roger hao wrote:His primary weapon to kill bear was a knife.
Trick wrote:I’m a Swedish city boy born in mid 60’s, using a steak knife was the “highest level” of meat cutting I had done until I moved to China and met my wife who taught me how to chop and slice much bigger chunks of flesh But killing a chicken I have not taken the step to do......(yet)......Another chopping that might be of “value” that I’ve done plenty, but is probably a quite absent activity amongst most city boys is chopping wood. Of course it’s done with an axe not a sword..but still chop chop.
klonk wrote:Back to the original topic, learning a bit about Western fencing sharpens any understanding of Asian swordsmanship. What Western fencing brings to the table is a Cartesian understanding of timing and position. Never mind the archaic French terms, it is about distance, time and sneakiness.
Trick wrote:klonk wrote:Back to the original topic, learning a bit about Western fencing sharpens any understanding of Asian swordsmanship. What Western fencing brings to the table is a Cartesian understanding of timing and position. Never mind the archaic French terms, it is about distance, time and sneakiness.
Absolutely, but can you cleave a man in half in one cut with those “western(Olympic) fencing tools/toys ??……………But seriously, absolutely engaging in western(Olympic) fencing would probably be to an advantage if one want to learn fencing.……Allez
Trick wrote:There is the Mensur way of fencing, that way have its specific rules and protective gear and could because of that be seen as unrealistic too even that they use sharp blades.
Common wisdom, adhered to equally by modern and classical fencers, is that the two forms of swordplay are significantly different. With this comes the belief among classical fencers that what they do is pure fencing, a far more realistic way of using the sword in an age when the dictum was to hit without being hit.
Modern fencing is seen as corrupt and lacking the sportsmanship, fine manners, and decency of the classical period, fatally flawed by the introduction of electronic scoring, and with its technique destroyed by the introduction of the pistol grip and the flick.
If these assertions are true, then Classical fencing should have significantly different characteristics from modern fencing, characteristics which address both the social and technical shape of its practice.
Hitting without Being Hit by a Sharp Sword
The principle of hitting without being hit is an article of faith, widely quoted by classical fencers (Gaugler 2004, Evangelista 2006), and grounded in the idea that you should fence as though the points (foil and epee) or the blade (Sabre) of the weapon is sharp.
In their view modern fencing is unrealistic because it no longer treats the fencing weapon as an actual weapon and that it routinely accepts the validity of actions that would be impossible in an actual encounter with sharps.
This translates into a condemnation of any attack that starts without a full extension of the arm to establish an unmistakable threat the opponent would be forced to parry to avoid being wounded.
This study examines the characteristics of classical and modern fencing to better understand the differences between fencing in the two periods in order to better ground the teaching of classical fencing.
It identifies 7 distinguishing differences between classical fencing, as stated by modern classical fencers, and modern fencing, and 4 broad categories of differences not identified by modern classical fencers that should be considered.
A qualitative content analysis was used as the basis to compare and contrast the classical perspective with the categories identified as meriting further consideration.
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