History WebVideo / ScholaGladiatoria

** For example, when cannon fire is depicted in films like ''Film/ThePatriot'', they will show the cannons firing, and then have an explosive charge buried in the ground shoot up a cloud of smoke and dirt. The thing is, regular 18th century cannon balls were not explosive shells, and rather than explode on impact they tended to bounce and roll until they either spent all their energy or hit something large.

** In his review of Brienne of Tarth vs the Hound in ''Game of Thrones'', he notes that friends of his who were involved with the show said the weapons used in filming were reasonably light. Nevertheless, the actors tend to make a show of grunting and straining as if their swords were really heavy.

* DanBrowned: In [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRZJxGi8Z44 "Richard Francis Burton - Sword Exercise Nonsense?"]], Matt says what annoys him so much about Burton is that Burton never admits that he isn't an expert about everything, and even if there's a topic he's ignorant about he'll just start making up bullshit to keep up the pretense. In his 1876 manual, ''New System of Sword Exercise'', Burton criticizes Henry Charles Angelo the Younger's ''Infantry Sword Exercise'', which was officially adopted by the British Army in 1817 and continued to be published through 1874. Henry Angelo was a master of internationally recognized expertise, being the third generation of the Angelo fencing dynasty, and his ''Infantry Sword Exercise'' was used for such a long time throughout the British Empire because it was such a practical and effective system. Meanwhile, despite containing some interesting tidbits, the style that Burton sets forth can hardly be called a complete system and contains some recommendations that are just nonsense. The example Matt focuses on is that Burton somehow seems to be completely missing the point about how the circular target and numbered cuts of Angelo's exercise are supposed to be used, scoffing that he never saw a man who was perfectly circular in shape. Matt does a FacePalm at this, since the manual specifically states that the circular diagram tells the recruit ''how'' to make each cut rather than ''where'' to cut, meaning that cuts 1, 3, and 5 can be directed at any body part from head to foot on the left, and cuts 2, 4, and 6 equally so on the right. There are just 7 cuts to remember[[note]]7 is a cut straight down; a cut number 8 which is vertically ascending did exist but was usually omitted[[/note]], and when you state the number together with a targeted body part you provide a very specific and concise description. Burton shows a man-shapped dummy as the target, but his system features 12 cuts, each of which describes both a specific angle ''and'' a specific body part on the target. Despite having more numbered cuts and thus making things more confusing, his shorthand is actually ''less'' specific and there are fewer types of attacks you can describe with it. ''He doesn't even name any cuts to the legs!'' The fact that Burton misunderstood arguably the simplest part of Angelo's ''Exercise'' and came up with something markedly worse just exemplifies for Matt how Burton didn't know what he was talking about, and the fact that Burton's system was never adopted by any military or subsequently reprinted shows that nobody at the time took it seriously.

* AnAxeToGrind: In [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55Sb93pz1Xk Cutting With The Viking Era Dane Axe]], Matt takes a Dane Axe made by Tord Bergelin of Thor's Forge and tests it on water bottles using different kinds of grips and cuts: hands medium distance appart, hands close together for a powerful swing, and hands far apart for a short, close-up attack. There are some neat tricks that might not seem immediately obvious, such as a thrusting attack that inflicts a surprisingly effective push-cut. One general disadvantage of axes that he notices is how compared to a sword blade, the head of an axe has a relatively short cutting edge. The edge of a sword blade is so long that you can cut off somebody's arm or leg without having to worry about under- or overshooting the target, but even just trying to hit stationary water bottles with the axe, Matt has to make more of an effort to judge the distance. Whenever he hits a bottle with the middle of the edge, the blade cleanly chops it in half, but sometimes sometimes he ends up hitting with only the upper or lower part of the axe's edge, causing the bottle to be only partially cut through. He may have known it before to some extent, but this test really helps it sink in for him that trying to cut through an opponent's neck or calf in the heat of battle might have often resulted in only partially cutting through.

* GentlemanAdventurer: Sir Richard Francis Burton--according to Wiki/TheOtherWiki, an "explorer, geographer, translator, writer, soldier, orientalist, cartographer, ethnologist, spy, linguist, poet, fencer, and diplomat", certainly cultivated an image as a great adventurer, scholar, fighter, and lover. Matt points out that he's been quite romanticized in the 20th and 21st centuries despite the fact that he had some beliefs that would be subject to ValuesDissonance today, as well as various scandals that made him controversial during his lifetime and tend to get brushed under the rug when talking about him, but more particularly he thinks we shouldn't let this glamor distract us from some questionable or even ridiculous things he wrote about swordsmanship.

-> ''"[[CatchPhrase Hi folks, Matt Easton here, Schola Gladiatoria!]]"''

* BadassMoustache: Matt, a fellow who knows more than a thing or two about swordfighting, is rocking a muttonstache as of January 2019.