Best Backsword or Broadsword manuals?

[James Brazas]

Some people in our group are interested in branching out into Early Modern fencing, especially English or Scottish Backsword/Broadsword/Cut-and-Thrust fencing.

How would such fencing styles compare with earlier material like Marozzo or Silver?

Is the newer English/Scottish material more simplistic than the earlier Cut-and-Thrust/Side-Sword material?

Finally, what manuals would be the most robust and complete manuals to study from for English/Scottish back/broadsword?

[LafayetteCCurtis]

It all depends on which manual you'd like to study. Many of the military drill books -- especially the ones in the English military broadsword tradition established by John Gaspard le Marchant -- are quite simplistic compared to the likes of Silver or Marozzo, but we should keep in mind that they were meant to provide large numbers of cavalrymen with simple but practical instruction in the shortest time possible (for which they were fairly adequate). On the other hand, there are other manuals like Hutton's, Burton's, or (pseudo-)Roworth's that also include details on more advanced practice such as feints and false-edge attacks. I think you can derive more benefit from this latter kind of manual if you can acquire some background in modern-ish fencing (a Victorian historical fencing group would be the best source, followed closely by a good classical fencing group; but even a modern fencing school can be useful if you take the basic instruction but don't acquire the electric competition-oriented habits).

So which is the "best" manual to study? Probably the one that looks the most readable and comprehensible to your group -- preferably one that uses terminology that someone in the group is already familiar with. Note that the numbering systems for cuts and guards vary among the manuals; some use the French scheme familiar to modern sabreurs (albeit with more numbers), some follow the Le Marchant tradition, and there's at least one translation of Radaelli's Italian manual. Just pick one system that (subjectively) makes the most sense and stick to it.

It's hard to compare the later systems with Silver since Silver's works don't have a well-identified "tradition" of other works that can fill the gaps in what we can extract out of his two principal works. There's a hint that the English may particularly like hanging guards (Silver's Guardant Fight, Hope's seconde, and the Victorian military sabre systems based upon the hanging guard) but every source uses it rather differently. Against Marozzo and the Bolognese tradition . . . well, latter-day military sabre and broadsword systems tend to be simpler and more straightforward in their plays, but it's worth noting that Marozzo wasn't teaching basic swordsmanship (there's an implicit assumption that his manual was meant for prospective teachers with already-strong fundamentals) while on the other hand there must be a great deal of advanced concepts and techniques that were only taught in person in the 19th-century salle (as opposed to being written down in books or manuals).

[James Brazas]

OK, thanks! Sounds like Hutton, Burton, or Rosworth would be best then.

Personally, I think I might prefer Silver or better yet Marozzo. I really want to delve in deeply into comlex-hilted straight sword material. But we tend to do things fairly democratically. So we'll see who outvotes who.

[LafayetteCCurtis]

Well, if you're really keen on the Silver or Bolognese material, try practicing them solo quite intensively and then demonstrate what you've learned in front of the others. Compared to classical/Victorian cut-fencing, the Bolognese style requires much more study and practice before it even starts to make sense at all and you'll have to make up many of your own drills rather than using the ones already laid out in the sourcebooks. On the other hand, this complexity might be exactly what you're going to enjoy once you've muddled through the basics.

Silver . . . now that's a tough one. The problem with him, as I've said already, is that he's the only example we know of in his "school" or "tradition" and his works come without any illustrations whatsoever of the actual stances, guards, and actions he describes. Unlike the Liechtenauer, Fiore, or Bolognese traditions, we can't cross-reference multiple manuals and use one (or more) manuals to fill the gaps that another doesn't cover. We can only guess at what his style looks like and for the most part people just wind up incorporating his tips and techniques into the methods of some style they've learned before. That's not a bad thing in its own right but pretty frustrating if you're interested in making a genuine reconstruction of his style.

Don't turn up your nose at the later manuals either; for example, go check out pseudo-Roworth here (I prefer to call it "Taylor" since that's the name of the author mentioned in the frontispiece and the attribution to Roworth isn't very strong). It has a straightforward and logical order of presentation, so you should be able to study it fairly easily as long as you follow the order in which the materials are presented (and don't jump ahead to the more complicated sections before you've worked thoroughly on the basics). Like other modern sabre/broadsword styles, the basics are really simple and you can start using them in free-play much faster than you normally would with Renaissance or medieval styles (although I might be biased in this since I had studied a little modern fencing in middle school, years before I started delving into this kind of material).

[James Brazas]

OK, thank you!

It sounds like the Bolognese material would be ideal for those who are already experienced with the use of such blades.

I understand what you mean about Silver! We haven't done anything with his sword material yet, but we just finished with his pole-arms. The techniques are simple enough, but his wording is so vague that you often have to fill in the gaps with what you think he meant. (As in he might advise you to throw the opponent by hooking him with your staff - but he doesn't say where to hook him or from what angle.)

Interesting. I looked through the Taylor manual a bit, it's fairly good! I'll keep that one in mind.