The Sword Guy Podcast

Forged in fire, quenched in oil. With Stephanie Aiuto

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 91

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/forged-in-fire-quenched-in-oil-episode91/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Stephanie Aiuto lives in New York and began her career with blades as a sport fencer, competing at a national level in sabre, until she had to stop because she wore away all the cartilage in her toes. To fill the void the lack of sabre left in her life she took up knife making, and now works at Nazz Forge in Brooklyn, when she’s not doing her sensible day job.

Stephanie’s website is Aiuto Knives and Swords, where you can see examples of her work. She’s also on Instagram at @aiutoknivesandswords.

Here we have pictures of Guy’s pattern welded longsword, set of Narex Richter chisels and his Sgian Dhu:

Chisels are from https://www.classichandtools.com/

 

 

 

Swords in the Movies with Peter Lyon

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 90

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/swords_in_the_movies_episode90/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Peter Lyon is a swordsmith and weapons maker from New Zealand. He originally started out making swords to use in medieval re-enactment in the 1980s, and was asked to make the swords for the Lord of the Rings movies. Since then Peter has worked on many other film productions with Wētā Workshop including Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The Hobbit trilogy, The Last Samurai, and Avatar.

In this fascinating conversation Peter explains some of the tricks and behind the scenes detail about making swords as movie props. You will look at weapons in films in a whole different light after this.

Here’s a picture of Boromir’s sword, which we talk about in the episode, and if you click on this link it’ll take you to the Wētā website which has the dimensions and stats:

Peter’s website is Lyonesse Armoury, which has lots of pictures of Peter’s swords, resources and further reading.

 

 

 

Wooden Weapons and Wing Chun with Carina Cirrincione

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 89

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/wooden-weapons-and-wing-chun-episode89/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

This week’s episode is with Carina Cirrincione of Raven Studios, based in Oracle, Arizona. Carina makes wooden training weapons such as longsword wasters, rondel daggers, and implements for Eastern martial arts. She's also a Tai Chi and Wing Chun practitioner and instructor.

We talk about woodwork, Eastern martial arts, turning a hobby into a business and the challenges involved.

Photos to accompany this episode

This is Guy’s little chest of drawers:

Here’s a photo of a pair of Carina’s Wing Chun Bot Jaam Do, or butterfly swords:

And this is a wooden dummy used in Wing Chun, which Carina describes making:

You can find all Carina’s products at www.little-raven.com and if you’re in the Oracle area and want to train in Wing Chun or Tai Chi, get in touch with her through the website.

Raven Studios is also on Facebook and Instagram.

 

 

A Whole Lot of Tasty Bolognese with Joshua Wiest

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 88

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/bolognese-episode88/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Joshua Wiest is an instructor at the Triangle Sword Guild, North Carolina, USA. He focuses on the fighting systems of masters Achilles Marozzo, Giovanni dall’Agocchie, Antonio Manciolino, and Camillo Palladini. He's also a successful tournament fencer and host of the historical martial arts podcast l’Arte dell Armi.

In this bumper episode we take a deep dive into these rockstars of 16^th century Italian fencing. If you want to know anything about Bolognese fencing, this is the podcast for you.

Here is a link to the Talhoffer treatises on Wiktenauer, as promised.

Joshua’s YouTube channel is here. He is in the process of posting videos for all of Lignitzer's Sword and Buckler plays at the moment, but he managed to get the Palladini play shot for you here: https://youtu.be/DrKzNiGQtqM

Here is Marozzo’s guardia d’intrare, from Guy’s 1568:

And this is a copy of Viggiani’s Tree of Guards:

 

The Duel of the Century:

The two sword duel between Ascanio and Giovanni Taddei, in which Ascanio appears to be doing Marozzo’s eighth play. You can read about it here: https://guywindsor.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Terminiello-Piermarco-Reich-Steven-Fighting-with-two-swords-according-to-Altoni-and-Docciolini-2013.pdf

F

Ballet for Swordfighters with Anna Beard

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 87

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/ballet-for-swordfighters-episode87/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Anna Beard is a historical dancing and ballet and historical fencing instructor at Austin Historical Weapons Guild. She has been dancing since she was four and went on to get her Bachelor of Fine Arts and Dance from the University of Michigan, followed by teaching in studios, and running her own projects, performances and small dance companies. A move to Texas in 2018 ignited a passion for HEMA that has led to her becoming a co-owner of the Austin Historical Weapons Guild.

Anna’s 20 years of teaching dance have given her a love and deep understanding of pedagogy and in our conversation we talk about training teachers and how to teach children or adults. She has taught workshops at events like Swordsquatch on ballet for swordfighters, renaissance dance, and exploring teaching methods.

Whether she manages to change Guy’s mind on his dislike of ballet remains to be seen…

Useful Links:

• The teacher that Anna mentioned as being a huge influence on her is Liz Lerman.
• Austin Historical Weapons Guild is on Twitter and Facebook, as well as other social media platforms.

