The Armour Archive

FrauHirsch

A body is a body is a body. A sword is a sword is a sword. That is why many of the WMA hand to hand moves are similar to Asian martial arts moves. I fight rebated steel sometimes. My friends moreso. A snap works as well or better with steel. It can be lightening fast and hit quite hard.... or not. R...

FrauHirsch

What if they like made T-tunics from the ground up, like made their own fabric, and then hand sewed them and embroidered them and stuff? That is combining it with fiber arts, and would not be a "costume" laurel. They would still need to be doing laurel level fabric creation or Laurel leve...

FrauHirsch

Wrestling was a period martial art. Golf goes back to at least the 15th century. I believe tennis dates back to the early 16th century; there are tennis courts at Hampton Court Palace. Of course, all of these would have been very different in period from their modern counterparts. I do agree that a...

FrauHirsch

What "other" activities are "non peer path"? Service is varied and wide, and covers everything from carrying boxes to cooking feasts to running events to book-keeping. A&S covers just about everything else that doesn't involve weapons, as long as it requires research and eit...

FrauHirsch

The laurels are going "But nothing involving FIGHTING is an art!" the Knights are going "Harrumph! If it's not RATTAN it's not FIGHTING!" and the Pelicans are cooking in the feast hall and refused to comment. From my perspective as a Laurel and long time rattan fighter: The Laur...

FrauHirsch

We still occasionally get guys who come out to practice who have a problem with being beaten by a woman. The last two like that had their butts handed to them by my very beautiful student. She has perfect china white skin, black eyes and extremely thick very long black hair. She looks like a curvati...

FrauHirsch

I never met a woman that played the "I'm better than you" game as well as some men do. I had never thought about it until I was writing this post. A lot of guys are good at convincing you that you can't win before the first blow is thrown. Many more try to play it, but aren't good at it. ...

FrauHirsch

Of the early female Knights: I fought Sir Maythen in the early 80s. Evil lefty. She hit like a tank. At a Tarnmist war I saw Sir Mary run down a bunch of guys by herself and take them out. They were all pad-boys and she was in plate legs, arms and breastplate with a chain shirt under it all. I didn'...

FrauHirsch

Rhiannon of the Wildflowers Mmmm, one of my first boyhood crushes. One of the reasons I still like chick fighters so much. a top heavy red Norman helm borrowed from then Count Sir Armand de Sevigny He still has that beast sitting on a shelf. You, Igrain, myself, and quite a few other newbies have a...

FrauHirsch

I joined the SCA in 1978 in May and fought in my first practice in October or November. Caid just became a Kingdom shortly after I joined, but I was too new to know what that even meant. I had seen one woman on the field at the time of my first pracice, Rhiannon of the Wildflowers. I had heard of Ma...

FrauHirsch

No, its any "period" art. The "martial" arts we are talking about are "SCA"isms with funky rules and modernisms that most Laurels do not consider within their perview. Well, if we're talking about prowess with combat archery, or fencing tournaments, then I agree absolu...

FrauHirsch

I personally have not heard of a fencing master made a knight, but Knights were familiar and trained in unarmored combat as well as armored combat in period. They were also well familiar with skills used for hunting, such as thrown weapons and archery, and of course horsemanship. Salvator Fabris wa...

FrauHirsch

Do we really need a peerage for every single possible activity in the SCA? We can agitate one for "waah, my pussy hurts and I won't do heavy list" to shut up this damnable "fourth peerage" debate once and for all. *grumble* Seriously: The issue is primarily that Laurel has drift...

FrauHirsch

Now many clamor for the old SCA days of wooden shafted arrows with bird blunts. Good range, good accuracy and they look like arrows because, well, they ARE real arrows. The problem is then you have possible broken wooden shaft issues and also you need to go with helm based protection for the eyes a...

FrauHirsch

One of the main issues I see is the issue I saw posted on the rapier vs armored thread a few weeks ago by someone who I think was a Don, that a Knight or top level rattan fighter can normally pick up rapier and easily become one of the top players, while that is not necessarily true in reverse. What...

FrauHirsch

Laurel here, In Caid, there is an equestrian Laurel - Master Damales, who is a professional horse trainer and who trained a horse to replica a 16th century dressage performance based on period texts. There is a Historical Martial Arts Laurel, Master/Don Giacomo, who was Laureled based on his researc...

