Why are Meyer's Longsword Guards so Exaggerated?
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- Опубліковано 9 вер 2024
- Relevant excerpts from Meyer's 1570:
"... stances are used, which are intrinsically nothing more than tarrying or holding the weapon at the outermost point to which you have arrived when pulling up to strike, where you still have space to consider in the middle of the same before you have completed the cut, whether to complete the same cut according to your first intention, or whether it would be more useful to turn to a different point." - Foreword
"I do not want you to tarry long in any one of them because they were not invented nor provided for this reason ... "
"... you should tarry for a small while-and virtually only a blink of an eye at that same outermost point-to further consider whether it is useful to complete your previously-considered strike or whether a better opportunity might have occurred ..." - Sword: Fencing From the Stances
"I really do not want you to wait in the stances for the opponent’s attack."
"However, it occurs rather often that you cannot begin your sequence in the Before, nor even carry it out usefully, without receiving injury from an opponent who fences against you. Therefore, it necessarily follows that you position yourself, cautiously and yet with grace and serious demeanor, into that stance in which they cannot cut at you without their own injury and disadvantage. Secure in your stance, you can thus observe and attack them to your advantage or wait for their cuts."
"... always change from one stance into another, and not solely because you mislead them in this way, but rather to confuse them [to the extent] that they cannot know what kind of sequence will be fenced at them or [what kind of sequence] they should fence at you." - Dussack: About the Stances or Guards and their use
Translated by Rebecca Garber
#sword #hema #fencing #martialarts #shorts
One of my favourite parts of Meyer’s longsword is that it is fluid. Cuts flow from one guard to another and can act as both a ward and an attack. He handles it the way one would use a Zweihander but adapted to the lighter and shorter longsword.
I'm guessing if you fight or train or just run around for a long time, it gets harder to swing a sword around, so it makes sense to have a style you don't have to be at full strength to use.
@@val26874 Close. It's still using full strength, just in a way that's more efficient.
Fighting is cardio on a full body scale instead of just legs and lungs. Any advantage in stamina is good.
is that a fucking zena cat pfp!!!!
@@sporperino Shhh. I wish not to wake the sleeper agents.
@@volatile100 Well, the cool advantage I often find whenever I practice Meyer is that it is good to flow with less strength to lull opponents and to save energy. It is kind of akin to Kali where our hands move and flow which allows faster and smoother movement. With Meyer’s, flowing through guards is both offense and defense. You can threaten a cut and sudden thrusts while protecting yourself from their own strikes, too.
In other words, Myers guards are keyframes in the animation, not static poses? Lol
Tbf, animation in their time period isn't that easy.
One good example is Vom Tag, Langenort, and Alber. If you did a vertical downward strike, you would technically cut “through” these guards. But you could also stop at any of those points and go into a different movement pattern. That’s why stucke helps, they’re examples of launching/changing your attacks from these points in space.
Keypose
@@Eis_ Underrated comment.
Parry mechanics based on animation. I think some games have this
There is a saying in karate that stances aren't places you stay, they're places you wind up
Correct. Also in quite a few other martial arts.
(joke)
Muay Boran: "I will assume you're made of stone and break you as such."
Shaolin is also the same... kung fu is about speed instead of brute force , so you must change your stances quickly when applying the techniques....
@@Lucasmagalhaes-vg5ox Kung fu is about getting your ass kicked in an actual fight. Plenty of those videos on UA-cam, and there's a reason why it isn't used in MMA competitions. Makes no difference with how fast you are changing your stance.
Pretty much the same with karate. They can be effective meditation and light exercise. They are almost complete bullshit in actual combat, unlike this gentleman swinging his sword around, in a way that was maybe actually used to kill people at a point in time. Some principles might be shared.
