European Swordfighting

Discussion in 'Weapons' started by Freeform, Sep 28, 2002.

  1. Freeform

    Freeform Fully operational War-Pig Supporter

    Hi Guys,

    I was just interested to find out if anyone out their practices the European Swordfighting methods. Whilst I was down in Bristol over the summer I had the pleasure of training with some euro-swordfighters and found the systems to be quite technical (10 weeks isn't enough ;) ). I was amazed to find out that there were many different schools of the broadsword.

    Normally I the pop media, european fighting methods are shown to be less technical and more 'brute force' than their asian counterparts, which is obviously not true.

    Thanx
     
  2. LilBunnyRabbit

    LilBunnyRabbit Old One

    Because the European swords tend to be heftier the impression that they are more brute force than technical skill tends to be promoted. However you can fence quite happily with a broadsword, you simply get bigger. There's an interesting book called 'English Martial Arts' which you might want to take a look at.
     
  3. waya

    waya Valued Member

    There are several schools here in the US that teach different eras of swordplay. A friend of mine studies Renassaince and Elizabethan fencing at one. I've seen him perform at medieval fairs and re-enactments here, it's definitely beautiful to watch.

    Rob
     
  4. Darzeka

    Darzeka New Member

    it depends on who you are looking at.

    The knights in full plate were more about brute force to win a fight but they also had some very technical aspects. They didn't need to keep their swords too sharp because they were trying to dent armor and break bones not chop arms off. Add in the use of a horse and shield and different types of weapons and there are many different styles of fighting.
    It is probably the same idea as asian weapons only with more emphasis on power to get through the armor.

    fencing styles were/are also very complex and diverse. With the multitude of weapons they used they had to adapt different techniques.

    I think they can be equated to the multitude now of different MA's. Each one has a slightly different emphasis and direction to get to the same goal. They just find the weapon that best fits them for there situation.
     
  5. LilBunnyRabbit

    LilBunnyRabbit Old One

    Add in the fact that they could walk, and some even swim, in thick steel plating and it really doesn't matter how sharp your weapon is, its gonna hurt.

    Fencing is technically a martial science by royal law. Knights would actually fence with their swords, same as fencers do nowadays, and at close to similar speeds. The brute force came in from the fact that they were absolutely huge (muscle-wise, mostly they were shorter than us today) and had enough strength to swing a heavy sword, while wearing plate armour, and change its direction in mid-air repeatedly for over an hour.
     
  6. waya

    waya Valued Member

    Mostly in fencing I think of Rapiers, Epee, Sabre, or weapons of that sort. Broadswords never really caught my interest much, although the lighter hand and a half cut and thrust blades did.

    Rob
     
  7. Baboon

    Baboon New Member

    European swords weren't heavy and knights weren't huge. In fact, for example, when examining period armour we can see that their legs were quite small.

    Swords weighted somewhere around 2 kilograms, they wren't bulky and heavy. As their eastern counterparts, they were made with the actual use in mind.

    Later full-plate armour decreased the need of shield-usage in combat as the armour provided protection. The fact that you could get hit without it disabling yourself decreased the need for actual skills in combat, and the fighting style became more strength oriented and brutal. Here we should remember that the sword was not the weapon of choice against full-plate armour in all cases, hammers and maces were more effective, and finally you could kill someone in such armour by stabbing a dagger through the visor of the helmet, or to his exposed joint-behinds or armpit etc.

    Nice to see this discussion going on here, this is my first post in this forum!
     
  8. johndoch

    johndoch upurs

    The germans made some massive two handed broadswords in medievel times. the Glasgow museum and art gallery has some fine examples. In particuliar a variant broadsword for hunting Boers that is almost 3m long.

    I think when a knight in full plated armour fell of his mount he would need the long sword to swing in large arcs to keep light infantry at bay. especially the quick ones with daggers, hammers maces etc.
     
  9. Baboon

    Baboon New Member

    Yes, longer swords were made to fight against soldiers armed with pikes and better work against armour.

    Let's just not mix longswords, true two handed swords and then something even longer than those.

    Longswords could be used also by one hand, and knights needed the length to fight from horseback more than they needed it when not mounted.

    The longer swords that had to be used by two hands were mostly made in renaissance times, after 15th century and even more after 16th century. As swords had less and less use in battlefield they eventually became decorative items (I'm not talking about rapiers), and I'd believe that the sword you mentioned is indeed a piece made for decorative purposes more than battlefield.

