https://www.darksword-armory.com/proper-use-of-a-medieval-sword/ Medieval Weapons, Daggers and Armors Mon, 08 Mar 2021 21:38:42 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 https://www.darksword-armory.com/proper-use-of-a-medieval-sword/#comment-139104 Mon, 08 Mar 2021 21:38:42 +0000 https://darksword-armory.com/?p=4366#comment-139104 You absolutely parry with the edge. Never ever spar with sharp swords. That shouldn’t have to be said. These things are made to kill and their techniques are effective and very deadly. Do not spar with sharps. But with that said, you actually parry with the edge far more often in Historical European Martial Arts than you parry with the flat. It’s in manuscripts used to teach the knightly class how to fight correctly in period. We study these techniques and know that edge on edge parrys are quite useful for many reasons. If my opponent throws a right side oberhau I can do an active parry into ochs guard where I put my weight into a swing toward their cut so that the blades cut into eachother just a bit. When this happens I can now feel what my opponent is going to do before they do it. Now I can choose to disengage the bind while still controlling the blade and glide past into a thrust or I could rotate off line and go for a oberhau or zwerchau. The options are always endless. Idk what school teaches students not to parry with the edge but they clearly aren’t studied in the arts in my opinion otherwise they would have heard of fühlin. Not to mention the fact that flat parry is far weaker than edge parrying because of basic human structure. To be clear my school is Blood and Iron and I am rather new to the school having only about 5 months of practice so far. I own a sharp and know how to keep it and was interested how good this guide would be and come to find out theres a great big glaring “no edge parrying” eye sore I had to sort out. Sorry guys. Or you’re welcome. Depending on how you reacted to this. Happy fencing.

]]> https://www.darksword-armory.com/proper-use-of-a-medieval-sword/#comment-25548 Fri, 18 May 2018 05:52:34 +0000 https://darksword-armory.com/?p=4366#comment-25548 3. Always remember that a sword is not a baseball bat. With a bat, the wrists and hands rotate through the swing. A sword, by contrast, in order to cut properly, must be not be turned while cutting through a target; the motion is more akin to swinging an ax; allowing the hands to rotate and the head to twist means an inelegant and ineffective chop. Or to put it another way, the rear edge should remain in the same linear plane as the leading edge during the cut.

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