Anachronistic cross-training

[Justin Blackford]

Hello.

I was wondering how many of you have considered anachronistic cross-training. Please note that this has nothing to do with the SCA, of which I am not affiliated.
I am merely referring to cross-training with weapons from different time periods and/or cultures.
I've met some people who are dead serious when it comes to sparring only with weapons that come from the same period, but I think that anachronistic cross-training could teach the fundamentals of how the weapons evolved and still maintain the basic principles of distance, range, and timing.
The closest I have come to cross-training in this manner is when I sparred a few bouts with rapier against longsword, which isn't necessarily anachronistic. I'm sure there were at least a few bouts between these two weapon types in the Renaissance era.
However, some friends of mine are thinking of serious anachronism in the field of battle later this week. We've even met some people who are learned in weapons of other cultures who are willing to spar with us in friendly freeplay. We've got in mind: Greatsword vs. gladius and scutum/ Tomahawk and knife vs. Rapier and dagger/ Sabre vs. Turkish Scimitar/ and maybe No-dachi vs. the two-handed Danish Axe. Man are we gonna have fun. We'll probably come up with more, since our weapons collections are quite extensive.
Has anybody else out there tried anachronistic cross-training? I would like to hear about previous experiences.

Justin

[Stacy Clifford]

Actually tomahawk and knife vs. rapier and dagger could have conceivably happened. Keep in mind the colonization of the Americas was going on in the 1500s-1700s. Guns get all the glory on this side of the Atlantic during that period, but there were lots of swords, halberds, armor, etc. brought over here and fought with too. (I think I'd take the rapier and dagger in this one, unless the tomahawk guy is really good at throwing it.)

Personally I think that the variety of weaponry was so great during the period we study that few fights could be considered truly anachronistic in actual form. A saber may not have fought a scimitar in history, but some sort of curved, single-edged blade almost certainly did at some point. Rapier probably didn't encounter sword and shield much, but it likely did confront all kinds of sword and buckler. A tuck could have encountered a long dagger/short sword/might as well be a gladius. Start crossing cultures, like with Japanese weapons, and similar encounters become a little less likely, but still not out of the realm of possibility.

And you guys are definitely going to have fun. I love cross-weapon sparring. <img src="/forum/images/icons/cool.gif" alt="" />

[David_Knight]

There is a very short OOP work titled "Arms and Armor of the Pilgrims" that details exactly which swords and polearms were used in 17th century America. I will try to get some of that material online.

[Jonathan Harton]

Sabers did in fact meet scimitars in history. The British conquest of India certainly saw sabers and basket-hilted claymores meeting tulwers and scimitars as the Indians also employed Arabs. One particular unit were the Lions of Allah and they squared off against English, Sepoy, and Highlander regiments before and at the siege of Gawighular (sp?) in 1805. The results? The Claymores and Sabers of the British kicked the hell out of the Arabs and Indians. There are several accounts of Indians writting of intense fear of the skirt wearing beasts with their big swords.

The British Cavalry was also supplied with a saber (I forget the exact name and place of make) that had a written warenty on the blade that it would never fail to do its job.
Just thought that an intresting tid-bit of history that I have been looking into lately. Wellington proved his genious in India.

[Jeffrey Hull]

Well, I think it is a fine idea.

I have been curious about how sword &amp; buckler would fare against gisari-kama.

<img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />

JH

[Justin Blackford]

Yeah, you're right. I forgot all about that. In the early colonial period, rapier and dagger and the later smallsword could definently have happened.
Well, we weren't supposed to start our bouts until tomorrow, but one of my friends had off from work today, as did I, and we saw my tomahawk and his rapier and just couldn't resist. It's a shame we don't have a digital camera, I'd love to show you guys exactly what's happening.
But, hey, none of the fechtbuchs have moving pictures, so you'll just have to use your imaginations as I explain what happened during our exciting bouts of tomahawk and knife against rapier and dagger.

I can wield both tomahawk and rapier, but my sparring partner knows very little on the use of axe-bladed weapons, so he took the rapier and dagger. I personally have some experience training with Native American weapons. My father was a Lakota and every once in a while, he would show me how to throw the tomahawk as well as a lot of neat little knife tricks that complemented it in close-quarters combat.

