The Sword Guy Podcast

Talking Tempo with Guy and Cornelius

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 71

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/talking-tempo-episode71/ 

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

Today’s episode is a bit different to the usual format. Dr Cornelius Berthold, who is a well-known historical fencing instructor in Hamburg, Germany, contacted me because he is doing a series of YouTube videos on the topic of tempo and had some questions for me.

We had never met or spoken before, but Cornelius very kindly agreed to have the discussion in the form of a podcast, so that you all can listen in to two absolute tempo geeks geeking out about tempo.

Here’s a link to Cornelius’s fencing school in Hamburg, Dimicator Schola, and the Dimicator Schola YouTube channel.

Guns, blood and swords with RC-Annie

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 70

                                                               

Rachel Bown-Williams

Ruth Cooper-Brown

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/guns-blood-and-swords-episode70/ 

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

Ruth Cooper-Brown and Rachel Bown-Williams are the founders of RC-Annie, the UK’s leading dramatic violence company, specialising in training, fight direction and intimacy direction for stage and screen. They hire out guns and swords (not to just anyone!) They are also purveyors of fake blood; thick or thin, “splat or spurt”, depending on your needs.

When creating a fight, Ruth and Rachel like it to look real and messy and painful, and in our conversation we talk about good fight scenes and bad, and why so many films show great unarmed combat, but are absolutely terrible as soon as the actor picks up a weapon. We also talk about sex, or rather what intimacy direction is for, and the difference between the ways sex and violence are portrayed on screen.

Here's a showreel of some of the fights RC-Annie have directed: https://youtu.be/yg3WMXRt3P0

 

For more on intimacy direction, you can also listen to episode 9 with Siobhan Richardson.

 

RC-Annie’s website: https://www.rc-annie.com/

Their YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqBl-eaYxK0KN5b_j_RZ8Aw

 

 

September Challenge: Range of Motion

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/monthly-challenge-get-more-flexible-in-september/ 

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

Your challenge this month is to engage with your ranges of motion. Much of this episode is adapted from my new book The Windsor Method: The Principles of Solo Training.

You can follow along with a pre-recorded flexibility-based training session at:

Guywindsor.net/hamstrings

Guywindsor.net/trainalong

Love poems to Welsh bucklers, with Paul Wagner

The Sword Guy Podcast, episode 69

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/love-poems-to-welsh-bucklers-episode69/ 

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

Paul Wagner has been involved in historical swordsmanship since the 1990s, and was present at the first night of the Stoccata School of Defence in 1998, a HEMA school which now has several branches in Australia. Paul is a Provost at Stoccata, teaching courses in Single Sword according to George Silver, Highland Broadsword according to Thomas Page, Sword and Buckler according to I.33, Rapier according to Joseph Swetnam, English quarterstaff and English longsword. He has written many books and articles on the subject too.

This week’s episode is a must-listen for all sorts of talk about about bum daggers, Swetnam the woman hater, fighting while half drunk, or how you could go about leaving your body to HEMA.

But first, here’s a link to the love poem to the Welsh Buckler: https://guywindsor.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Welsh-Bucklers.pdf

Welsh buckler https://collections.royalarmouries.org/object/rac-object-2645.html Shield - Buckler (1540) From Wrexham, Wales. Located at the Leeds, Self Defence Gallery, UK. Royal Armouries.

We cover quite a lot in this conversation, and there are a few accompanying links:

Paul’s new armoured jacket: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WHcgIAD583A

The McHowarth "Fencing" text - i.e. the missing Art of Defence on Foot - is going to be on https://stephen-hand.selz.com/. It’s not up yet but hopefully soon. There'll be some kind of nominal fee to cover the cost of the platform.

Alehouse Dagger article: https://stoccata.org/2017/05/14/english-knife-fighting-the-alehouse-dagger/ 

Alehouse Dagger Video: https://youtu.be/bTNbpoqgYkE 

English Buckler videos: 

• https://youtu.be/uaMVpzP2aSU
• https://youtu.be/U2Ym9GynDBM
• https://youtu.be/lBkqTK_0_Qw

Comparison of Dagger and Buckler: 

• https://youtu.be/pM4ZmRgJV0M

English Longsword videos: 

• https://youtu.be/VB3kt3y7EPU
• https://youtu.be/ZO52-watCOM
• https://youtu.be/oP_Ay-Bkgr8
• https://youtu.be/PW-e_gt7p5M

Articles on English Longsword: 

• “Common Themes in the Fighting Tradition of the British Isles” in Late Medieval and Early Modern Fight Books, Brill (2016) 
• “English Longsword: a Tactical Approach” in In the Service of Mars, Vol. II   Proceedings from the Western Martial Arts Workshop 1999–2009, Volume II (2015) 
• “Hawks, Rabbits, and Tumbling Cats: An Analysis of English Longsword Terminology” in In the Service of Mars. Vol. I Proceedings from the Western Martial Arts Workshop 1999–2009, Volume I(2011) 

 

Classical Fencing and Digital Pedagogy with Dori Coblentz

The Sword Guy Podcast, episode 67

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/classical-fencing-digital-pedagogy-episode67/ 

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

This week’s episode is with Dr Dori Coblenz, lecturer in Communications at Georgia Tech, specialising in early modern English drama, digital pedagogy and the history of fencing. She's the author of many papers and the book Fundamentals of Italian Rapier: a modern manual for teachers and students of historical fencing, with David Coblentz.

 

In our conversation we talk about the differences between classical Italian fencing and historical fencing. Dori’s passion is for teaching teachers, geeking out about sources and how we apply that to teaching contexts.  

