

 

That would be neat. The question is, how many fechtmeisters in the HRE could merely be referred to as "Johannes" (kind of like "Sting" or "Cher") and have everybody know who was meant? Liechtenauer is certainly as good a guess as any, however unlikely.

And really, that's the important part.

Best regards,

-Mark

 

It certainly didn't help that there are many towns called Liechtenauer's in Swabia (ie: Johannes of Liechtenauer). But Fiore did study in 'germany', Swabia and italy aren't that far apart, Uncle Johannes would have been well known in fencing circles and if you were an ambitious sort you would gravitate to the best teacher you could.
Absolute proof for the theory is definitely lacking but Bob (who does things like this for a living) thought that it is plausible to pinch a category from Mythbusters.

 

So the Celts and Romans practiced the same swordsmanship art?

Louie

 

obviously Louie
with the introduction of the spanish gladius ... The roman uses a short stabbing sword as part of a trained methodology within a cohesive unit ... while the celt uses a long slashing weapon and fights as an individual without formal support from his mates.
How could you not see the parallels?

 

My personal oppinion on the matter of Fiore vs German tradition, is that Fiore developed a system-beating-system, and in that sence, it was strongly linked to German systems. A friend of mine is publishing a book on the matter this year, hopefully, and until then I will not elaborate.

So in that sence, fiore presents a system based on others systems. He himselves sais that he taught from other masters, german and italian, and remember that there were nothing called germany or italy at his days, so talking about a german or italian system is absurd. It's more like modern ma's developed by skilled people, putting bits and pieces from other systems, mixing them into their own styles.

 

would you prefer we call them the styles of germanic and romano longswordsmanship? ... nah, lets just call them german and italian! We know what we mean.

Johannes Liechtenauer's system came from travelling around and learning from the masters that came before him in germany poland and northern italy. So his is a refined system of other peoples techniques. Fiore's is a similarly refined system based on other systems or even some of the same.

I'm sure there were styles on the go before 1350 but were never written down and were lost.

 

Euroswash!

I.33?

With every city, town, village and hamlet in Europe probably sporting at least one sword 'master' - and the wide variety of swords/armour configuration from country to country - it's hard to imagine them all doing the same euro-sword art.

Louie