In our first bout, I realized that I couldn't let his signifigantly longer weapon take the initiative, so I rushed him as he attempted the first thrust with the rapier, which was parried with the tomahawk, and then came the thrust with the dagger, which was parried with my knife. We ended up caught in a tight bind until I kicked him in the gut and forced him back. Then, I was all over him like Mel Gibson in "The Patriot". Had the fight been real, he'd have been hacked to pieces.
Then came bout two. I tried to rush him again, but he dropped to one knee and delivered a stop-thrust under my neck before I could close the distance.
For bout three, same as "bout two". <img src="/forum/images/icons/blush.gif" alt="" />
The final bout lasted several minutes, involving a lot of binds, wrestling, and attempted stop-thrusts. I wasn't going to throw the tomahawk because I was too afraid I would miss or would be deflected, thus having to face the rapier with just my buck knife(not good!). I managed at one point to strike at his dagger hand, causing him to loosen his grip, and then I knocked the dagger out with my tomahawk. He didn't hesitate to withdraw before I could strike him again and proceeded to fight with the rapier alone.
It ended when he attempted another quick stop-thrust, which I locked up using both of my weapons and proceeded to strike him on top of the head with the tomahawk. Then, I took his scalp(just kidding!).
So, I've learned from this that the fast thrusting rapier is a real pain to fight when armed with shorter close-quarter weapons. But when I close the distance between the sword and the man, he's as good as dead. This is all pretty obvious to the experienced martial artist, but the cross-training with different styles certainly taught me better judgement at distance, range, and timing.
And there was much rejoicing....(Yeeeeaaaaah!) <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

I'll brief everybody tomorrow when we get back from our anachronistic cross-training with a variety of other weapons. It'll be a lot longer, because my whole group will be there, and everybody is eager to try out different combinations. I think that our results should be fascinating. We'll see.

Justin

[Allen Johnson]

Indeed- Here is a link to several pictures I took at the South Carolina State museum a while back.
http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread.php?s=&amp;threadid=26712&amp;highlight=Museum

most interesting are the leaf blade short cutlass, many sabers, a baskethilt, ans some pikemans armour.

[David_Knight]

This is somewhat tangential, but here is a fascinating 19th C. British Lancer uniform from an amazing private collection in my new hometown of Lexington, VA:



These mail epaulets were to protect against sabers and lances in Africa, if I remember correctly.

[JeanryChandler]

We recently did some rapier vs. greatsword bouts. You can see a bit of it in this video clip

http://www.iregames.com/jr/ownage.wmv

Ever since I saw the duel scene at the end of Rob Roy I've been interested in this kind of match. I remember noticing that there was a longsword or bastard sword on the table of weapons Laim Nissons character had to choose from, and thinking 'I'd grab that longsword!" Ever since then I'd been interested in the smallsword vs. the longsword, and since some guys in our group do rapier, we have tried that as well. With the rapier it's not alltogether anacrhonistic and much more of an even match.

The longsword can dominate the smallsword largely due to reach, but against the rapier, it's tricky. As the longsword fighter, you have to avoid very wide sweeping cuts (as you can see when I get skewered in the neck) and keep your blade in front of you. Before you engage the rapier has a bit of an advantage. Once you are engaged you have a brief advantage but you have to exploit it quickly and carefully.

You can also see at the end of the clip where one of our guys is using a Huscarl axe against a sword and (large) buckler, and he manages to hook the axe around the guys foot and literally pull him off his feet...

definately good fun <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

Jeanry

P.S. if we seem a bit slow, it was 37 C / 94% humidity in the park that day, and the heat was kind of kicking our collective butts <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

[s_taillebois]

As noted, also have to consider that oftimes obsolete weapons tended to drift down (often in pieces) to the lower social orders. Wasn't uncommon for obsolete swords to be recycled into daggers, or into other things. Sometimes that also occurred as a sentimental issue, someone keeping and using an obsolete weapon as a matter of heritage.
And might consider cross training with things not usually considered martial arts weapons...certainly the late Medieval, Early Renn. Brits raised a substantial amount of trouble with Billhooks and such...and in revolts whatever was at hand was put to use, and the fighting style advocated by the Renn. masters/fightbooks may not have been accessible to the lower orders, but it was certainly used agaisnt them at times.
(although the martial arts of the lower orders were nothing to disdain, apparently the bills and staff traditions were very effective...)
On the Lakota sparring...curious if there was a tendancy to use a repeated type of strike. Here, in the usual knifing incidents, the pattern seems to be a downward descending knife strike (rotating of the forearm). Granted not Lakota (in general) most here are Dakoda, Nakoda and Assinibiones.
That said, in the South, the NA has a functional equivalent to the fighting schools and fechtbuchs, that the Europeans had...The Aztec/Nautl's had seemingly distinct fighting styles associated with the jaguar/eagle/hummingbird societies, and so did the potecha caravans (who were a hereditary class of sorts...mainly traders and spies, and usually a harbinger of a upcoming flower war).
So the Spanish rapiers, arbalests and such...would have confronted a very developed fighting style when invading Tenochitlan and etc. Obviously well within the parameters of the ARMA period of study. Although it seems that few, if any, Aztec fightbooks survived the flames.

