From time to time, clubs may have the opportunity to do some community outreach and give some HEMA demonstrations for the public. This is a great opportunity to raise the profile of your club in your local area while helping to entertain and educate …
Is technique important?
Sometimes there is a question about technique and its importance, compared with other elements of fighting, martial arts, and/or sports. Often some people will suggest that historically accurate technique is what verifies our practice of HEMA; other …
Does HEMA have a place in historical re-enactment?
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 12th August 2011. It has been edited and improved for posting here. I used to be involved with a historical re-enactment group before I began to practise HEMA. More recently, I have taught …
Learning to apply difficult techniques in sparring
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 6th January 2017. It has been edited and improved for posting here. One of the common problems faced by many practitioners of historical fencing is that while we know and have learned many …
Feinting with the longsword, according to Ringeck
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 18th September 2015. It has been edited and improved for posting here. A common action in modern Olympic fencing is that of feinting: making it look like you intend to do one thing, when in …
How to become a good HEMA instructor
A question I am asked quite regularly is how to become a good (or better) HEMA instructor? Of course, everyone’s situation is a bit different, but here is a simple set of guidelines for becoming a better instructor. I’m afraid this is quite blunt in …
A chronology of the books by D.A. Kinsley (version 3)
D.A. Kinsley is a researcher and author who has been of tremendous service to the HEMA community. His area of interest is that of first-hand accounts of British military engagements and civilian encounters during the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th …
A chronology of the books by D.A. Kinsley (version 3)Read More
How to begin working with a HEMA source
HEMA is an activity that relies on sources; but what does working with a HEMA source involve? Although it may seem obvious to people who have involved in HEMA for a while, it is not the simplest process, and there are many things to consider at each …
Making footwork lessons work for you
There are two broad kinds of footwork lessons: technical lessons and integration lessons. You need both of these types of lessons before your footwork will begin to work for you in sparring, and you also need to be training the right thing before it …
HEMA – A Systematic Approach
This is a guest article by Nial Prince. The subject is one about which Nial has been writing quite often recently, in answer to people’s questions on Facebook. So that the ideas and points of view would be easier to find again in the future, with a …
Sparring and Fighting
This is a guest article by Duncan McEvoy. Duncan and I have had several discussions over the last year or so, on the topic of sparring and fighting, and how we think these elements fit into the ways that we each conceptualise HEMA and martial arts. …
Book Review: Sport and Physical Education in the Middle Ages
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 4th March 2016. It has been modified for reposting here. A while ago, I bought what promised to be a fascinating book with great relevance to the study of historical fencing: Sport and …
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Sparring is not always the best training method to become better at sparring
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 11th October 2013. It has been edited and improved for posting here. I have often come into contact with the idea that the best way to become good at sparring is to practise lots of …
Sparring is not always the best training method to become better at sparringRead More
6 books to help learn the context of medieval HEMA
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 18th December 2015. It has been edited and improved for posting here. There are now many publications dealing with the nuts and bolts of different medieval HEMA systems, which is a wonderful …
Short Biography: Johann Justus Runkel (1751-1808)
I am interested in working with antique swords, since studying the original items can tell us much about the construction and use of swords in history. I have a small (but growing!) collection of antique swords, and some of them bear a signature on …
When can we question the masters?
An interesting discussion that arises from time to time in the HEMA community is how much we can trust what the authors of our source material wrote, when we may in fact have better ideas and can improve upon these methods, and generally: when can we …
Fencing with mixed weapons
An idea that seems to be enduringly popular is to see what happens when fencing with mixed weapons; if one person as a longsword and the other a messer, or sabre against rapier, or spear against sword and buckler, for example. Some combinations are …
What is HEMA to me?
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 10th June 2016. It has been edited and improved for posting here. We all have different motivations behind our practice of HEMA, and we also tend to have slightly different understandings …
Curved Swords and “Polish Sabre”
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 24th June 2016. It has been edited and improved for posting here. I have a curved sword. When I fence with it, am I practising Polish sabre? The reconstruction of 17th century …
Shelf numbers for books in archive
This article was originally posted on Encased in Steel on 24th February 2017. It has been edited and improved for posting here. You may have observed that when discussing original source material, people will sometimes refer to sources by their …