@@Greippi10Kung Fu was developed for war in a country where weapons were legally banned. But continue in your delusions 🎉
Relevant excerpts from Meyer's 1570:
"... stances are used, which are intrinsically nothing more than tarrying or holding the weapon at the outermost point to which you have arrived when pulling up to strike, where you still have space to consider in the middle of the same before you have completed the cut, whether to complete the same cut according to your first intention, or whether it would be more useful to turn to a different point." - Foreword
"I do not want you to tarry long in any one of them because they were not invented nor provided for this reason ... "
"... you should tarry for a small while-and virtually only a blink of an eye at that same outermost point-to further consider whether it is useful to complete your previously-considered strike or whether a better opportunity might have occurred ..." - Sword: Fencing From the Stances
"I really do not want you to wait in the stances for the opponent’s attack."
"However, it occurs rather often that you cannot begin your sequence in the Before, nor even carry it out usefully, without receiving injury from an opponent who fences against you. Therefore, it necessarily follows that you position yourself, cautiously and yet with grace and serious demeanor, into that stance in which they cannot cut at you without their own injury and disadvantage. Secure in your stance, you can thus observe and attack them to your advantage or wait for their cuts." - Dussack: About the Stances or Guards and their use
Translated by Rebecca Garber
Beautiful
(Your work) ((as well as the original words))
I believe MS I.33 says something similar for its wards. It says something like that these wards are not necessarily "stances" that you would turtle in (or castle, as I think I recall the texts saying) but rather, the illustrations depict the natural points your body will find itself moving through when exhibiting proper form.
How do I learn to talk like this manual
Never have I, nor will I ever again, witness a most eloquent description of _footsies._
Gotta admit, the entire time I was worried he was gonna accidentally klang the sword against that tree in the back everytime he did one of those big swings
...or the camera!
In my headcannon that wasn't the first take for that exact reason.
that sword is an extension of himself 🙏
My headcannon is the tip of the balde is flat because he did hit that tree lol
I know it's not true but it's just funny to imagine
O!
The Landsknecht uniforms are incredible.
"You wish to cut up my clothing? Hah! I have already cut them to ribbons myself, you knave!"
@@ALEXANDER1318 knave?
@@kerkonig5102 en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knave
@@kerkonig5102 I suppose "Rapscallion" might also suffice.
Vom Barette schwankt die Feder
The exaggeration could also be done to make the illustrations more clear and easy to understand.
Potentially, though I do not believe they're exaggerated beyond reality. There's actually one guard where he says the artist depicted it wrong, Hanging Point, and that the arms are not extended enough.* (I'd argue he's describing an even more "exaggerated" posture than what the artist depicted). Additionally, from his (translated) wording, he calls them the outermost point of your preparation.** To me, the guards he shows in the plates are the maximum point you are moving towards, but you might not fully reach that point in practice every time. You should always be ready to abandon the stance the moment it's not worth keeping, but I think the expectation is there that you are still drawing into the full stance if opportunity permits.
* [I.9] "The portrait on the right side in the abovementioned Figure [F] teaches how you should correctly initiate the Hanging Point (except that the arms are not shown as sufficiently straight here)."
** [b ii] "... stances are used, which are intrinsically nothing more than tarrying or holding the weapon at the outermost point to which you have arrived when pulling up to strike ..."
Translations by Rebecca Garber
While I think that's true another way to think is that it's the biggest version of the movement that's useful.
I really recommend reading the German, just to experience the full poetics
There is also that in training you do the most full motion while in the stress of an actual fight you naturally tend to cut motions short and make them shallower. You need to go deep into each pose during training so your muscle memory brings you back into them when you are under pressure.
@@lagg1e wow that is such an insightful way to say that I'm glad you added that.
Pov: this guy gives you a lesson while slicing you up during a duel
I'm always reminded in HEMA that if you can master footwork and distance you can control the flow of the conflict. You can have the best edge alignment and strongest cleanest strikes, but if your footwork is sloppy and your depth control is off you will leave yourself open to the more patient attack.
all combat
use any style you like but if your positioning and balance are bad youre at a severe disadvantage
We have this joke among soldiers that if in combat your stance and aim is good you're not moving, communicating or using cover right.
