Troper Fencing Academy

Aggresssion, Aggression, aggression. By being the first to attack, you dictate the terms of the duel, rather than letting your opponent do so. Put him on the defensive, but remember that kendo/kenjutsu excel at punishing swordsmen who overcommit. Was he mainly in jodan or hasso?

Swordplay and writing blog. Purveyor of weeaboo fightin' magic.

Punishing attackers who overcommit also comes from Iai/Battou. A prepared/mentally present person is already an aggressor, even if he's the last to initiate a movement i.e. being on the defensive means you've already won (in certain circumstances).

In the video below, Yoshinori Kono, the master of movement. He doesn't belong to any school, rather he's an independent researcher, who has focused specifically on how the samurai managed their bodies. The kenjutsu section is in the beginning (no subs, but I think you get the idea).

Notice his unusual grip. The grip in which the hands are close together specifically forces the body to move as one, making a strike far more faster and stronger, although limiting the range of control you have over the sword. Take it all with a grain of salt.

edited 26th Aug '16 11:34:11 AM by TerminusEst

Si Vis Pacem, Para Perkele

Found this video of what I think good realistic cinema sword fight could be like. Not saying all cinema sword fights have to be realistic, I just wish some more were like this.

Nice. I like the touch of the one swordsman running through all the potential techniques in his head interspersed with prints from Fiore's manual. And as with German longsword, I could easily see some of those techniques applied in kenjutsu.

Swordplay and writing blog. Purveyor of weeaboo fightin' magic.

That was pretty neat. Wish I saw it earlier.

Who watches the watchmen?

Kinda loses some point by starting with a Sword Plant though. YOU'LL RUIN THE EDGE GOD DAMN IT

edited 3rd Oct '16 8:15:39 PM by Gaon

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

I thought the Sword Plant was a nice touch. Notice the one who does it is the envious Master from the intro text. Its a great shorthand for his lack of respect for his weapon and the art of swordsmanship in general. This is in contrast to the man in black Fiore de'i Liberi who shows respect to his weapon before the duel begins.

I would have loved to see a matchup between Fiore and Liechtenauer.

edited 4th Oct '16 7:43:01 AM by TomoeMichieru

Swordplay and writing blog. Purveyor of weeaboo fightin' magic.

Speaking of respect for the weapons and art fo swordmanship, I wonder is that why the more honorable swordsman in media say, "You dishonor the art of swordmanship" thet see someone doing particularly disrespectful or rude. I might be stating the obvious but that aspect of any martial art always interested me in media. I once asked about the whole honor code and respect thing, is there a value where you need to respect the craft that you practice in? I know it isn't limited to the fighting arts but it always interested me.

"Thanos is a happy guy! Just look at the smile in his face!"

I think it has more to do with teaching values (cultural or otherwise) to students and sportsmanship among peers, rather than anything to do with swordmanship (or any art) in particular. The sharp bits go into the enemy, and an honourable corpse is still a corpse.

edited 4th Oct '16 1:09:44 PM by TerminusEst

Si Vis Pacem, Para Perkele

One should also keep in mind what is considered honorable today may not be what was considered honorable back then.

I would take any statements of honor outside of duels and tourneys with a good dose of salt. Every account we can find of outright warfare suggests honor is not exactly at the forefront of anyone's mind.

Who watches the watchmen?

This too. After all chivalry said to protect the weak and innocent but also to be a warrior in service to your lord. This included pillaging villages of innocent people who just so happened to be under the jurisdiction of your lord's rival. Contradictions like this are the reason most systems of honor tend fall apart under close inspection. And this wasn't lost on the people of the time.

My philosophy is that if you want to be gentlemanlike, well, talk things over in a civil way.

Outside of that, what's even the point of being honorable, go get bloody and dirty.

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

Honor is not about how you choose to fight, but why.

Edit: "So many vows. They make you swear and swear. Protect the king. Respect your father. Protect the innocent. But what if your father hates the king? What if the king slaughters the innocent? No matter what you do, you're forsaking one vow or another."

edited 5th Oct '16 11:43:10 AM by TomoeMichieru

Swordplay and writing blog. Purveyor of weeaboo fightin' magic.

Tomoe: I hate to tell you history puts a lot of holes into that notion by leaps and bounds. Honor is at best situational mostly when it is convenient for it to be practiced. Again historical accounts do a pretty thorough job of that. This has held especially true for war especially war against rivals, "heathens", and foreign nations.

Who watches the watchmen?