[Justin Blackford]

On the Lakota sparring...curious if there was a tendancy to use a repeated type of strike. Here, in the usual knifing incidents, the pattern seems to be a downward descending knife strike (rotating of the forearm). Granted not Lakota (in general) most here are Dakoda, Nakoda and Assinibiones.

Well, the style of tomahawk and buck knife (and two tomahawk) fighting that my father used to show me involved a lot of fast changing of attacks between both weapon hands, as well as armlocks, joint manipulation, and binds that lead to disarms. I don't usually fall into a pattern of using the downward descending knife strike by rotating the forearm. I do use it sometimes if my tomahawk hand is locked up in a bind, but I will often rotate my knife grip from blade up to blade down, depending on which situation I'm in. With shorter axe-bladed weapons and knifes, one must be as aggressive as possible to close the gap between a longer one(i.e. rapier), and that's exactly what I did in my cross-sparring bout.

That said, in the South, the NA has a functional equivalent to the fighting schools and fechtbuchs, that the Europeans had...The Aztec/Nautl's had seemingly distinct fighting styles associated with the jaguar/eagle/hummingbird societies, and so did the potecha caravans (who were a hereditary class of sorts...mainly traders and spies, and usually a harbinger of a upcoming flower war).
So the Spanish rapiers, arbalests and such...would have confronted a very developed fighting style when invading Tenochitlan and etc. Obviously well within the parameters of the ARMA period of study. Although it seems that few, if any, Aztec fightbooks survived the flames.

Yes, the Aztecs, Toltecs, Mayans, and other Central American Indians did have fightschools that gave detailed martial instruction on the use of various weapons, primarily the macana, which is a fearsome weapon indeed. The obsidian studs on the edge of the weapon are unbelievably sharp, though also frail if improperly handled. That would probably explain the need for a disciplined martial art system. And yes, most books relevant to the use of Central American Indian weaponry were burned during the conquest of the New World. Some artwork has survived, and various descriptions of fights and how war was practiced between the city-states of Ancient Central America, but it doesn't seem to be sufficient to provide us with a necessary amount of information on the exact historical use of the weapons themselves. Though, the macana and shield against a rapier would be an interesting fight indeed. <img src="/forum/images/icons/cool.gif" alt="" /> That gives me some ideas.....

As for my bouts today, only three of my friends were able to make it, so we'll have to finish our ideas tomorrow.
But, today, we managed two fights: two-handed Dane-axe versus no-dachi and gladius and scutum versus 14th century great-sword.

On our first bout, I was not involved. My one colleague in arms who is totally into the Anglo-Saxon/Viking Age period weapons took the Dane-axe, and my other friend is a practicing kenjutsu fighter, and was quite eager to see the effects of the nodachi.

As for the weapons stats:

The Dane-axe is five feet long, weighs only 2 1/2 lbs, and has a skeggox ("bearded" axe-head).

The nodachi is approx. 5'5" long, and weighs nearly 5 lbs.

The fight:

The Dane-axeman siezed the initiative by delivering a slipping strike aimed for his opponent's lower leg. This was countered by a long series of hanging parries followed by powerful downward strikes from the nodachi fighter. The Dane-axeman was defending considerably well, using the area under the "bearded" tip of his axe to parry and lock, as well as blocking with the shaft and delivering thrusts with the butt end of the shaft.
Finally, the nodachi fighter made the fatal mistake of striking down from his weak side(his left), which was bound strongly with the underside of the axehead before the Dane-axeman used his momentum and delivered a slipping strike to his opponent's throat.
Winner: Dane-axe!

Fight two: Greatsword versus gladius and scutum

Weapons stats:

The greatsword used is a 14th century German replica(we fought with full protection using padded waster forms and not our real blades of course) and is 54" long and weighs exactly 3 lbs. The blade is rather parallel edged, though it does start to taper towards the point, making the point fairly distal. The handle is also very long to counterbalance it, so that the hands may have the space necessary to deliver the wide cuts it just begs me to do.