I like how this guy is a nice sword "nerd" but in medieval times he would be an absolute menace and a killer because his skills and knowledge would be actually put to their intended use
When we will have instakill space lazers in the future will we have gun enthusiasts talking about the historical usage of kalashnikovs and M4's?
@@HarryBolsak We have UAV drones and Spectre gunships now, and gun enthusiasts still talk about historical weapons. There's been a whole re-creationist community all about those black powder weapons for decades.
@@digitaljanus Arma milsimmers don’t really use drones, it’s mostly late-Cold War to Iraq War kit so we already have historical reenactors for modern pre-drone combat 😂
@@oscaranderson5719 facts!
@@digitaljanus
Seems to me that Drones are going to be as much of a tactical dead-end as gas and nukes are.
Manor Lords background music as well. Awesome
I thought that I was hallucinating after yesterday's Manor Lords marathon hahahahaha
Yup
I was just wondering where I know this music from
bro I thought I had my game open LOL
That's what it's from! I knew it sounded familiar.
my man lookin dapper with that feather hat
Macaroni
Chain swanging
It's kind of sad that all the fashion these days is mostly for women. Just look at this outfit, imagine the swag if men still dressed like this nowadays
@@KeksimusMaximus"I don't care what anyone says, I'm wearing it" -some guy in the internet
@@KeksimusMaximusculture changes. Accept it.
I feel like Meyer was aiming to be like water with the sword: always moving, using the feedback of what's in front of you (the other guy) to determine to either blow through or "bounce off", but always move forward.
I know thats the endgoal of all "schools" but I fell Meyer just jumps in and sets the fluidity out of the gate.
One thing is that it's good to practice a full range of motion because that'll give you some wiggle room when actually trying to use those techniques, and so it makes sense for a manual to depict the deepest point in the motion.
Similar to how in traditional hand to hand martial arts many forms consist of stances and moves that just show the transitional periods and apexes of the movement. No one would ever stand in a Karate cat stance while fighting but it's a stance you might flow into and from while changing angels, prepping for a strike or moving defensively.
I think it is also meant to exclude any form of ambiguity. It's a still image in the end and better to visualize the stances if you exaggerate them.
I love watching your videos on swordplay. Your movements are so fluid and effortless, and your educational mini-lectures help me understand just what exactly swordplay is.
I now know that Swordplay, like water, is meant to be fluid and responsive and ever-changing. Never stagnant. I thank you for that, sir!
Finally somebody who understands guards. I have believed for a long time that guards are generally the beginning or end of a strike. The only reason you start from that guard is because you are practising your options when the worst happens ie. you missed or were countered. In actual combat you would never deliberately begin in one of these guards as they are nearly all putting you at a disadvantage.
Manor Lords soundtrack🔥 🗣️🗣️
This was an extremely good explanation of those crazy poses you sometimes see in treatises. As someone who doesn't practice HEMA, but is interested in it, this was an extremely enlightening video. Thanks!
This is one of the reasons Siegfried was my main in the Soul Calibur series.
Dude the clothing you have on in this video is sooooo sick. I feel like something just clicked in my brain because I have always thought fashion from hundreds of years ago was kind of goofy up until now. Seeing you swing the sword efficiently like that really shows how cool these guys really did look
exactly they look so cool in context
It looks ridiculous.
Realizing that, with some of your motions, it looks like my fav Dark Souls 3 Weapon, The Hollowslayer Greatsword, seems to implement the Meyers guard in the second swing/light attack. Which is really neat!
Lucatiel and her bro were def inspired by this school of swordfighting in general, they have the drip and technique shown with the moveset.
This guy puts in the time, the research and the application, major respects for keeping this alive
Thank you Renaissance Mario 😎👍
Hahaaa
This is one of your most informative videos. I'm still taking notes over here.
I would also argue that it's also got with Dynamic Momentum; you pick something relatively heavy up, the strength you have to put into the swing in order to change it's direction is going to be a lot more than swinging something static
Monkey terms: A to B and immediately from B to C uses more force than A to B, wait and then B to C
I don’t think long sword is that heavy. 2-4 lbs? It weights about the same wt as a modern pistol.