Honor is a thing, that much is undeniable. History does paint a more complex figure of situations, but it's a proven fact honor was a huge factor in medieval society. Knights and Samurai did need to be perceived as honorable. The trick and the catch is, the concept of honor is very malleable and chief of all, highly variable throughout history, location, social position and individual person. And of course, they just had to be perceived as honorable, not actually be honorable.

In the case of the samurai, the classic Jidaigeki film Hari-Kiri illustrates nicely how the Samurai were more focused on looking honorable than actually being honorable. In the case of the Knights, well, any Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire season/book shows (despite being a fictional universe) fairly solidly how the medieval concept of honor is a maze to walk through that is very malleable.

For an instance of honor popping up in medieval history in actual war, when Edward The Black Prince started his practice of scorching the countryside and pillaging peasants to deny his enemy resources and strike psychological terror, the Knightly class was absolutely horrified because that went against the whole shtick of Knighthood, protecting the innocent and whatnot.

Within the same time period, we had cases like King John the Blind of Bohemia, who seeing the English advance, decided to stay and die for his honor during the Battle of Crécy. It was a effectively meaningless tactical decision that got him killed and earned him, his kingdom, and his allies absolutely nothing, but why did he do it? For honor, of course (he found dishonorable for a Bohemian King to retreat from battle).

There are in general other examples of honor popping up as an actual thing in battlefields. Lords and Knights sparing the populace from time to time but more often sparing some form of rival or at least treating him with respect, refusing to retreat and dying where one stands, heroically dying for their lieges, so forth. The catch is it is a lot more complex than just "WE ARE MEN OF HONOR!" and there are often more political and sociological trends running behind it.

In my personal opinion, yes, I value honor, and I think there ought to be some standards when you fight someone. To quote Winston Churchill, "You're going to kill a man. It costs nothing to be polite."

edited 5th Oct '16 7:55:02 PM by Gaon

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

Except most of that isn't accurate either and again history knocks great huge holes through including archeological evidence. You pretty much laid out the reality is more about looking honorable when it was convenient to do so but the vast majority wasted almost no time in doing the exact opposite of it to benefit themselves. Now I can reasonably concede there were honorable individuals and that is backed up by records however they are the exception. Thankfully so are their polar opposites who seemed to go out their way to be huge monstrous ass hats.

Honor is about the same as religion you have a small handful of honest adherents who are the exception and actually do believe what they preach and practice it. That is the problem though they are the exceptional few. They are the exception and such consistency of those behaviors is pretty rare in pretty much all historical records.

Most of them paid lip service to the codes or even perceptions of honor just like they did for their religions. They conveniently stopped applying them against numerous enemies, adherents of different faiths, foreigners, and sometimes even their own people. Even more notable is many of them had the equivalent of professional propaganda writers working for them and actual historical records paint a completely different picture.

The protesting knights pillaging the French countryside are a good example. Many of the benefits of the pillaging and looting of the enemy lands regardless of how it was carried out went to those knights and there are almost no records of any of them turning away said gains. Saying I am against this and still carrying out a horrific order and sitting around picking your nose and benefitting from it is at best lip service.

John of Bohemia is an even more overt example. First and foremost did no such thing. According to Jean Froissart the medieval chronicler this was the description of John's final moments.

He and his men grossly over extended themselves into the enemy lines, were cut off, and then cut down. They found them where they fell the next day. That isn't staying behind to die honorably at all that is an example of blatant blundering and recklessness at best.

Nearly all other examples of "honor on the battlefield" are pretty much the same thing. There are some examples that are legit and not some romantic sophistry to paint someone in a better light but they are not exactly as common as the other variety. It is pretty much another form of propaganda that was widely practiced to make the nobility look good.

Who watches the watchmen?

It is strange that you said "most of what you said is incorrect" and then you just agreed with me.

Thing is, not applying honor against say, foreigners or usurpers, is perfectly reasonable from a medieval perspective of honor. Like I said, medieval ideals of honor are a maze to walk through even when you're dealing with a figure actually concerned with being honorable, because the logic system is just plain different. I'm not talking about what we perceive as honorable, but their take on it. Like, say, William Marshal not butchering every peasant who stood against King John was considered a remarkable act of mercy and honor on his part when today it seems mostly basic decency. Godfrey de Boullion deciding to wipe out Muslims from Jerusalém? Not dishonorable at all, they were heathens after all so honor naturally doesn't apply to them (of course, opinions zig-zagged on that in their time as well). Even the Black Prince was considered very honorable for his fair treatment of his noble prisoners (in contrast with how he made peasants suffer by scorching the countryside). Honor is variable as it gets.

