American Explorer and U.S. Financier:

What this 1844 Schläger has to do with the Met’s Arms and Armor Collection!

Secrets of the Mummy: The “Dead Student” in Bremen’s Bleikeller

Supposed to have been stabbed to death in a duel in 1705 or thereabouts, we find ourselves disappointed by reality…

Rassemblement and Counter: Favorite Épée drills at Joinville-le-Pont

Taking the proper starting distance: Heels together, arms extended, tips touching.

While foils and sabers dominate the pictorial treasure trove contained in the souvenir postcards sent from the French military collector at Joinville-le-Pont, épées start to appear in the first years of the 20th century….

25 years of Secret Sword History! (Actually, make that 30…)

Just when you thought there couldn’t be anything less interesting than endless Star Wars regressions, here comes The SHotS Origin Story...

Lines in the Sand: The ins and outs of 19th-century fencing spaces

—by J. Christoph Amberger (republished from a 2019 piece over at Duelingswords.wordpress.com)

What follows is a veritable smorgasbord of late 19th- and early 20th-century fencing images illustrating the development of early modern fencing’s combative spaces. You better pour yourself a stiff one.

Drills and bouts require an even surface for fencers to move on. Wooden floors covered with fine sand or saw dust were ideal. Less so, but still acceptable, were sanded or graveled walkways that would provide fencers and duelists with reasonably firm attachment to the ground. Footwork quickly created the danger of rolling an ankle—but when used as the background for a new-fangled photograph, sandy surfaces preserved an impression of actual movement for eternity…

Ancient Modern Épée Skills

Setting up a distance trap for fun and profit.

Der Renommist—The Show-Off

Bootleg Kreusslerian instruction backfires

The Dead Boy in the Woods

Reconstructing a Deadly Duel from 1841

—by J. Christoph Amberger

Some went to Rathsberg near Erlangen for the wholesome air. Others came to die...

We don’t know why the kid brother of a dead revolutionary ended up with a half foot of steel in his chest, but we think we’ve figured out how.

Sons of the Muses vs. “Poodles” — A Nocturnal Assault between City Guards and Students in 1627

Yes, we’re still flensing 17th-century Albums Amicorum for fencing-related information. Someone’s got to do it!

The Dirty Half-Dozen

How a Livonian at Marburg took on six opponents at the same time until the rector broke up the fight…

Eberhard Werner Happel’s 1690 novel, Der Academische Roman, recounts the adventures of a group of stock characters representing the predominant tempers of contemporary students. There is the perma-horny lover boy, the drunkard, the pedantic leearned man of great ambition and meager purse. Obviously, the most likable one for our purposes is Klingenfeld, the swordsman of the group. A veteran of 58 scraps just at the four German universities he attended, not to mention several encounters during their journey, he also is a fountain of battle stories…