 

 

 

 

The Two-Handed Sword with Neil Melville, and a Review of the Year

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 86

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/two-handed-swords-episode86/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Hello Sword People! Welcome to the Sword Guy podcast. This is your host, Dr Guy Windsor, consulting swordsman, teacher, and writer. Join me for interviews with historical fencing instructors and experts from a wide range of related disciplines, as we discuss swords, history, training, and bringing the joy of historical martial arts into our modern lives.

As this show is going out on the last day of 2021, I thought I’d share some thoughts about the year gone by, and some ideas for the year ahead. All the links and information can be found in the blog post on my website.

Then, we welcome Neil Melville, author of The Two-Handed Sword History, Design and Use. So of course we talk about two-handed swords. How do we decide what is a true two-handed sword? What is the difference between a longsword, a bastard sword, a zweihander and a montante? And how were these enormous swords used?

Neil has been collecting swords since he bought his first sword in an antique shop in the 1960s. There are some pictures of his beautiful swords in the blog post.

You won’t find Neil on any social media, but you can support him in the good old way of going out and buying his book, which is available in the usual places. The Two-Handed Sword History, Design and Use.

 

The Mathematics of Fencing with Pamela Muir

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 85

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/the-mathematics-of-fencing-episode85/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Pamela Muir is the founder of the Academy of Chivalric Martial Arts in Arlington, Virginia. She's been doing historical martial arts since about 2003, and I've met her at several events. In this episode we talk about theoretical maths, Liechtenauer, chivalry, and representation for women in HEMA. Pamela also talks about the adult education class she teaches on historical fencing, and what a popular class it has turned out to be.

A couple of things we said would be in the show notes: The Mike Loades interview is episode 48, and it was Dori Coblentz in episode 67 who suggested that there ought to be free childcare at all events.

The web page for Pamela’s Academy of Chivalric Martial Arts is https://academychivalricma.org/ And also on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/AcademyChivalricMA/

 

 

 

 

 

Katanas and Koryu with Jaredd Wilson

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 84

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/katanas-and-koryu-episode84/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

This week’s episode is with Jaredd Wilson. Jaredd is the host of the Martial Thoughts podcast, which I appeared on back in January. You can find a link to our “The Pen is Mightier than the Podcast” episode here, or on Stitcher or iTunes. In today’s conversation we talk about what prompted Jaredd to start up the podcast, and the joy of getting to interview interesting people.

Jaredd is also a presenter at CombatCon and a long time practitioner of Japanese swordsmanship and other martial arts. We talk about how Japanese martial arts have evolved over the years and how training works. The conversation also take a slightly unlikely turn when we end up talking about a potential foray into the manufacture of high fashion silk ties.

You can find The Martial Thoughts Podcast on Twitter and The Martial Thoughts blog.

 

 

 

 

 

Swordsmanship is Woodwork, with Shanee Nishry

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 83

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/swordsmanship-is-woodwork-episode83/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Shanee Nishry is a historical martial arts instructor and founder of Stratford Swords, which is in Stratford-upon-Avon in the West Midlands of England. She's also a software engineer in the games industry. We first interacted when she posted some photos of a very ambitious woodworking projects she's working on, because I'm a complete woodworking nerd and it turns out that Shanee is turning into one too.

A couple of woodworking YouTube links for you:

Xyla Foxlin’s impossible table: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hk1l9tIjbEs

More woodworking ideas from Tamar 3X3 Custom: https://www.youtube.com/c/3x3CustomTamar

We also talk about the swordsmanship community and a project Shanee would like to complete which would bring together the community into one cohesive place, where everyone can go to find all the publications and discuss and debate them. We talk about the difficulty in getting alignment on the interpretation of sources, and how to make secondary sources more accessible to everyone.

Shanee can be found on her blog: https://shanee.io/ and Twitter: https://twitter.com/lunarsong

 

 

 

Your Challenge for December

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 82

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/your-challenge-for-december-episode82/ 

To support the show, come join the Patrons at  https://www.patreon.com/theswordguy

Hello Sword People, and welcome to the final monthly challenge of the year. This one is a little different.

Before I introduce it, let me just refresh your memory about what the challenges are. Basically, they are alternatives to New Year's resolutions because I don't like New Year's resolutions very much, and the challenges so far this year have been: breaking a habit, adding a habit, sleeping - in other words, how to sleep better, food, (so eating better,) learning a new skill, working on stamina, working on strength, working on range of motion, working on footwork and working on striking. Now you may very well suppose that this month's challenge will have something to do with perhaps, well, we've done striking, let's have a look at throws. Or we’ve done striking, let's have a look at parrying or something like that. But no, we've done most of the aspects of solo training as I discuss in my book, The Windsor Method: The Principles of Solo Training. So the focus of these challenges is on solo training and rest is part of training. So the question we are addressing this month, December, is how do you recover?