With regards to the Knights and the Black Prince, yes, they did end up accepting this mode of warfare, The tricky thing is, this mode of warfare was the Black Prince's command. My Master, Right or Wrong is one of the central concepts of medieval honor, so of course they protested but ultimately recanted. Be it because they were just hiding under the My Master, Right or Wrong excuse to raid some good and ol' peasantry, or because they legitimately were following the "My King commands me" thing to its limit, even when they disagreed with the King.

Regarding John of Bohemia, see you quoted the specific part of his death. But Froissart along with every single contemporary account and historian states John had no actual reason to even be in that battle, much less in the vanguard as he was, and even less reason to be charging at the English at that moment. For several reasons, chief amongst them that John was fucking blind. His whole gambit of "let's tie our horses together and charge to our deaths against the English" seems to legitimately have been his attempt to go down in a honorable blaze of glory as there is no other explanation for why he'd do such a suicidal dash for the enemy. Not even stupidity (as John was well-versed in tactics and had military experience before going blind, and by all accounts he was quite aware of the situation of the battle).

This is not even purely a deduction. Froissart writes it from the English perspective of the battle. Benessius of Weitmil, in The Chronicles of Prague, 1370, contemporary to Fouissart's account, wrote from the French perspective and had information from within John of Bohemia's own court. He ascribes this quote to John:

Both accounts agree that he charged to his death very unnecessairily (and both interestingly agree that one of his last observations before charging to his death was asking about his son's whereabouts). They both agree that he likely did so for honor, The debate is more whether John did so before the French retreat (as Froissart believes), which makes his last act more of a mad act of courage, or after the French retreat (as Weitmil believes), which makes it a bonafide Last Stand. Either way, he was likely acting out of his own ideal of "honor". There's little reason for a blind man to charge to his death otherwise (unless you hold the interpretation of some modern historians that John's blindness had given him a death wish).

edited 5th Oct '16 10:14:45 PM by Gaon

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

Except I am not agreeing with you at all. I am saying at best there were maybe a few rare individuals who practiced it if t all. Most were only concerned with appearance only which by the way is a contradiction of those oaths and beliefs by a large margin but also against more then one moral view on such behaviors including from the church which has its own share of hypocritical behaviors that are an almost perfect mirror of "One set of rules for me, another for thee" despite the various oaths saying otherwise or insisting on a greater degree of responsibility. Really at this point in history that isn't anything new at all.

Try taking a much closer look at those oaths and codes most of them contradict a lot of that behavior we just discussed. Last I checked it was not limited to just those of your territory, kingdom, or even nation. I am willing to bet we could find no shortage of views that said it even applied to "heathen savages" to many degrees. Nearly all the varieties of the codes that were written down pretty explicitly frowned on the behavior exhibited by the black prince or the slaughter of the Muslims.

Not doing things to peasants had a lot more to do with actual codified laws that forbade it and had punishments backed up by more highly placed individuals the penultimate almost always being the King or Queen. Which did things like give even peasants basic rights and stipulate limits on a lords power in many ways but also stipulated the same for the peasants. It even outlines their responsibilities. You have a skirmish with some rebelling peasants it isn't a matter of honor to not hack them up but to spare some as the survivors can still work the land and make you money and it is actually pretty expensive to have the land unworked for long periods of time while you find someone to take their place. The law itself has limits on how far you can go with such measures as does politics and even other perceptions that have little do with honor. Chaucer did a good job of taking thinly veiled jabs at it in "The Canterbury Tales".

Except your example of the Black Prince and slaughter of the Muslims thoroughly proves my point to begin with. It was not uniformly practiced but selectively practiced when it was convenient and beneficial to do so and had little to do with a specific medieval view. The good treatment of ranked French nobles had notably more practical considerations like ransoming them back a widely known and documented practice. Again saying he is honorable vs what the codes would say even by medieval views are completely two different animals. Even by the medieval view doing what they did to the peasants was generally frowned upon even against the French who were Christians. At best it is shallow lip service and overt propaganda.

Which is where you get the overt critics of the eras of those actions pointing out the rampant hypocrisy. The more power the individual had the less likely they would be held to any standard and regardless of their actions "called honorable". Which isn't even perception but more practicality and propaganda and deference to power. Tell me what would have happened if one his vassals would have called him out for the abuse of the peasantry? It would have quite likely ended very badly for them regardless of the perception of honor of that persons actions. Power of the individual performing the acts has a significant factor here. Outside of the highly placed the knights had a lot of that power themselves.

