The Weekly Warfare   Musings martial from across the SCA

 

Translation by Rachel Barkley

Contact or Collision of the staffs from the first fight

You will accommodate yourself in this manner to this position if rightly you will have wished to engage with the enemy. In the athletic custom[1], the right foot should have been fixed forward, you should seize the club next to the posterior end with the left hand, the right hand directly should stand in the middle of the club, and if in turn the adversary will have positioned forward his right foot against you, should he hold the club with both hands just as you and in order to make contact he should strike, then in turn you will meet him and you should touch[2] his club with your own. If you will have completed this and you will have felt the enemy resisting strongly to you, if you will have moved with the left foot against his right side, strike the right arm of the enemy.

If however he attacks by the same reckoning, send the club on the right side downward[3], and repel the enemy’s attack. Thence you following quickly with the left foot, if you will have struck the right side of his head again, you should remember to retreat back from the enemy.

Notes:

[1] Words used are more athletico, so that’s a literal translation. I think it’s the same sort of “athletic custom” that we similarly saw in the Peasant Flail section.

[2] Word is contingere which can also mean “reach”, “take hold of”, “seize.” It’s clearly not “block” because Mair would use avertere

[3] This forms a hanging guard on the right side, much like Scales from the flail plates.
Interpretation by Owen Townes

Setup:

Agente:
Medium grip
Vom Tag or Plow
Right foot forward

Patiente:
Medium grip
Vom Tag or Plow
Right foot forward

Play:

Agente:[1]
Onside Oberhau

Patiente:
Onside Oberhau to block
If Agente resists strongly[2], yield downward[3]
Step in with Left foot
Strike Agente’s Right arm

Agente:
Block with Right side Scales
Step in with Left, yielding
Offside strike to Patiente’s head

 

Observations and Notes:

[1] The “You” of the first paragraph of this plate is Patiente.  Agente’s opening action is inferred from “should he hold the club with both hands just as you and in order to make contact he should strike“.

[2] In longsword this is referred to as being “Strong in the Bind”.  The play described is almost identical in execution to plays found throughout the Liechtenauer tradition longsword manuals.

[3] The yields, combined with the steps, both pass through a stunted “Tail” guard, with the head of the staff behind the fighter