The Best Sword Show: See you March 16 in Timonium, MD!

Same time, same place. Every year in mid-March, the Maryland Arms & Armor Collectors Association puts on a monumental sales show.

Hope I’ll see you there on Saturday!

Silence of the Sticks: Why wooden weapons fell out of favor in 19th-century Germany

The Irish beat each other with shilelaghs, the English drew blood with singlesticks and quarterstaves, the French wielded canne and baton. The Portuguese still play at jogo de pao and the Italians had the bastone. The Germans, however, showed no interest in wooden weapons, at least after the Fechtschul traditions of dussack and assorted staff weapons (most of which with a blade of one kind or another) had disappeared. How come?

Legends of the Sword: Satan fights a Mensur

The German novelist and poet Wilhelm Hauff (1802—1827) is more famous for his fairy tales than for his novels. Unreasonably so, because his Memoiren des Satan alone are better written and more enjoyable than all the semi-competent writage they throw at German literature students in college these days.

Hauff studied philosophy and theology at Tübingen. In 1826, he wrote Mitteilungen aus den Memoiren des Satan (Memoirs of Beelzebub), in which he works in some of the fencing activities of his brother, a member of the Tübinger Burschenschaft.

For the connoisseur of Gedecktes Hiebfechten, this is a rare monument of armament and strategy of the early Mensur…

Sword Skills: Disarming and Throwing the Opponent, according to Roux

He may’ve been one of the most outspoken opponents of the Jena students’ thrust duel with the elongated “wälsche Banditendolch“—the “Frog” bandit dagger, as his colleague from the philosophical faculty, Dr. Scheidler, called the disgraceful French dueling sword.

But F.A.W.L. Roux continued to teach Kreußlerian thrust fencing with the “Rappier” way into the second half of the 19th century—both as a healthy exercise and part of the German Turnkunst, and as a practical martial art for military men.

Included in his repertoire were some disarms and throws that few of his colleagues ever bothered mentioning in print…

Weapons: The Ziegenhainer Walking Stick

Apart from a few late imports, wooden staves or sticks disappear from the printed instructional record of 18th- and 19th-century German martial arts literature.

There’s only one example of a wooden weapon being used in a more or less organized combative context in the early 19th century:

The Ziegenhainer walking stick. 

And even this leaves something to be desired…

Swords in the News: Confederate sword returns to Corinth, Mississippi

The sword of a Confederate officer leading the last charge of the 2nd Texas Infantry at the Second Battle of Corinth returns to the scene of the casualty.

Fencing Nudes: Duel Naked!

One of the leading search terms that brings novice FencingClassics readers to our site is “topless fencing”.

Who’d'a thunk?

And since we thrive on giving people what they want, we’re happy to oblige… with images of duels between women in various stages of dress and undress…

Free Resources: Leboucher’s 1843 La Canne Manual

Yes, we know. We really shouldn’t. We’re spoiling you rotten.

But heck, you just might learn something! Today, we’re giving away your free access to Rouen, France-based master of the stick, staff, kicking boot and fist Leboucher’s 1843 manual.

We can afford such generosity because someone else’s already paid for putting it online…

Swords in the News: Admiral Nelson’s Sword Found… Underwater?

To the hardcore xiphomachophiliac, there’s only one thing better than finding a great old sword.

Finding a great old sword that once belonged to a great old man.

Looks like an enterprising diver and treasure hunter has entered sword nirvana. He claims to have found a sword in an ancient shipwreck.

A sword that can be traced back directly to Admiral Nelson…

Italian-School Saber: “Slipping the Leg”

Since we just reviewed and edited this posting and still have one more article on Italian-style sports saber in the pipeline, we’ve decided to make this “Eye-talian Saber Week” at SHotS Fencing Classics…