Swordplay / Fencing

[Revontheus]

Hey guys!
I've started practicing medieval swordplay and swordplay from the 17th century for like 2 months and I'm getting better, and I wonder if someone else here in Smogon practices it and could give me some tips.

 

[verbatim]

Interesting, out of curiosity what/who are you learning from? In my experience I've seen an abundance of European swordsmanship pop up in many different places and in my mind it'd be interesting to see how you got into this. Also, you titled this swordplay/fencing, does this mean that you are looking at both two handed weapons and foils, or just fencing related weaponry?

I don't know much about European swordsmanship, but I'm a second dan in Koryo Gumdo (Korean swordsmanship) and have light practice in European stage combat, so I could probably work my way through specific questions.

 

[Revontheus]

I'm learning from one the few Swordmasters (don't know if it's right translated) in Portugal, called Fernando who has learned from a famous english swordmaster.
I've got into this because I always liked to see swordplay in movies and series, and some time ago I heard that a friend of my dad was practicing it, and he also happened to represent Portugal in many European tourneys (his name is Rui Cunha) so I asked if I could see how they do it and I liked so I started practicing.

And I titled this thread swordplay/fencing because I didn't know the correct translation. The kinds of swordplay I practice are called Medieval Swordplay and 17th Century Swordplay (not sure if it's right translated).
The Medieval Swordplay is fought with a Sword and a Shield while the 17th Century Swordplay is fought with a rapier and a dagger.

 

[forks]

yo, i did this for a few months last year. it was good times, swordfighting's a hell of a hobby. luckily vancouver has some great resources for learning it, and it's popular enough so that you can train against a variety of other opponents and get lots of exposure to different styles. the whole medieval swordplay scene seems to have a pretty solid following in north america and western europe, though it can be hard to track them since the community at large can't all seem to settle on a name: we called it 'western martial arts', but i've also heard historical european, medieval european, renaissance, german and occidental martial arts, as well as simply historical fencing. i always just called it 'doing swords'.

exciting for you, though. did they start you off with the dagger right away? i took rapier for six months or so, but at my salle we don't work the dagger into the mix until you reach a certain rank. do you have a preference between rapier and sword+buckler?

for the record, i mostly did italian rapier in the style of ridolfo capoferro. a bit of italian longsword and german messer. we weren't permitted to spar with the heavier weapons without rigid arm/chest protection, which i never got a hold of, so my full-speed fighting experience is restricted to rapier - which was fun as hell, though never quite as glamorous as the longsword.

 

[Revontheus]

Yeah, swordplay/fight is really cool, I don't know how there are so few people practicing it. Here in Portugal we call it Medieval European Swordplay.

No, at the beginning I started only with rapier, though after my first month my master said I was doing pretty good for a newbie and gave me a dagger to start practicing with it. And yeah, I prefer the sword+buckler 'cause with rapier you can get "killed" just by having it a few milimeters to the wrong side.

We aren't permited to figth with heavy ones too, and 'till now I've only seem my companions use it in tourneys. And whats different between the Italian Longsword you say and the usual medieval swordplay?

rapier - which was fun as hell, though never quite as glamorous as the longsword.

^^You stole the words from my mouth

 

[forks]

We aren't permited to figth with heavy ones too, and 'till now I've only seem my companions use it in tourneys. And whats different between the Italian Longsword you say and the usual medieval swordplay?

i specify as such to distinguish the style i've been taught from other, mostly german styles. i was taught longsword almost exclusively from fiore dei liberi's flos duellatorum (the only italian manual i know of for longsword, though they have a bunch for rapier iirc) whereas most of the other schools i've come across follow german masters like liechtenauer, talhoffer, ringeck, etc.
"medieval swordplay" is pretty vague, do you have any idea where your particular style of swordplay comes from?

 

[Revontheus]

i specify as such to distinguish the style i've been taught from other, mostly german styles. i was taught longsword almost exclusively from fiore dei liberi's flos duellatorum (the only italian manual i know of for longsword, though they have a bunch for rapier iirc) whereas most of the other schools i've come across follow german masters like liechtenauer, talhoffer, ringeck, etc.
"medieval swordplay" is pretty vague, do you have any idea where your particular style of swordplay comes from?

I'm learning from Fiore dei Liberi's Fior di Battaglia, I think the style of swordplay is pretty much like the Italian one, with minor changes.