The longsword is a powerful piece of historical weaponry. Its mystique has captured our attention for hundreds of years and is consistently prevalent in both ancient texts and today’s pop culture. A typical training longsword is steel, between 40 and 50 inches in total length, and can take up some serious space when you…
Tennis, one of the few internationally followed duelling sports, has four major tournaments throughout the year that are held in esteem above all of the others. These events, "the majors", are hosted in four different countries and played on four different surfaces: Wimbledon (grass), French Open (clay), US Open (Decoturf), and Australian Open (Plexicushion). Each…
I'm not a fan of brutality in modern martial arts practice. Aggression brings unnecessary risks and injury, overvalues intensity over grace, and makes martial art less accessible to the unarmoured (both physically and psychologically). Wasn't Real Historical Fighting Brutal? I won't argue that there is no historical precedent for brutal, cruel, and ruthless martial art…
This post originally appeared on Duello.TV, Academie Duello's online learning and training blog portal. At our recent Instructor Intensive, the topic of "training so hard that you lose the joy of it" came up. The people who come out to intensives are hard workers. It takes a lot of drive to come out to do…
While I was doing some research for another article I came across this video, on the Funker Tactical youtube channel, that includes some advice from a Vegas police officer about close quarters covering and entry. WHY BLOCKING IS USELESS! A Las Vegas Cop Issues a Challenge and Teaches Some LessonsWatch this video on YouTube There…
Read More... from The Three Defensive Principles, A Cross Martial Approach
At Academie Duello we have an ambitious goal: Make 1000 Masters. The challenge is that at this moment, we have yet to make our first. What is a Master? Within most European martial traditions, a master is someone who not only practices their art with a high level of proficiency but more importantly is able…
Martial arts have been a big part of my life since I was a child. I started first with Kung Fu then Arnis/Eskrima and then I began my longest-term exploration, Western Martial Arts. I am often asked why people practice martial arts or why I practice swordplay specifically – considering it’s unlikely that I’ll be…
People often try to use the term HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts), often pronounced phonetically as "hee-mah", as if it were a specific martial art such as karate (technically a family of martial arts), or taekwondo (a martial art, practiced in the Olympics, of Korean origin). However, HEMA is truly a much broader term that…
Read More... from What is a Part of Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA)?
This past weekend, I was teaching in Istanbul, Turkey, a city that was arguably the centre of the western world at one time. It is a city steeped in both European and Asian history. Every site you visit reveals layer upon layer of history that goes back at least 2000 years. This makes Istanbul both…
I have fought in a lot of tournaments, and for a while that was what really lit my fire when it came to Western Martial Arts. There was a certain attraction to the intensity of the environment, the training program beforehand, and then winning a prize or a medal was pretty exciting too. However, as…
Today is the first day of Kwanzaa. Many of us know of Kwanzaa, but not many of us know its origins and how it is celebrated. Today, I would like to talk about what the holiday truly means, and how we can apply its core principles to our lives as martial artists and practitioners of…
Read More... from The Seven Principles of Kwanzaa and How to Apply Them As Martial Artists
The Internet has been a great boon to us as historical swordplay practitioners. 15 years ago access to resources regarding historical fencing were much harder to come by and generally required actuallyvisiting repositories of historical manuals. Now through the power of the Internet you can have high quality copies of nearly any manuscript and the ability to connect and…