Get a load of THIS...

[Randall Pleasant]

Scholars

I don't like or wear period clothing because with few exceptions it just look completely silly in a martial arts context. I think period clothing can has a very negative affect upon a martial art - it's mixing oil with water. At the 2006 WMAW event I felt that there were not clear boundaries between re-enactment and the actual martial arts and as a result I think the martial arts at the event suffered greatly because of the re-enactment.

People who wear bright yellow hose with white rag warped around their butt while talking funny should not be suprise at the level of respect they receive from other martial artists.

[michael fitch]

I tend not to wear period clothing because along with being expensive, it is usually shoddy workmanship and couldn't handle an intense practice or sparring match. As soon as I convince my sister-in-law to make me some that will hold up, you bet I will be period (in proper colors of course). The freedom of movement is worth it.

-Jeremiah (GFS)

I am not for or against wearing period clothing, but if you are looking for some "Revival Enterprises" has a very nice Zuparelli (gambeson) that is not to costly. I am in no way connected to revival, but own one, like it and would tell a friend about it.
bob

[Jeremiah Backhaus]

Scholars

I don't like or wear period clothing because with few exceptions it just look completely silly in a martial arts context. I think period clothing can has a very negative affect upon a martial art - it's mixing oil with water. At the 2006 WMAW event I felt that there were not clear boundaries between re-enactment and the actual martial arts and as a result I think the martial arts at the event suffered greatly because of the re-enactment.

People who wear bright yellow hose with white rag warped around their butt while talking funny should not be suprise at the level of respect they receive from other martial artists.

Just to clear up, I don't mean to say that I will be running around in Puff-and-slash motley clothing. I mean a loose fitting shirt and some simple leggings.

I agree that if you dress like a fool, don't expect to be respected like a king. But I think that there might be some advantage to dressing more similar to what they wore when the fechtbuecher were written.

-Jeremiah (GFS)

[Will Adamson]

Well...we should try to bring back the codpiece.

[Randall Pleasant]

Michael

I do own a gambeson from Revival.us (see link below). However, I don't view a gambeson as cloths, I view it as armour. I also do not consider my gambeson to be part of my ARMA uniform, thus I choosed a black gambeson rather than a red one.

http://www.revival.us/index.asp?PageAct ... &ProdID=83

[Steven Ott]

I think the point is we do get things wrong. Archeologists often disprove other acheologists before them. There is no school master to say yes you got it right or no you didn't. I beleive it is possible to re-construct fighting forms from the manuals but you can't go back and ask the authors if you got it right. You are left in the realm of assumption. And things change with time. Since none of us actually want to kill anybody with a sword (assuming). I just remember that martial arts were created by and practiced by falliable human beings and there is always room for growth and change. To me the heart of western arts is not rigidness of technique but an adherance to the things that work best and a willingness to adapt and change

[Brent Lambell]

Well...we should try to bring back the codpiece.

I think its a fine idea. Count me in Will!

[Alan Abu Bakr]

I think the point is we do get things wrong. Archeologists often disprove other acheologists before them.

...with the same applying to e.g. science.
And let's not forget that opinions of how HEMA should be, has changed through years of practice and research.

To me the heart of western arts is not rigidness of technique but an adherance to the things that work best and a willingness to adapt and change

Well, I don't know if that was entirely true, during the middle ages, but it is certainly a good (indeed, the best) attitude for fighting with the sword ...or for any martial art, for that matter.

[Kevin T. Crisalli]

Just my 2 cents. We all strive for accuracy in what we do, and that's a good thing, however, sometimes it seems like we can end up bogged down in minute details, and forget the larger picture.

Yes, when we practice a technique, we may be doing it "wrong". But what is wrong? If it's a deviation from what the particular person who wrote the manual would have showed us. Well, yeah, probably. On the other hand, there may have been a few hundred more masters that never wrote anything down that would have told you that you were doing it correctly.

I suppose what I'm saying, is that a difference of ten degrees in the positioning of one foot while you are in Ochs dosen't make a lick of difference when reproducing a historically accurate and brutally effective martial art. Precise reproduction is not required, nor is it possible, even when one is learning directly from an unbroken lineage.

Learn the intent and method of a technique, refine it in the crucible of practical application and the proper form will follow. The manuals provide us with the intent and method (most of the time) and we provide the sweat. By this, we recreate the martial practices of medieval europe.

[Jonathan_Kaplan]

Well, I've noticed that martial art styles that existed in times and places where people lived and died by them tend to have much less useless fluff than martial arts styles that didn't exist to fill the same need. For example, as near as I can tell, some of the Chinese martial arts with the Jian that existed *to be used to kill people* look a WHOLE LOT like the martial arts with the longsword that had the same use. And I'll bet that any period "stage" martial arts that used something like a longsword and the stage martial arts that use the Jian (which is a later style...) would have some similarities too...

of course, im completely sourceless, but I would love to have someone help me figure out if I'm right!

[Jonathan Coupe]

It's hard to believe that someone who writes and reasons as badly as Klens-Bigman has a Phd, but I suppose it's possible...

Given that we've been left detailed handbooks with engravings for, say, C16th rapier fighting, and actual weapons, it's hard to argue that the situation for western arts isn't BETTER than for equally old "original" eastern arts. Eastern arts (as far as I'm aware) have much more limited textual sources. They're only "advantage" is a claim to an unbroken route for verbal transmission - but often this claim is false, and the junk very quickly gets mixed with the valid stuff. Oh - wait - Dr KB works at some $100 a month dojo teaching "authentic" Samauri sword fighting... http://www.newyorkbudokai.net/

[Jeffrey Hull]

It's hard to believe that someone who writes and reasons as badly as Klens-Bigman has a Phd, but I suppose it's possible...Oh - wait - Dr KB works at some $100 a month dojo teaching "authentic" Samauri sword fighting... http://www.newyorkbudokai.net/

I guess that explains why she "drank the kool-aid", as they say.

People like her are utterly unable and/or apparently unwilling to comprehend what we do.

[Jonathan_Kaplan]

Does anyone know of any eastern textual sources in general? I remember seeing a movie that had some discussions of some of them. If there are copies online, I would love to see them!

[Kevin T. Crisalli]

Does anyone know of any eastern textual sources in general? I remember seeing a movie that had some discussions of some of them. If there are copies online, I would love to see them!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muyedobotongji

here's one. Korean.

[LafayetteCCurtis]

Qi Jiguang--a 16th-century Chinese general--once wrote an extensive body of rules and regulations that included a martial arts manual for use in training his soldiers. Unfortunately, it's a bit hard to get an adequate English translation of the whole stuff. Just look at this Wikipedia page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ji_Xiao_Xin_Shu

No info about any transcriptions or translations whatsoever!