Academic – Martial – Education
Most of what we train in HEMA revolves around one-on-one combat, but it is instructive to train multiple opponent scenarios every now and then, Off the top of my head, here’s a few reasons to do so: – Fighting multiple…
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The devices in Meyer’s longsword introduce different techniques sequentially to the student,and often introduce the same technique in a variety of contexts. One such technique is a beat with crossed hands from the left, which is introduced and displayed in…
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It’s an age-old problem- how do you motivate and guide somebody to get better at what they do? It’s an issue that comes up in my day job as a university lecturer and my night job as a martial arts…
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In Joachim Meyer’s comprehensive longsword treatise, the second section of the book is devoted to a set of “devices” which I believe represent a teaching syllabus, designed to introduce different techniques in sequence to the student. In this section, the…
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I enjoy sparring, but I love tournament fighting. There is something about being in a competitive situation, with something riding on the outcome. In the past, I played rugby and soccer, and in the now, I hit people with swords….
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It was an odd experience, coming back to Europe in 2010 after not being involved in the international HEMA scene for 5 years. Whereas the early HEMAC meetings in Dijon were massively polygot (and still are), ranging from reconstructions of…
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An issue that comes up every so often when dealing with Meyer’s longsword is “stance”- how wide should you be? This is a contentious issue, with different groups advocating a permanently wide stance, or a variably wide stance. At the…
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Something a little less technical today, as I work on surviving the winter cold and the last of my marking. I’ll try get another chunk of Thibault’s longsword and a piece on Meyer’s First Device out over the weekend. Over…
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Anatomy of Interpretation: The Kron or Crown Additional translation provided by Jack Gassman We often tend to forget that HEMA is actually an oral tradition in many respects. Despite the hard work put into translating and understanding the manuals, the…
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It still surprises me how few people in modern HEMA know how far we’ve come in the last 15 years. From a small group of scattered researchers across the globe, to a vibrant growing community today, the change has been…
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