Groundfighting Techniques

[Martin Wallgren]

I try to be careful about examining Ringen with my "jiu-jitsu goggles". It's true that there are universal priciples in human body mechanics which give rise to related techniques across styles but it's also true that cultural factors profoundly shape martial arts. I'm very curious about the ground game in Ringen but reluctant to compare it to submission jiu-jitsu.

Which plays, specifically, strike you as indicating a guard game?

One of basic principles of the Liechtenauer Tradition is the Nachreisen. And to turn a "leger" on once back with a foe ontop into a opposite situation would be the ultimate nachreisen in my oppinion. The many of the techniques in general shown is counters and use of situatiuons where you are not in an advance possition. So it could be something like that. To pin a foe down and kill/win is more of an instinct thing. So what is worth mensioning in a manual. The nasty tricks or the obvious stuff you learnt on the floor as a 3 year old.

As well as you could be countered in standing you could be it on the ground. And it is not any BJJ stuff I´m thinking of with fancy chokes and armbars. More of the escapes so I can scramble up on my feet again or be in a top possition to do some serious ground and pound (pref. with my rondelldagger )

[Jaron Bernstein]

"Which plays, specifically, strike you as indicating a guard game?"

The arm locks work both standing and on the ground. There are also some specifically described ground techniques in the manuals.



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[Stewart Sackett]

That's definitely true, but armlocks can be applied just as well from a pin as from guard & a dominant top position is less vulnerable to strikes (or stabs) then a bottom one.

There are plates that resemble the full & half guards but, in every case I've seen, the acompanying text is describing an offensive action from top with little or no mention of counters from the bottom.

Also, as has been mentioned in this thread before, the word commonly used to describe the ground fight is unterhalten. Holding down. It seems like another word would have been chosen if the bottom person regularly went on the offense.

I think it's reasonable to train escapes from bottom & joint locks from a secure pin as part of the study of Ringen but the emphasis (on the ground) should be pin & stab.

[Martin Wallgren]

I have just found the correct term for the manuvers I´m after - Aufstehen "Up-standing" or roughly how to get up!

Thanx all for your answers!

[Stewart Sackett]

Very interesting. Which manuals mention Aufstehen?

[Martin Wallgren]

Danzig for example.

Here... http://www.hammaborg.de/en/transkriptio ... stehen.php

[Tom Keesler]

I know this thread has been pretty dormant for several months now, but this is something I feel is worth bringing back up.

It seem that everytime someone mentions ground fighting everyones' initial reaction, illustration, or comparrison is BJJ. Just because historical European ground fighting may not have looked like BJJ doesn't make it a lesser form of groundfighting.

Unterhalten techiques have been mentioned many times in this thread describing trained techniques to subdue and dispatch an adversary. If they trained to hold someone down. It only seems logical to me that they would have trained to counter being held down.

It is my understanding that BJJ was intially developed from Judo. Judo is a martial "sport". BJJ has many great techniques for two unarmed opponents wearing no armor to grapple on the ground. I beleive that the ground fighting in Ringen would have reflected the goal of the fight: to gain a dominant position from which to stab, choke, pummel, or otherwise incapacitate you adversary.

So I guess my point is that an art doesn't have to contain the armbars and triangle chokes of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu to be ground fighting, it simply requires techniques for fighting back against an adversary while you are on the ground.

As for the social aspect that it would have been concidered cowardly to fight from ones back, It seems to me that the adverse would be true: That it would be cowardly to attack a man that is on his back. And, we know from the manuals that this was not the case.

[Tom Keesler]

I think it's reasonable to train escapes from bottom & joint locks from a secure pin as part of the study of Ringen but the emphasis (on the ground) should be pin & stab.

The emphasis in any fight should be survival.
I don't think our acestors looked at it any other way.

[Stewart Sackett]

Just because historical European ground fighting may not have looked like BJJ doesn't make it a lesser form of groundfighting.

Actually, yes it does. The “separate but equal” argument just doesn’t hold water in this case.

It is difficult to hold someone down who is trying to get away. It is several orders of magnitude more difficult to hold someone down when they interpose their legs & work to disrupt your balance, constantly threatening to either sweep you over or achieve a hold with the power to break your arm. A bottom game that includes an understanding of the guard, whether it’s used offensively or simply as a means of escaping bottom, is superior to a bottom game that lacks the guard. A superior bottom game requires a superior top game to address it. Steel sharpens steel, as they say.

That’s not to say that I believe historical European grapplers to be unskilled or bad. I simply believe that their emphasis was on standing grappling & pins. The presence of daggers in combat grappling made extended ground fighting unnecessary.

[Jason Taylor]

It is my understanding that BJJ was intially developed from Judo. Judo is a martial "sport". BJJ has many great techniques for two unarmed opponents wearing no armor to grapple on the ground. I beleive that the ground fighting in Ringen would have reflected the goal of the fight: to gain a dominant position from which to stab, choke, pummel, or otherwise incapacitate you adversary.