The gladius and scutum are typical of the Imperial era of Rome, the most widely recognized form of Roman weaponry before the changes brought by Marius. The scutum covers a good area of the body, extending from below the neck to right above the knee. The gladius is almost 30" long and is the style of the standard issue legionary during Rome's glory days.

The fight:

My much shorter friend took up the weapons of Rome(his favourite period in history), and I wielded my much revered greatsword.
Combat began when the Roman rushed at me with his scutum, pushing me back before I had a chance to come down with a zornhau I intended to do. I quickly started to regain my balance and started moving backward faster than he was pushing me, in hopes of using his own momentum against him. Then, I quickly side-stepped and tried for a Schaittelhau to reach over his scutum. He quickly parried this with the gladius and bumped me back with his scutum, returning us to the zufechten. I regained balance again and took the guard Pflug, awaiting to see what the Roman fighter intended next. He brought his scutum in front of him a moved his sword into a guard reminiscent of Ochs/Finestra/Prima.
Krieg began again as he rushed me with his shield and attempted a powerful downward thrust over his scutum. I side-stepped and hanging parried his blade and made a powerful oberhau to his exposed back leg. He saw this coming and circled around to meet me before the blow landed and blocked it with his scutum. I quickly stepped back and then stepped forward again with a Schaittelhau which he parried by lifting his scutum slightly, but not enough to deflect me fast enough. I then turned the strike downward into a thrust aimed for his neck, at the same time he stabbed me in the gut with his gladius.
Result: Simultaneous kill! <img src="/forum/images/icons/shocked.gif" alt="" />

So, that's all for today. I wonder if anybody else has seen a Roman era style fighter use similar tactics. His method seemed appropriate for facing a much longer blade.

Justin

[s_taillebois]

Justin, interesting information..thanks.
Concerning the macana, would be interesting to experiment in its potential use. Due to the brittleness of the obsedian insets, it may not have been useable in a direct 'impact' strike;such as the deer antler or ball club NA weaponry might have been used in the north. Rather the tactics may have entailed something like a drawing or oblique cut. And in the parrying of blows, presumably a rotation so the back 'club' edge of the macana would take the impact. The post classic Maya archers seem also to have been feared/well regarded (although the Aztecs also used archers). And at times, the Spanish found that plate armour was a liability when being subjected to mass fire of obsidian arrows. Apparently a shards from a shattered obsidian arrowhead could alone cause substantial damage. Reached a point where the Spanish were adopting a varient of Aztec armour (or becoming more reliant on gambesons). Aztec 'armor' seemed to have worked by absorbtion of a blow, rather than by deflection. Also allowed their fighters a very high mobility...almost gymnastic in nature. Although, I don't recall if the field expedients/equipment the Spanish adopted when fighting the Aztecs, had any change on equipment patterns back in Europe.
The roman/longsword sparring...looks like what happened is somewhat similar to the images on Roman reliefs about the Gaullic wars. Might have been very different if a pilum was kicked into the sparring (how from a safety view might be problematic)

[Justin Blackford]

Okay, here's today's story.

I can't seem to find an accurate replica of a macana, but I have a couple of antique and several handmade replica North American Indian weapons. So, the macana/Aztec style shall have to wait a while.
Oh, and thinking about what you said on the Spanish armours, I saw something interesting the other day. I got a book from the library about the time of Japan during the Sengoku Jidai and in there was a picture of a Christian samurai receiving a blessing from a priest before going into battle, and he was wearing a Spanish "Conquistador" style helmet and had a Spanish made steel breastplate on top of his traditional samurai armour. I was astounded! Maybe to some of you, this might be old news, but it was a new discovery for me. It said that there were many samurai who couldn't deny the strength behind Western armour technology and incorporated it into their own armours. Neat stuff!
Anyway, today, I had an interesting bout.

Anyway, today was: Lakota weapons versus Dark Age European weapons.

Weapon stats for the first bout:

I wielded the Lakota weapons, which were:

A lance which is approx. 5.5 feet long with a 17" blade.(My real lance is beautifully decorated with eagle feathers and glass beads, but I just used a plain staff of equal length padded towards the tip for safe sparring.)
A ball-headed mace which is approx. 30" long. The real one is beautifully carved so that it looks like a hand is gripping a round stone towards the business end. A good friend of mine in my historical weapons study group is quite crafty and made me a properly weighted and balanced padded waster form of this interesting weapon which I love to wield.
And I wore an accurate shield made out of Buffalo hide and wrapped up in a coyote skin. It's a historically accurate replica, but I just left it undecorated since I was going to be sparring with it.

