Can someone explain this statement by E. Oakeshott, where he describes cutting while keeping the wrist stiff? A video clip would be even more helpful.

Quote:

"In the old slashing, smashing days of mail armor and broad, flat-bladed cutting swords, the wrist was little used in sword-fighting. A blow was made from the shoulder, the arm straight and the sword a rigid, yet sensitive and flexible, extension of it." [Oakeshott 1997 p51]

A similar concept is reported by Elgood about Indian sword-cutting:

Quote:

Colonel Blacker suggested that the Indian cutting stroke was the only one capable of penetrating the layers of cloth in turbans and quilted jacket armour. 'The native practice not only requires a stiff wrist, but a stiff though not a straight elbow, for a cut that shall disable.' [Elgood 2004 p184]

I'm having difficulty visualizing it because trying to keep a stiff wrist means fighting against the natural centrifugal motion of the sword during a cut, which automatically rotates the wrist and hand outward. This seems to reduce rather than strengthen the power of the cut, and makes getting a sword strike up to full speed difficult. Has anyone else had similar observations about this cutting technique?

I'm not sure about the wrist in the European context. It seems as though he meant that the wrist is rotated forward with the point closer to 180 degrees than 90. Maybe it was held at an angle and the arm and body moved, but the wrist doesn't.

The Indian one is talking about draw cutting. The sword is held at around 90 degrees and when cutting you sort of pull towards yourself. This video shows what I mean.

http://youtu.be/RQwbf1_LP8w?t=6m42s

The comparison is with modern styles of sword-fighting, where a lot of the motion can be rotation about the wrist, with the arm remaining fairly stationary. This has relatively little power. Cutting from the shoulder, where there is little movement in the wrist and elbow, generates enormously more power - it's a larger movement, and more mass is moving. A lot of the motion can also be provided by rotation and motion of the whole body - even more power. This much is largely independent of the angle between sword blade and forearm.

It's ideally suited to draw-cuts (as already described above), whether the angle between blade and forearm about 90 degrees, or more open (as long as the hand is leading the blade of the sword). Is is a very effective cutting action. You shouldn't have to fight against centrifugal force, any more than you should need to fight against gravity in a blade-forward guard. Your sword should not be that heavy and ill-balanced.

If you combine the body motion described above with rotation about the wrist, you generate a very hard and fast strike, but it is more percussive than slicing. Since European Medieval art often shows about a 90 degree angle between sword and forearm when the sword is held near the body, and almost 180 degrees when hitting, this is likely to be a historical technique. And it works well in the SCA, where percussive power matters and slicing doesn't: http://www.bellatrix.org/school/section04.htm

I notice that too -- that period European art often shows sword cuts beginning from near perpendicular orientation. But no matter where the cut begins from, I can't quite see how you *wouldn't* fight centrifugal motion. Since the centers of balance and percussion are always above the hand/wrist, there will always be centrifugal force exerted on the wrist no matter how light the sword is. I'd think that this pressure would only increase if most of the power in a cut came from the shoulder, since that would be even more centrifugal force trying to rotate the wrist.

I don't doubt that stiff-wrist cutting is effective -- indeed, many kinds of sword pommels (talwar, Viking, takouba, etc.) prevent free wrist rotation. It's just not intuitive to me, and I've been unsuccessful trying to figure this out on my own! Would really love to see video of full speed, full power stiff-wrist cuts against resistant targets, if any are available...

My guess is that Oakeshott is talking about cutting primarily from the shoulder, and wanting to make it clear that the medieval sword wasn't (generally) suited for purely wrist cuts, unlike some later blades.

It's also worth remembering that while he was an absolute expert on the history and development of swords, he wasn't a martial artist, and so isn't a perfect source for how they were used in combat.