Last weekend, North America's longest standing Western Martial Arts conference took place. This is a beautiful four day event of swordplay and martial art that spans many disciplines. This year, workshops included everything from Bolognese sidesword to Persian sword & buckler, and from wrestling technique to combat psychology. Beyond workshops, free-fencing plays a part every day, along with a final night feast where conference instructors are asked to put on demonstration bouts to display the best they can of their various arts.
For this week's video post I thought it would be nice to share some of the videos from this event including sparring, armoured combat, and a couple workshop topics that often do not get seen outside of very specific groups.
Rapier & Dagger Bout - Bill Grandy and John O'Meara
https://youtu.be/oMhfzqGddsI
Sword & Buckler Demonstration Bout - Devon Boorman and Robert Rutherford
https://youtu.be/fMH6I6Q4_rs
Persian Sword and Buckler as taught by Dr. Khorasani
https://youtu.be/xoAZ9M6jW4c
Italian Two-Handed Stick as taught by Marco Quarta
The Deed of Arms
If you're in for a longer watch, this video shows off a fantastic Deed of Arms put on in a medieval fashion to honour the origins of the art.
This Week on Duello.TV
It's the start of a new month of curriculum at Academie Duello so you can look forward to the start of a whole new series of educational videos on our education channel. This month's topics include:
- Use of the Rapier and Offhand
- Use of the Rapier and Dagger
- Grappling at the Longsword
- Weapon Disarms
New videos every Monday here.
Devon Boorman is the Co-Founder and Director of Academie Duello Centre for Swordplay, which has been active in Vancouver, Canada since 2004. Devon’s expertise centres on the Italian swordplay tradition including the arts of the Renaissance Italian rapier, sidesword, and longsword, as well as knife and unarmed techniques. Read more from Devon Boorman.