So I guess my point is that an art doesn't have to contain the armbars and triangle chokes of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu to be ground fighting, it simply requires techniques for fighting back against an adversary while you are on the ground.

In my mind, this is the crux of really understanding the difference. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu teaches you to do exactly what it does best--one on one fighting on the ground, with extremely heavy emphasis on joint locks and choking. Ringen, in my mind, is a much more "military" art (depending, naturally, on which master, but that's way more scope than we need to get into here). In Judo/BJJ/etc. you know the guy's friend won't stab you in the back of the neck while you're going for an Americana (o?). In Ringen, that assumption could not be made. Plus, why break an arm, which is harder than people think anyway and takes some time, or position yourself for a choke, which could take a while, the dagger is the trump card that ends the fight NOW.

I'd say a lot of the BJJ techniques under discussion are just too hazardous to do when facing a knife, even if yo get on the ground. Triangle choke, for example, is a terrible idea, since you have every limb (usually) tied up on his head, while he can stab you in places no one should ever be stabbed, pretty much at will, and bailing out from your position isn't all that quickly, either. Guard in general is dangerous for this reason--you can't get up easily, and yo can't really control his arms, while all he has to do is move the knife through about 6 inches of space to cause massive damage and bleeding.

As was said much earlier in this thread by Jay, most of the BJJ stuff goes out the window when one guy pulls a knife. And though it was mentioned by someone that most of the knife vs. grappling stuff relied on a stupid grappler, I'd have to disagree. You don't rise to the occasion, you sink to the level of your training. If what you train all the time to do, as many BJJ/MMA enthusiasts do, is to double-leg and then pound or choke, then that's what you'll do when attacked, by instinct, because you do it 800 times a week. And if you don't know the knife is there (which you really should assume, anyway, but many people don't) then it's too late by the time you figure it out.

I think the mode Stewart recommends, getting two-hand control of the knife (or some kind of arm wrap) is necessary, definitely. Which works great--Jay's book is full of these kinds of covers and controls. After that, I personally prefer to take down and remain standing, but that's just me. Gives me a much better chance to bail if I need to (important with a knife).

[Tom Keesler]

That’s not to say that I believe historical European grapplers to be unskilled or bad. I simply believe that their emphasis was on standing grappling & pins. The presence of daggers in combat grappling made extended ground fighting unnecessary.

That's part of my point. They found it neccesary to train defenses to standing dagger attacks, I'm wondering why we don't see more material on defense from the ground. I do concede to your points in your last post, I just don't get why they wouldn't train to defend against the portion of the fight that you work so hard at training to achieve (arguably the most dangerous/important part). I'm just musing now...

[Tom Keesler]

To clarify on my last post:

I'm not saying that Ringen should look more like BJJ. I understand that the ground was the last place you wanted to be on the battlefield, and still is in modern day self-defense application IMO. But if the ground is where you don't want to be then you have to practice techniques designed to get you back on your feet. You have to fight on the ground.


I just had something of a "No Duh" moment. It was said earlier on in this thread that in the Army's new CQC they train ground fighting first, and build from there. And, it's been speculated that many of the thngs we don't see in manuals were left out because they would have been known to the average fighting man already. They would have been practicing "Knave's wrestling" since they were 5 years old or so. Working from the ground is the first thing that they would have learned as young boys and the masters would have built on their knowledge and skills from there. I know this has been said in different ways before, but it just now really clicked in me.

Sorry for the long/double post, but I do some of my best thinking while I'm writing.

[Tim Ingersoll]

"Then seize him with wrestling, whichever you can do best, and follow the wrestling with breaks and Widerbrche (this is a tricky word it could mean illegal breaks, unnatural breaks, or opposing breaks). You can apply the same breaks and opposing breaks in all situations: on horseback, on foot, prepared (I assume this means either armoured or armed) or unguarded, in coming in close, lying down or standing."

Might the term Widerbrche be describing joint manipulation rather than actual breaks?

Tim

[Steven Ott]

BJJ has techniques for dealing with weapons, including knives/daggers. So don't diss on it for that, obviously different situations merit different responses. Do we say ringen is weak for not having gun defense? In competion Bjj, weapons aren't used but the system is bigger than that.

One thing that is true of wrestling that probably can't be set of most arts, is that there isn't a set number of techniques. There is no definitive master or manual to say this is wrestling and this isn't. It is a system that transcends culture and history. To me ringen is wrestling and not limited by anyone's manual or opinion only the situation and the training of the individuals.
Obviously studing the manuals is a great way to learn, but as was stated before the master's weren't teaching newbies to grappling, they were showing practical techniques for given situations

[Tyrone Artur Budzin]

I can't agree more with Steve on this matter. Everything I have read and seen about Ringen and Dolch paints a picture of practical self-defense which can be used in everyday life.

Hoping that someday someone could make a compendium on this German system of unarmed defense.