The 12 Rules

[John_Clements]

Jake,
Don't you remember the pressing drill I covered in Provo to teach sensitivity and blade divisions?
It's one of the keys to our system of learning.

[Jake_Norwood]

Hey John-

Yes, I remeber. Are you talking about the half-sword drill that you briefly showed me at origins, or the "waster touch drill?" Both are challenging and both teach a lot. I look forward to getting a better introduction to the half-sword drill in January.

[David Lindholm]

Hello Everyone,

Ringeck talks a lot about hard and soft, feeling and Indes ( at once), these concepts are all interconected as I see it.Let me explain. As you make contact, if you are relaxed ( not teh same as soft) you will feel teh amount and direction his force is taking, that is Fuhlen. How you make contact with his blade is of no importance. Indes ( at once) is the moment when you must react in order to make good of teh situation.It is teh instant when you feel his force and react against it ( does not mean pushinmg against it).Ringeck also seems to imply that this is not a thinking process, but something that must be done as a trained reaction.If he pushes left you go around it an dhit him.If you think about it, you will get hit instead.What bearing has this on weak and strong.Well, weak and strong are not important in themselves, neither is ood or bad.But they will force you to react differently, but you must still feel (fuhlen) and act at once ( Indes).I do not hink that Indes hould be seen as a chronological concept indicatinmg that you must attack in teh middle of their movement. That is absolutly a possibility, but it does not fit well with the germna text. It implies that you act in an instant between two of your opponents actions. Indes is not used together with Uberlauffen for example which is Ringecks concept of both outreaching and out timing the opponent, hitting hiim in the middle of his own attack.Again neither hard, soft, Indes or feeling 8 fuhlen) is an action but illustrate what we almost can call Meta concepts since they can be applied to actions but are not actions themselves.
yours Sincerely,
david Lindholm

Pardon the spelling

[John_Clements]

Yes. That's what I mean by "sensing" and using it to improve your "perception" in gauging their intentions. It can even be done from a distance without crossing weapons.

JC

[John_Clements]

Niether. I mean the two-person sword crossed on sword pressing drill, in Abnemen / Incrosada. The one where you try to press and touch and close and bind and wind.

JC

[John_Clements]

Another thought...
It makes you wonder if these 12 rules for the beginner were part of another set of "other" rules for more experienced fencers? After all, there are things it does not include that you would think would be importnat, such as half swording and closing in.
Thoughts?

JC

[Guest]

I would think that there are more "stages" or "rules" as the student/scholar progesses. What about the use of shield. I'm sure we could all come up with 12 Rules to shield work as well as 12 rules to just foot work.

[Jake_Norwood]

Okay, John, I know the one now. I'll admit it's been a while since we've worked it. We'll get right back on it...

[John_Clements]

Yeah, man. It's important. Works wonders.

[Guest]

I am new at WMA, but I have been taking kendo and iai for about 2 years and this sounds exactly like some of the practices in those arts. I am by no means a master, so please don't think I am coming from that direction. Hopefully nobody objects to some comparisons between the two. I will start with the first 4 rules.

1. The leg in front is bent, the other one going towards the back is stretched.

This is the normal stance. The weight is distributed about 60% on the lead foot and 40% on the rear. The rear leg is not locked, but the entire lower body is tensed up. This is used to move quickly. The front foot moves first and the back foot *pushes*. You can cover a suprising amount of distance with this move.

2. Fight high with straightened body, deliver mighty blows out of the length.

Fundamental strinking principle. Strike with body erect, no leaning and fully extend the arms. Done properly you get a tremendous effect when you accelerate a blade by moving shoulder, then elbow, and finally wrist into a strike. Also promotes good recovery into proper stance.

3. Strike and move at the same timeand place your feet against each other.

I am -still- working on this. By striking at the culmination of your movement, (when your lead foot touches the ground) you add the force of gravity on your body into your strike.

4. He who moves after the blows has no right to be proud of his art.

Sounds like it can mean several things. First, you did not recover (bring up) your trailing foot properly leaving you in a poor stance as well as limiting your range. Your blow also would not have had as much force as possible.

[Jake_Norwood]

We spent some time lately working on this winding drill, focusing for "hard" and "soft" pressure. It was wonderful (we'll keep it up for sure). One of the observations that we made was that the best counter for hard pressing was a soft reply (or re-direction and disengage), and that the best counter for a soft pressure seemed to be a fast and hard response. Funny how those things seem to contradict each other...

Anyway, I'd love to hear more about others' experience with winding and pressure.

[John_Clements]

8. Strike Vor (“before”) and Nach (“after”), do not close in too early.

This is fairly straightforward. It's an admonition to use the concepts of preemptive attack and follow on attack, as described in so many Fechtbuecher.

Interesting though is the second part about not closing in too early. Could this refer to entering into Ringen range, or more broadly a caution about moving to strike from Zuefechten (the approach range)? Perhaps it even refers to moving from Zuefechten to the middle range of Krieg. All of this would be reasonable advice.

Then again, it might very well mean all of these...or something else.

JC

[Jake_Norwood]

Could this refer to entering into Ringen range, or more broadly a caution about moving to strike from Zuefechten (the approach range)?

My current mood/line of practice tells me something like this. If you close in too early you are open to be attacked in either Vor or Nach, especially if you attack out of range--it leaves you as open as anything will in a fight.

Another option is that it's an exhortation not to go straight to grips every time. A couble of guys out here are very proficient wrestlers, and they always try to go for the Ringen instead of really working their blade. That may or may not work well in a fight, but it doesn't improve your knowledge of the sword. That seems to be a plausable bit of advice for someone studying the sword. Like our day now, we know that a gun is more effective, but we're trying to learn the sword...so we shouldn't Indiana Jones it at shoot our sparring partner, but rather we should fight to learn and to improve as a swordsman, not just as a fighter.

I like my first interperetation better, but I think that both have some possibilities.

[John_Clements]

It's also interesting that while rule 8 refers to Vor and Nach, rules 6 tells us to remember In Des too.

[Jake_Norwood]

It's also interesting that while rule 8 refers to Vor and Nach, rules 6 tells us to remember In Des too.

What I think is most interesting about that, from a linguistic point of view, is that they're in different lines. Admittedly, it may be entirely due to the poetic form for the 12 points, but if it isn't, I think that it's worth asking "why is in des in a different line than vor and nach? could it be saying anything? How is In Des really a different principle from the other two?