Henry the V himself who was completely uninterested in hostages but victory had his French prisoners slaughtered to a man. Which by even the basic laws and customs of war was a massive breach of pretty much all the codes you could drum up of the era. Honor codes of nearly every stripe of the era would consider that rather wrong minded even by medieval perceptions yet he is hailed as an honorable hero of England. Again less about perception and codes and more about power and propaganda in regards to seats of power and whose side they are on. The French, supposedly serious diehards for those codes, found the action of Agincourt anything but honorable. Especially the often outright slaughter of knights. They were even shocked at the lack of regard for capturing prisoners for straight forward financial gain.

From what I can find the Black Prince did not command the vast slaughter of the peasants but destruction of the economic property ie burn the shops, fields, and destroy manufacturing not kill everyone you stumble upon. And before you say it no the English and the French did not consider their peasants actual property in any legal regard but servants who owe loyalty and adherence to the laws of the kings and lords and other laws commanded their faith to the church. They were seen as a resource in pretty much every other regard but not actual property.

The ad-hoc and often wanton slaughter of the peasants and looting of their property was almost always optional and yet we see that option almost always being exercised. Something that by the way was widely frowned upon by many measures of honor, law, and even religion to varying degrees even if they were not of the same nation. While against other religions was given more leeway it was seldom that absolute. It is especially notable that many of the worst behaviors of war among the Europeans were frequently frowned upon when at least visited upon those of the same faith, it was notable that it didn't stop it one bit.

"Just following orders" has an extensive history of not being acceptable when doing things that are overtly contrary to oaths and laws alike. That particular bit of philosophy is at least classical era philosophy old. It would have been telling that their protests matched their actions but while the perception of honor would have backed up their restraint it was far more dangerous to defy the prince if he insisted and far more likely it was practical in terms of making money. Armies weren't cheap and that war was very expensive. Even peasant soldiers needed pay and food.

Except the account of John's death of someone well aware of the situation is still rampant recklessness and the chronicler accounted that he desired more then anything to just join the fight and strike at the enemy. Again neither really overtly honorable nor staying behind to die as your own snippet points out. There is also the fact he was not actually completely blind but saw very poorly and by most accounts was very likely horribly near sighted and/or some other visual affliction. Which is nearly the same thing but he could see well enough to fight and most things on his own. Of course riding a horse he may as well have been completely blind so it is kind of a moot point until he could see something well enough to swing at it ie on top of the enemy. He managed at least four strokes by the chroniclers accounts against armed enemies.

The bit about his son is kind of odd and it makes more sense that he was making sure he wasn't struck down or in peril already before committing to the charge and possibly seeking his own death and partly as a death or glory approach.

I will concede it may have been in part his personal honor but I contend it also had deep practical ties possibly including a desire to die because his affliction would likely get notably worse the more he aged leaving him effectively helpless. Stepping down was an option but there was some stigma with that approach and from what I can remember had other considerations tied to it ie the power behind the throne line of things. Taking his own life would look very bad if he did want to die but the enemy doing it looks brave and gets around the whole messy suicide taboo and hands his son the throne without too much trouble down the road. Witnesses on both sides seeing him fall in battle solves a lot of problems to be darkly pragmatic.

Who watches the watchmen?

Honour is taking heads Not always the right ones either...

Si Vis Pacem, Para Perkele

Oh lord not that channel.

If you want to see something kinda crazy in terms of weapons look up Frisian warrior Pier Gerlofs Donia's sword. Supposedly they have one reportedly to have belonged to him. It is 7 feet long and weighs about 14 lbs. Though some contend it is just a large ceremonial sword used in parades rather then an actual war blade.

If we accept it is real it must have been an impressive feat of swordsmanship to wield it with even moderate skill.

edited 8th Oct '16 8:51:06 AM by TuefelHundenIV

Who watches the watchmen?

Yeah, I know the channel's reputation. Antony probably gave them the book since he got annoyed about their other samurai video. "Samurai Headhunters" documentary is the one to look at for a more deeper look at the subject. You can find it on youtube.

Dear lord, the size of that thing◊. Was he a real life Dark Souls character?

edited 8th Oct '16 7:44:33 AM by TerminusEst

Si Vis Pacem, Para Perkele

I actually watched that one. It was pretty interesting.

Or he was a real life Guts the Berserker. As far as medieval swords go that thing is huge and fairly heavy.

Who watches the watchmen?

I think it is confirmed to just be a ceremonial piece as it was actually dated as about a century older, or younger (can't exactly remember which) than Piers himself