On top of that, using momentum to keep the motion flow doesn’t take a lot of energy(energy is being recycled) however, when you stop the motion is when you take the most energy.(takes equal amount of energy to stop)
if you stop and start swing(taking a static pose, changing to another static pose) takes the most energy out of your system given that you need initial energy to start the motion and an energy to stop the motion.
thank you, that totally changes the game for me. i've been struggling with moving from olympic fencings more static and linear approach to the fluid nature of longsword and this is really helping me contextualize how the ebb and flow works
Loving Manor lords I can hear Rob!
I would swear you are the most skilled sword fighter on UA-cam, or at least the most practiced. You make that look so natural and smooth, as if you’ve been doing this every single day from a young age.
This short is better than a lot of video essays
Meyers fluid cutting flows is so good! Dynamic guards were game changer for me :D
But even a turtle goes with the flow (?)
Super helpful seeing you execute the movement into and from the stances. Cool stuff, Robin.
The clothing seems to allow for quite a lot of freedom of movement.
Does the leather jacket feel restrictive around the shoulders?
I can feel it bind a little, but not to the point that it stops me from moving. You gain a lot of mobility from having it only fastened at the neck.
I do mostly empty hand, but your description of point-from-which-actions-radiate, rather than just a resting position makes total sense. Quite beautiful watching the full flow version you show. We focus a lot on changing leads and attack angels. Fits right in with this.
Anyone know where I can get a sparring longsword like that, I see every professional with one looking almost exactly similar but when I look all I can find is red dragon
Purple Heart armory and Kult of Athena
Regenyei or SIGI if you're in Europe. ^ Purplehearts are great in US. I can recommend VB feders too
I'm using a SIGI feder
@@robinswords thank you good sir
Regenyei direct. About 8 weeks for a custom feder from order placed to in my excited little hands (Australia). Postage is a HUGE amount of the total cost, but once they do ship it left them Thursday and was delivered to my place of work on Monday. Very happy with it.
I love the period accurate costume, really sells the movement range well. Also, as a fellow mustache haver, I gotta compliment you on your grooming, you are really pulling it off well. Well done, keep making good historical content!
The heavy swordsmen handbook says it's impossible to swing greatswords at that speed. You are in clear violation.
Here's your Speeding Ticket 🎫
but it's a just longsword >:(
Your channel deserves more traction. You’re providing really valuable information!
Now i imagine a master swordsman making all these moves even more swiftly, efectivly in middle of combat with heavy armor on slashing through peasants with ease slowly aproaching to an enemy knight. Marvelous. Amount of training must've been exhausting.
Imagine you’re sitting there getting hard about wealthy people extinguishing poor people. Reeeally strange comment my guy.
@@yehooyahoo6861i'm getting hard about possible skill level. The rest is only some probable background.
My man testing the cameraman’s invincibility to its absolute limit
🐢 👈🏻 Could this be a dog?
Yes
Praise the dog!
Yeah
this man's got more confidence in his spacing and camera lens than I ever could
it's beautiful to watch you swinging that marvel of human ingenuity. It s almost like watching someone dancing.
Music is from the game “Manor Lords” on Steam
Terribly devastating grace and power accentuated and moreover enhanced by those gloriously splendiferous pantaloons sir, truly indeed befitting of a man of great renown... ⚔️🏅⚔️
I heard the music so much I thought I had the game open... :D
I love they way you break all of this stuff down. It makes it engaging to learn about this stuff!
Outstanding video. The amount of thought that our ancestors put into the art of sword fighting is just astonishing to me.
I never knew about this Meyer fellow or his guards, but you have sold me on this entire thing in the span of a Short. Bravo!
In case you are wondering.
Yes, the feather is necessary for maximum damage output.
What you're doing with this, and what I've seen in the HEMA community in recent years is really amazing. I was a kendo guy for years and what you describe approachs the technical complexity I remember from that.