FrauHirsch

Duke Martin the Temperate described his early practices in a dorm room. He practice katas using a yardstick in front of a mirror. Its all about muscle memory.

FrauHirsch

I used to do at least 15 minutes of combinations without breaking when I started fighting. I did it every day I wasn't at a tourney or practice for at least the first 6 mos, then probably 3 times a week. Occasionally I'd take a break after than and do a few more reps of same duration. It really help...

FrauHirsch

We have one that has a base of an old VW tire with rim. In the places where the lug nuts would be are long screws with eyes on the end. A 6" diameter peeler fits inside, but can be pulled out and taken apart. The tire rolls pretty easily from one place to the next. The peeler pole is layered wi...

FrauHirsch

Very good, we usually have two going. One tall, one shorter. I want another at "person on their knee's" height.

FrauHirsch

I'm 5'2" and sometimes use shots that pass over their head... when you are short, you have bad angles and often need to do things to make them respond by moving their shield to get an opening. It can be used like a high wrap set up to get a shield to move to the high outside to be followed by a...

FrauHirsch

My husband made one on a canvas that could be staked down some 15 yrs ago. It was fun to play with, but he made it to his long-legged stride, which was too long for most normal humans and especially for very short me... I think he gave it away. It looked cool for our 16th c reenactment group present...

FrauHirsch

The only problem with hanging pels is you can't practice some of the shots combos that require the blade to fly over your opponents head as part of the maneuver.

One of the pells we use has a wooden stand that breaks down easily for transport.

FrauHirsch

1) Hit the pell continuously while moving from out of range to extremely close range. The purpose of walking forward and back is to take small steps and start at maximum range out and then walk until you cannot move forward and are short sticking the pell. This helps you figure out how to throw the ...

FrauHirsch

Me without my plackart:
<img src="http://home.znet.com/savaskan/stmartins/smimages/JulianaAbbeyshield.JPG" border="0">

Me fighting rebated steel with maille:
<img src="http://home.znet.com/savaskan/stmartins/smimages/JulianaArionMeleeNovwar.JPG" border="0">

FrauHirsch

I noticed some full armored C&T pas d'arms videos on utube. They were doing standard percussive hits, not draw or tip cuts. They really looked more like standard armor rebated steel fighting done in other groups. Is the SCA allowing this ok? Are the heavy C&T armor standards similar to the o...

FrauHirsch

Men trying to impress women always say the most amazing things. I used to play harp as a pass-the-hatter at the big So. CA ren fair. There were many times when a guy would walk by with a lady and she'd say "Wow, that is beautiful instrument, what is it?" Their very authoritative replies ra...

FrauHirsch

Alexander,
Perhaps we'll see you at Crown and I can give you the whole story. Basically there were several changes in "armor" rules that were rattled off to me and my husband that were supposedly this past years changes. There was a change to gorgets mentioned too.

FrauHirsch

Interesting. As former KRM for Caid, I'd think I'd know of such. What rule change would that be? Nothing has changed in the armor requirements in years, since the mandate to rigidly enforce the underarm protection. That was about 7 years ago now. It was that some commonly bought fencing doublets ar...

FrauHirsch

I think much of the antipathy for the rapier fighters to be included in the Chivalry is because the *way it is done in some local SCA areas*, it doesn't seem like a real fight. And most of my rapier friends that do both also say that. Its not that rapier *can't* be a real fight, but in many cases it...

FrauHirsch

I also think the shinai community in Caid harmed the growth and credibility of the rapier community here, but that is a local anthropology.

FrauHirsch

Over the years, I have seen many efforts by our local fencing community that discourage people from participating, especially if they are coming from armored combat. They may occasionally take an interest to help someone from the rattan community get started, but more often as not, there is a lot of...

FrauHirsch

This is really a cheap hobby relative to others. I used to do horses and off-roading. Those are much more expensive. I also used to surf, water ski, snow ski and play volleyball. I could have hurt myself much worse with those. I still fish. I guess fishing is slightly less expensive, but not much. I...

FrauHirsch

Vitus- I would tend to agree with you on this. It certainly appears that there is a fear involved in foam fighting that has to do with (and this is a generality) touch shots being "good." As a result there is now allowance for armor doing its job, nor for using power bleeding techniques t...

FrauHirsch

Sir Arion and I may come to watch/marshal.