 

When it comes to swords, is there is anything at all that is better taught online than in person? Dori makes some great points about the benefits of online teaching, and has some great ideas for how to make using digital media more effective: a must-listen for anyone who teaches or has an interest in pedagogy.  

 

Dori’s website: http://www.doricoblentz.com/

 

Swashbuckling with Sebastien de Castell

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 66

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/swashbuckling-episode66/ 

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

Sebastien de Castell lives a life of music, adventure and swordplay. He is the author of the Greatcoats series, which is full of sword action, and the Spellslinger series, which features magic finger guns!

For all Sebastien’s books, see here: https://decastell.com/all-books/

In this episode we talk about how to write a great sword fight for stage, screen and literature, including these two classic scenes:

• Inigo and Westley in The Princess Bride
• The first duel in The Duellists

Sebastien’s ulterior motive for coming on the podcast was to ask Guy’s opinion on how a rapier might be modified to contain a pistol. Have a listen and see if you agree or have a better idea of how it could be done.

 

 

The Armoured Knight, with Dr Amanda Taylor

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 65

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/the-armoured-knight-episode65/ 

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

Dr. Amanda Taylor is a Research Fellow at the Oakeshott Institute and a Research Affiliate at the Center for Early Modern History, University of Minnesota. She is the author of several academic papers such as The Body of Law: Bodies, Combat and Rhetoric in Sir Thomas Mallory's Quest for Justice and the forthcoming Domesticating War: Women, Medicine and Military Activity in Premodern Europe. She has presented at conferences on topics such as martial women and political power in Shakespeare's history plays and battlefield wounds and treatment in English and Italian sixteenth century epic romances and surgical practise. As well as all that, she works for a medical equipment company.

In our conversation we cover lady knights, battlefield wounds, PTSD in returning soldiers, academic publishing, and more. It’s quite a wide ranging one!

These are the books recommended in this episode:

• Tamora Pierce: Song of the Lioness Quartet
• Edmund Spenser: The Faerie Queene
• Ludovico Ariosto: Orlando Furioso
• Matteo Maria Boiardo: Orlando Innamorato
• Elizabeth Lev: The Tigress of Forli: The Life of Caterina Sforza

More information on Amanda’s Ph.D., Fabricating the Martial Body: Anatomy Affect and Armour in Early Modern England and Italy, can be found here: https://conservancy.umn.edu/handle/11299/206363

Amanda has a love for armour, and her favourite is the Lion Armour, which can be found at the Royal Armouries: https://collections.royalarmouries.org/object/rac-object-34482.html

Here’s Guy’s favourite Avant Armour: https://www.glasgowlife.org.uk/museums/collections/collection-highlights/avant-armour

 

Amanda mentions Craig Johnson a few times, and if you would like to listen again to his episode, it’s episode 33.

 

 

Tales from the National Fencing Museum, with Malcolm Fare

The Sword Guy Podcast episode 64

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to 

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

My interview today is with Malcolm Fare, who is a collector of historical fencing books, a fencer himself and proprietor of the National Fencing Museum in the UK. The museum houses a library of over 300 books, 250 paintings and prints, 200 weapons, numerous masks, kit, trophies, posters, programmes, medals, stamps, postcards and other ephemera. You can click through on the museum’s website to see photos of the items.

In 2017 I spent three days at the National Fencing Museum with a decent camera and a book-photography rig, taking hi-res images of the cream of their amazing collection of treatises, with the kind assistance of James Hester, and Malcolm himself. Here is a link to the Senese: https://guywindsor.net/2018/06/the-last-of-the-bolognese-seneses-the-true-handling-of-the-sword-yours-free/ and De La Touche: https://guywindsor.net/2017/07/the-true-principles-of-the-sword/

In the interview I mention the photos I took of McBane’s The Expert Sword Man’s Companion. They are sadly still in a disorderly state on my hard drive, and not yet fit to share. If anyone would like to organise them, please get in touch!

Listen to this episode to hear how Malcolm got his hands on some of his favourite books. It’s a wonderful tale involving auctions, barons, and chance encounters.

You can get in touch with Malcolm and arrange a visit to the National Fencing Museum at http://www.fencingmuseum.com/

 

Guy’s new book, as mentioned in the intro, can be found at www.guywindsor.net/solo 

 

Drawing swords with Yael Nathan

The Sword Guy Podcast, episode 62

For transcriptions and more detailed shownotes, please go to https://swordschool.com/podcast/drawing-swords-episode62/ 

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

Yael Nathan is a comic artist who draws swords as part of her Warriors series. She has also worked with IDW on several Star Wars comics. Find her work at https://elcomics.gumroad.com/# and https://yaeln.com.

Yael is also the author of the Serpent webcomic. https://tapas.io/series/Serpent/info and https://www.facebook.com/SerpentWebcomic Serpent is the story of a girl born into a guild that does not accept her, in a land where women are no more than property. Through determination and deceit, she leaves her home and infiltrates the assassin’s guild, rises up through the ranks to become the king’s personal assassin; only to be betrayed and extradited to the enemy land of Dane, where she’ll fall in love and help bring about a revolution in her homeland.

We talk about her grandfather’s Kris sword. Here are some photos of it:

  

In our conversation we mention Gunpowder Milkshake, the new film written by Yael’s friend and collaborator, Ehud Lavski: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8368408/

 

Guy’s new book, as mentioned in the intro, can be found at guywindsor.net/solo

 

 

 

Your Challenge for August: Get Stronger!

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

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

Your challenge for August is to get stronger, following the principles of conditioning as described in Guy Windsor's new book, The Windsor Method. In this episode Guy reads the chapter aloud for you (with minor changes).