In a situation where you need to condense as much information as possible, into as few illustrations as possible this makes so much sense. If you know what position to aim for, you could figure out the in-between with practice
Was reading the Horse Guards Adjutant's training manual for the sword yesterday. In it, the instruction described that the cuts, points and guards are meant to flow from position to position naturally, and not be maintained in any particular order.
Instead - as you describe - the movements of the positions are simply a mechanism by which you can recover your balance and decide upon your next move.
I did HEMA for a long, long time, and I just wanted to say that you've got an EXCELLENT sense of your body and where the whole sword is at all times. That kind of physical awareness doesn't come easy, well done.
Thank you!
Reminds me of the way my Taekwondo (ITF) instructor explained the traditional exaggerated front stance. It doesn't actually represent a fighting stance, but rather the stance you're in for an instant, when a punch hits the target. They are solid stances in forms, but in practice they are fluid positions you'd only spend a split second in.
"Just as still waters turn foul, stagnation leads to decay.
Warriors must remain ever-drifting." -blue cloth set, elden ring
This guy fought and sailed the sea with the infamous captain Jack Sparrow, he had a chaotic feast in Tortuga, and marry the daughter of British governor before cursed to sail the sea forever and only walked in the land once in a ten years
The fact that future generations will have detailed video recordings of how we, for example, train in the use of firearms… it’s an incredible boon.
Swinging around that sword with more prowess than Rellana, damn 🤯
Now Margit’s long delays in his swings make canonical sense now
It's good to see that nobody understood mid action frames back in the middle ages, I was beginning to think that was a current form of obliviousness. I sware the amount of times I had to explain this about comic books is astounding. Like seriously, you think Spiderman just randomly has stiff spasms in mid-air like he has some oddly specific form of Parkinson's disease?
My personal favorite short from u. I'll dare to say that this is the ultimate lesson to understand in the
Blades world. Be water, my friend
This and attack into the knoch are two hardest concepts to understand if you getting into Meyer's Longsword (Hema) from modern Olympic style fencing.
Oh man when you started to doing the gaurds back to back the body mechanics was just gorgeous.
Thank you for the excellent explanation! I always wondered why the positions looked so exaggerated.
In terms of mechanical function the deeper postures have a chambered basis of power that multiplies the importance of footwork
This is beautiful. And I love your clothing and beard. The cocktail it makes with Meyer's stances and moves is both terrifying and very classy.
The one specifically shown is also when defending and leaning out of the way with the guard up
Sir we just want our baseball back
True that these were probably like a still shot of a a transitional motion, but also, as a training exercise in some martial arts, forms are are sometimes practiced with exaggerated extension and deeper stance,
to help improve range of motion and stronger stance, so that the actual form is easier and more fluent.
It's so satisfying to see someone do these stances how I've always imagined them being done. People fighting with swords were experts of their craft and every stance was for a reason.
The stache plus the get up really sold this short for me
This was actually recorded during the renaissance
This is why I think mixing Fiore and Meyer works so well. Fiore has many good 'relaxed' positions, whereas Meyer shows where you should reach as you travel through them.
Trying to learn something with just pictures and no video mustve been hell back then. I wouldve been stancing up like a gangsta if i was born in this era.
I think bros in that era had instructors and trainers
This is applicable to all movement learning. Whether it's combat, tennis, dance, etc.
Love your costume, it looks really good and super accurate, I can tell you put some careful consideration to it! People think that historic costumes are kinda silly and ineffective looking, but they provide both unlimited range of motion of flexibility and a surprising amount of protection for just being cloth and leather. They also feel really nice to wear, at least to me, a lot of period clothing is more than just comfortable to wear, but especially fine silk or muslin is actually pleasurable to feel moving against your skin
I'm basically the only student in our Meyer based HEMA club who doesn't think those positions are exaggerated, only they're shown at their geometric fullness, i.e., one need not be in them to the fullest always, but the technical ideal is expressed. As for what they are, they're called Lager (rhymes with "logger," NOT "lay gurr"), which means "stored up." Recall a type of beer is called Lager, which is "stored up" for a while before it's ready for consumption. Thus, these Lager are positions from which the strike is chambered and ready to go... no winding up necessary. The first lesson we offer newcomers is the oberhau from Vom Dach/Tag, in which we tell them to move into distance (here we demonstrate Langort) then shoot the sword forward into the strike without any telegraphing preparatory movement, then let the sword pull your body with it into a passing step.