My partner donned the Dark Age weapons which were:

A 6' long ash spear with an 18" blade. (Again, he used a staff of equal length and a padded tip.)
An Anglo-Saxon/Viking style sword which was approx. 38" long and had parallel edges with a round tip(typical of the period).
And a rawhide buckler-shaped shield with a steel umbo.

The fight:

We started with our spears and shields and kept our close-quarter sidearms sheathed at our sides. My opponent took a guard which resembled the Wild Boar and I charged at him with a series of quick thrusts aimed for his exposed legs.
My opponent continually parried with his rawhide buckler style shield and tried for a few thrusts at my face. Actions like this continued until we got bound up and he kicked me back several feet. He then decided to throw his spear at me while I was still regaining balance. I pulled my shield up to guard central mass, and it struck the shield.
In reality, this would have punctured the shield and made it unwieldly, so I dropped the shield and wielded my lance two handed and started for him.
He didn't hesitate to draw his sword and successfully parried every one of my thrusts with sword and shield. His actions with the smaller rawhide shield certainly resembled those of the later Medieval and Renaissance style of sword and buckler fighting, and these techniques were working great for him.
He managed to defend himself well from my assault, and then when I got close enough, he performed a kind of scissors hold on my spear to seize it temporarily and then tried to slip strike with his sword towards my legs.
I dodged and pulled the spear out of the bind. By this time, I was in range for a good spear throw, and I was hoping that I could at least hit his shield. I threw it, but he rolled out of the way and came for me.
I pulled out my ball-headed mace and we began close-quarters combat. I had a hard time defending because I had no shield, so I tried to close in with some grappling, but he wouldn't give way to it.
After exchanging a few blows, he locked up my weapon hand in that weird scissors hold and then tried to use a horizontal slip strike with his sword towards my head.
I quickly ducked my head so the strike missed and I dropped my weapon into my free hand and struck him between his knee and thigh(Okay, I admit I took the dropping the weapon and switching hands move from The Hunted with Benicio Del Toro, but hey, it works great!).
Apparently, I must've struck him towards his sciatic nerve(so he claims), and he fell over his leg towards the ground. Since a strike to the leg would not necessarily be fatal with a blunt weapon(at least immediately), I decided to follow him to the ground and finish him off with a good strike to the head.
Just as I came down to him and raised my weapon, he rolled out of the way and stabbed me between the ribs.

Outcome: Dark Age warrior has broken knee and thigh, and I'm totally dead!

It was a good fight though. Took a lot of energy out of us. We were planning to do more, but we decided enough was enough and went home. But, I'm glad that I've had the chance to cross-train with and against weapons and styles from both halves of my heritage. It's been fun! Anachronistic cross-sparring is really interesting and enlightening. I'm definently going to do this more often! <img src="/forum/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />
Although, today's fight may not be considered anachronistic for those who believe that the Heavener Runestone is real, but that is a subject of another debate and would seem to be off-topic for this particular forum.
So, that's all folks!

Justin

[Stacy Clifford]

So, I've learned from this that the fast thrusting rapier is a real pain to fight when armed with shorter close-quarter weapons. But when I close the distance between the sword and the man, he's as good as dead. This is all pretty obvious to the experienced martial artist, but the cross-training with different styles certainly taught me better judgement at distance, range, and timing.

Your friend may not have been so skilled at the close-in fight, but don't underestimate the grappling skills of rapier fencers of the time. Many of them could have turned you and your tomahawk into a nice pretzel and probably wouldn't have dropped that dagger so easily. This article talks a lot about it:

http://www.thearma.org/essays/G&amp;WinRF.htm

[Justin Blackford]

Actually, my friend being unskilled in grappling is my point exactly. I'm not denying the skills of wrestling that many historical rapier fighters would have had, but I'm definently saying that my own skills at closing in and grappling are signifigantly better than those of my partners in training. So much in fact, that they intentionally try their hardest to avoid grappling by any means possible.
I've tried to convince them that training in Ringen is a very necessary component on the use of historical weapons, but several of my partners seem too afraid to try some wrestling drills with me because they don't like the uncomfortable and sometimes painful holds that I can put them in. I'm not being sadistic, but I do believe that one must be willing to be brave and take a little pain and discomfort if one is going to get good at learning the Art.
But hey, you try telling that to a couple of my partners. I know I have.

Justin