Posts: 1,420 Location: New Orleans
Wed 12 Feb, 2020 6:45 pm
Sean,
Wonderful image there of the hunter. I love it.
I don't think I'm opposed to most of what you said. I'd like to be clear, I am not making the claim that people in 15th Century Nuremberg or Venice were somehow
better fighters than in 1st Century Rome or 5th Century BC Athens.
Nor am I one of the black coated horde of tournament fighters who think the longsword is the only weapon that matters. I'm 51 my tournament days are maybe not yet over completely but surely drawing to a close. For the record I have respect for the martial cultures across the span of time. I'm sure any Roman Legionairre or Spartan Hoplite is tougher than me. The Classical armies were highly formidable and incredibly lethal, and generally, they get their due. I think we sometimes have a tougher time coming to grips with the capabilities of people in the late medieval.
In the 15th Century same as the 1st, the sword was a sidearm. The primary weapons were in fact the same - some kind of spear was still first and foremost across that entire swath of time. Newer devices like crossbows and arquebus were carving out a niche, but in many ways the spear was still king (and the newer weapons had their ancient equivalents too).
But we do know the designs did change, the capabilities of the weapons changed and the fencing systems that went with them changed. The sword arguably became more important both as a backup weapon and in a civilian context for duels or chance encounters on the road.
I'm sure s
ome parrying was done with a
gladius or a spatha, just as some is done in Japanese fencing. And we know that the Classical World had their own marital arts like Pankration. It's basically a matter of emphasis. My argument is, relevant to the original video we were discussing, that far from being brittle, late medieval and Early Modern European swords were designed more and more for the use in defense, yes quite often in one on one encounters, but also on the battlefield. We know that armor had improved quite a bit too, and thrown weapons weren't any guarantee of taking out an opponent (although they too, in the form of things like the hurlbat and the Swiss Arrow were certainly still around).
The question of why
shields gradually became less prominent on the European battlefield is a big one maybe beyond the scope of this thread, but we do know that fewer people were carrying them and more were relying on the sword for defense as well as for offense. We know that complex hilt features became more and more prevalent and fencing systems leaned toward techniques
requiring a highly robust (and therefore given the length, springy) weapon.
That is my argument in a nutshell. Far from being more fragile or brittle, I think European swords in the era of the
tachi and the
katana and the
no-dachi were probably a bit more robust. That isn't to take away from Japanese sword design or swordmaking, since they had their own advantages as we well know.
And I also still say that yes, I think it's highly unlikely that the Romans could have made an
Oakeshott XV or XVIII sword any more than they could have made an arquebus, a steel
rotella, a volley gun or a tempered steel gothic harness. And if they could have done anything like that, I believe they would.
J