To compare, Fabris shows exaggerated stances but says that one doesn't have to go that far.
this sounds like what i learned in karate
when learning a new stance we always went out to maximum width/length stable positions for our feet. in practical exams a narrower stance often worked and instructors rarely told us to go to the more exaggerated static poses we learned.
Great point about the images being like snapshots. I think there's also a couple of other relevant considerations:
1. Diagrams need to be clear in what they're depicting, especially given that with woodblock prints, there's a chance that ink may not pick up on a crucial piece of detail if the detail's made too fine;
2. Beginners by their very nature need to start with broad, exaggerated movements that are refined and made more subtle by practice and understanding; I've seen one Japanese martial artist liken it to sculpture, in that you gradually take away parts of a movement you don't want until you're left with the essence of it. Works intended as manuals very much need to take into consideration that beginners may be less refined in the specific movements that the manual is trying to teach.
Posture often serves as a lure to bait in a strike. Predicting what your enemy will do is great, but determining what they will do is supreme.
Don't forget, as with other martial arts, in practice, the stance may not be so big, but training that way eventually trains your body to put more power into the stroke than you usually can do in a narrower stance.
I think it's cool how people think these big swords are unwieldy, cumbersome things that require weird stances to use, but in reality, you're really just guiding the sword through its motion by changing your stance as the sword goes, and the drawings just depict them in-between those stances
The zornhut you showed in the beginning, also is a very, very good evasion.
love the well-informed, demonstrative content
Nice clarity. I tried to hold a sword once, but it was a 6'4" rapierist's rapier, so it was too heavy for me (I mean, I held it, and I didn't do anything stupid like break something). I like to learn though, and this makes the stances make better natural sense to me; thanks.
My man's playing the Manor Lords OST in his videos now.
How many days of your life have you lost building the perfect village my friend
A toast to his cameraman, for standing so still during the filming. Not even a tripod could be so disciplined in supporting his video! 😂
There is a philosophy in Eastern traditions which says that when we get into actual combat the brain tends to take shortcuts. Training in exaggerated forms and positions fills in the gaps caused by those natural adrenaline induced shortcuts so that when engaging in a fight you perform the action in its most effective form. It makes perfect sense that the Europeans also figured out the same thing.
Those swings that consistently rotate back into the guard remind me of the Bastard Sword movesets in Dark Souls 2 and 3.
it’s amazing how the foot work and the movement of the hands, arms and hips are so similar to MMA, Muay thai boxing etc.
It's nice to see Clark Kent has expanded his wardrobe. I know the glasses are effective, but it's nice to have variety.
The light greatswords in Elden Ring capture this kind of effect because you can delay the attack input and it leaves you in those stances for a second before returning to neutral
literally playing KCD when this video started and had to pause cause of the music lol.. very intrigued by the hema stuff, keep at it!
Not only is he teaching, he is also showing great moves !!
I couldn't understand most of it, but I knew you looked very good in medieval noble clothes.
ㅤAnd it was really cool to see you diligently explaining your specialized knowledge.
It was fun!
😍😍😍😍😍😍😍😍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍
I actually have been wondering about this when I have seen depictions of this in art and books.
Thanks for clearing this up.
Now I can file this cold case away and stamp “solved” on it.
when i was training with a professional boxing coach, he really emphasized using my legs to add power to my strikes, so i imagine it might be a similar thing here, too! a deeper stance allows your legs to generate more force and really make your swings a full-body movement, rather than if you were to simply use your arms