    Most modern-day replicas of these great-swords are heavier than the originals were. Three-meter long sword would be something I'd too consider "massive", but the two-handed swords used in battle were not more than four kilograms.
     
  10. Cooler

    Cooler Keepin The Peace Supporter

    Welcome to the forum Baboon. You obviously know a lot about this subject myself I know next to nothing so have kept out of it :)

    I studied fencing for a few years while at Drama college and loved it.

    Look forward to reading more on this subject

    Cooler
     
  11. johndoch

    johndoch upurs

    very interesting baboon. So what would someone in full armour do to protect themselves if they got pulled of their horse. I dunno but i'd imagine they would need a weapon that would give them range due to lack of speed caused by the weight of the armour.?
     
  12. Baboon

    Baboon New Member

    Thanks, Cooler.

    John, you're correct, they need a weapon on foot, too! There's not much use for lances when not mounted, so they used their swords.

    Long-sword was a common choice, because it was strong enough to be used against armour and provided better defensive options than a shorter sword without shield. It also had reach over shorter weapons. Other weapons were also used.

    The weight of the armour wasn't such big issue in speed, it weighted about 25 kilograms, and the weight was equally spread across body (compare to modern gear marines carry, which is about the same weight). Most problems full-plate armour caused was due to overheating, it got quite warm in full-plate. :)
     
  13. johndoch

    johndoch upurs

    so how long would a long sword roughly be?
     
  14. Baboon

    Baboon New Member

    Roughly from one meter to 1.3 meters is what I'd consider a longsword.
     
  15. johndoch

    johndoch upurs

    thanks, so a short sword would be 0.75m - 1m??
     
  16. Baboon

    Baboon New Member

    Yes, those would fall in the category. 0.75m is very short, but the swords were made in various lengths.

    Short sword is not an accurate term, but you could say that something from 0.8 to 1.10 meters is a length where single-hand grip swords were commonly made, and those can be called short swords or one-handed swords (there are other terms also, but those are common today). Longswords were different from short swords in that they had longer grip as well as longer blade, so that they could more easily be used with two hands.
     
  17. Freeform

    Freeform Fully operational War-Pig Supporter

    Hi Baboon, good to have you aboard!

    What about the actual fighting style used with the swords? I take it was more of a hack than the oriental cut?

    Thanx
     
  18. Baboon

    Baboon New Member

    Hi Freeform, and thanks!

    There were many different schools in medieval combat, but unfortunately (in some way) no living tradition has actually survived. Number of historical manuals and texts have survived, but most of them are relatively new, oldest ones dating back to late 13th century.

    However, these manuals show us that a lot of thought was given to swordsmanship, and skills were taught and organized. What we know today is that the combat was quite straight forward and brutal, included versatile use of weapons, and pretty no-nonsense grappling and empty hand combatives.

    What is evident in all manuals is that the swords were used for cutting, not hacking. The swords were made to cut, they were sharp and could do tremendous damage.

    Of course, against full-plate armour it was not easy to cut through, som using the sword may have been more like "bashing". That's one reason I personally am not interested in fighting armoured as much as unarmored.

    But the hacking style is not how you'd like to use a european sword, nor is it how they propably were used back then.

    I really can't say about the differences between oriental sword use and the western, but generally i'd think it was not that much different. Most western swords had two edges and were perhaps more suitable to straight thrusts than a single-edged katana, this sort of things make some difference.

    I'm not very familiar with eastern styles, especially the historical ones, but when all blows were allowed and it was a fight for life and death, the combat technically might come down to similiar use of swords in both cultures. The underlying basics were propably pretty much similiar.
     
  19. waya

    waya Valued Member

    I don't know a whole lot of sepcifics on the historical European sword systems, but I know that sword masters were fairly common at one point, and there were many advanced schools on the subject. My understanding is that the Romans had a very advanced system of armed combat that was taught for a couple hundred years or so.

    One company that I deal with for edged weapons seems to have some good historical references that they sell, as well as producing good replications of historical blades.

    Rob
     
  20. LilBunnyRabbit

    LilBunnyRabbit Old One

    When I say huge, I'm referring to brute size rather than height. Short legs don't mean small legs, it can easily mean short legs like tree-trunks.

    You try swinging a longsword for a couple of hours while wearing thick steel plate and having someone else battering at you, and this was in the tournaments, not in an actual war.
     

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