In what is probably one of the great misconceptions of the European and American worlds, the popular idea if melee combat is that the Japanese were masters with highly specialized schools, and Europeans were, somehow, brutes who muscled their way through battles with the help of heavy armor and swords that were not that sharp.
Of course, this is hogwash in the highest order, born of multiple misunderstandings. And while the Japanese marshal arts tradition is rich with a long linage of accomplished, and revered masters, the fact of the mater is that sword fighting and hand-to-hand combat were no less of a science in Europe, and no less heavily studied. To be sure, the two regions had drastically different approaches to the art of melee, influenced by the people and tools brought to bare in each fight. None the less, where Japan had master instructors like Sasaki Rui and Ito Ittosai Kagehisa (just to name two), Europe had its own names, who in their day carried no less the measure of awe and respect, and even fear on the field of battle. These men were masters in even sense of the word.
One of the older, and regretfully less well known names of the schools of fighting was Ott Jud (“Ott the Jew”), an 15th century Austrian master in the art of grappling and hand to hand combat. While little of his life story has survived to the present day, his own writings identify him as a member of the Jewish faith. A later biographer would write that Otto was a wrestling master (and teacher) for the House of Habsburg, one of the most powerful families in that part of Europe at the time. He was also included as a member of the Society of Liechtenauer, a sword-fighting school founded by Master sword fighter Johannes Liechtenauer in the 14th century. Ott was the author of a treaties on “ringen” (German vernacular for grappling), and that document was repeated as a foundational work for central European sword fighters for centuries to follow.
Roughly contemporary to Ott Jud, was Fiore dei Liberi, born in Italy in the mid 14th century. Where Ott, and Johannes and this like were well documented to have founded schools and taught many students, Fiore’s works included a master treaties called “Flower of Battle” (“Fior di Battaglia” or “Flos Duellatorum”), and extensive travel across northern Italy training high profile figures in preparation for coming duels. These duels were major social events, and heavily regulated, with rules being agreed upon weeks or months in advance, and the whole event attended by figures such as counts, dukes, and even members of royal houses, their family, and high ranking figures in the church. Fiore was also a fighter himself, taking part in the Aquileian War of Succession, and engaging in several honor duels in defence of his good name or reputation as a fighter. None of the records existing today say that he ever lost one of these duels. Fiore’s life was as much mystery as not, with the year and place of his death not certain. While his works today, predominately the Flower of Battle, give us good insight into fighting of the time, it’s also understood that his impact on sword fighting was limited by the fact he didn’t run a traditional school with many students like his contemporaries.
By the end of the 14th century, one of the most concentrated places of sword fighting instruction in Europe was Bologne Italy, giving rise to the term “Bolognese Swordsmanship”. Master firefighters such as a maestro Rosolino (1338), maestro Nerio (1354), and maestro Francesco (1385) each had established and well attended schools with many students in the Italian town. This collection of instructors, and the tradition of formal training as part of a larger culture of schooling for the wealthy and politically connected offered a perfect environment for multiple treaties to be written, each chronicling not only the individual philosophies of the masters and authors, but highlighting the weapons of the day, and their growth over time that lead to new and different techniques.
One such master was Lippo Bartolomeo Dardi, who’s name gave rise to the “Dardi school” of swordsmanship. Even though little is know about Lippo, his work, and students from his school are refernced for over 200 years following the schools founding.
A century and a half later, one of the Dardi students-turned-master named Achille Marozzo would author a treatise entitled “The New Text on the Art of Arms”. Where 150 years before, Ott Jud had concentrated on hand-to-hand combat, Achille’s work included detailed illustrations and text highlighting such techniques and methods as, Sword and Small Buckler, Sword and Broad Buckler,
Sword and Targa, Sword and Dagger, Sword and Cape, Single Sword, Sword and Rotella, Large Dagger with and without Cape, Two-handed sword, Polearms (Lance, Ronca, Spetum, and Partisan), and Unarmed against Dagger.
The lists of schools and teachers across Europe during ‘the middle ages’ is as vast and diverse and the continent and the people who inhabit it. These are just a few of the men who helped shape the art of the fight and developed European marshal arts into a technique every bit as sophisticated and capable as its Asian counterparts of the day.
Two hundred years before the romanticize fights talked about in ‘the 3 musketeers’ and ‘Cyrano de Bergerac’, the science of combat was a well researched marshal art, taught by well known masters in their fields.
They were the master “black-belts” of their day.
His Lordship Ivo Blackhawk
Kingdom of Ansteorra
"Long Live the King!"
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