The Armour Archive

I am looking for a online resource for fighting in the "High Atlantian Style" If anybody knows of any please let me know.
Gabhan

Are you referring to the glaive style?

Sounds like it might be the "Oldcastle style" of sword and shield. Duke Gyrth Oldcastle wrote a manual describing this style. I haven't been able to find it available online, but if you like I'll dig out my copy and mail it to you. I don't use a shield myself, but there are many basics iterated therein that any fighter might do well to take to heart.

If you are indeed thinking of Old Castle style, be prepared to have your sword leg pulverized and to fight from your knees until you get good at it.
In my opinion, this style is designed specifically for SCA combat where there are lots of wraps, face thrusts and no lower leg targeting.

BEDLAM

I could make such jokes...

From my experience, high Atlantian style is when you line people up in a shield wall at the base of a bridge and tell them to stand there and do nothing while the "cool" people go and fight.

'cause they must be high if they think I'm going to stand there...

HELMUT the bitter

I've always wondered....
HAS anyone ever "fragged" their OWN bridge commander?

Gawd, I have wanted to do that SOOOOOOOOOO many times.
There are SO many different choices in candidates one can make when appointing a command position, yet the job often is given to someone, who, in my opinion, kisses @ss REEEEAAALLLLYYYY well.
Cause tactical knowledge and decision making under pressure sure as hell weren't factors
in their appointment to the position.

Rrrrrr......

VvS

Vermin - yes, I have witnessed a commander fragged. The commander in particular was a rather unpopular knight with a reputation for being an ass. He pissed off the wrong group of people who were on his side during the war. In a field battle with siege engines, he was shot in the back "accidentally" by a ballista bolt about three seconds into the battle.

Gather round and I will tell you a story.

It was at Pennsic, maybe number 17. The mighty Tuchux were given the distinct and of course deserved honor of carrying and protecting the banner for the Eastern Crown during the woods battle.
Since we typically would go on search and destroy missions in the woods, this seemed like it would be kind of interesting. Can you imagine what it would be like for an opposing force to fight its way through to the banner only to find that it is defended by about 75 well rested, rough and ready Tuchux who have been chomping at the bit to get in some fighting?
Unfortunately, the woods battle was called off because there was a large number of ground hornets that year, not that they would dare sting us (It IS our home turf). So we never got the fight.
As the battle ended, the king never came back to get the banner so we marched it back to our encampent, which was then on the hill.
Well, our orders were to hold the banner for the king or die protecting it. So when some knight or other comes and says, that he is here for the banner, we told him that the king would have to come and get it or the knight would have to bring an army and take it by force.
Sir knight shuffles off spurs a-draggin to relay the message.
We, hoping for a fight, stay more or less armored up, but alas the knight came back saying the king couldn't come to the hill as he had court, blah, blah, blah...
We told him pretty much, "Too bad, so sad"
So we kept the banner for a month or so after the war until contacted by the king to return at an East kingdom event.
See what can happen when your allies don't get to fight?

BEDLAM


[This message has been edited by Bedlam (edited 06-01-2001).]

High Atlantian style???

Being a former Atlantian I would love to be able to help you out with this, but am not sure what you are describing- as others have stated it is probably the years old Olde Castle style that use a very high shield guard and a sword held almost perpendicularly behind one's back. I haven't seen it used much recently, but some good modifications on it seem to be working- I think that the current Prince of Atlantia, Galmr was a student of that style, and has won three Crowns using his version of it.

Strict Olde Castle style is very process oriented, very system like (or that is what I have been told), and when it was the new thing on the block, it helped to put at least 5 Atlantian kings on the throne.

Alaric

Gabhan, ask Baron Vebrand about it. He started out in Atlantia and knows most of the styles there (including at least the basics of Old Castle if you're interested).

Martin - Vebrand's Short Squire

Way to go Bedlam! We could use a tribe of you folk out here. An Tir, that is..

I've known Galmr for years, camped at Pennsic with his household the last 3. While he is (obviously) a good fighter, he does not use Oldecastle style. His style is more of what I call "relaxed-shotgun". Sword is back, baskethilt resting on his shoulder. Oldecastle is "elbow-in-the-ear". Hand is behind the head, sword is tip-down running along the spine.

Can't help with the Oldecastle Online Manual however, can't seem to find it in any of my links. It's around somewhere though, I'd recommend a search on Metacrawler or Google.


Frederich

The Oldcastle manual is available online at:

http://sabletower.homestead.com/files/index.html

courtesy of Duke Gyrth Oldcastle and Lord Sylvanus Perrin.

Can't help with online info, but I at least have heard of a style called "High Style."

I have an old edition of The Fighter's Handboke. Back when freon cans were legal for helmets. It describes the Bellatrix snap as a new, advanced blow, not to be taught to a new fighter, etc.

It also addresses the High Style briefly. All it really says is that this style fights with a shield held well out from the body, edge toward the opponent. Blocks are done by moving the shield a bit up or down. Dang hard to get around a shield held out there, but man that would hurt the arm muscles after a short time.

If there is another version of High style, I'd like to hear about it. I like Oldcastle, but it really is a system you have to keep coherent. I had no luck picking and choosing concepts from it. I am happier with what appears to be the generic SCA style.

It is worth knowing a couple of other styles, at least in concept, though. I have used Cariadoc's closed-form heater style effectively a couple of times. Another fellow was using it and the other local fighters couldn't figure out what he was doing. Watching at the sides, I recognized the style and switched into it when I fought him. We were pretty well matched, since he was not used to fighting against his own style. Then I got sloppy and slipped back into generic SCA style and started getting clobbered.

Anyway, other than what I typed above, I know nothing more about a High Style.

-Patrick

I have heard of a glaive style commonly reffered to as "high" style. Basically, it is fought with the weapon held vertically in front of the body with dropping cuts as the main blows. I have tried it a couple of times but preffer not to use it as it is so much more difficult to block thrusts and arrows like that.

I think Patrick has has found it. I talked to a couple of former old-school Atlantians this weekend and they showed me what they refer to as "high style". They both said it was different than "Old Castle" but the differences were lost on me. (It looked really, really painful until you learned how to move correctly).

Gabhan, the guy you want to talk to around here is THLord Alan of the Brightlands (Barony SGB and Shadow Legion). He can explain it a whole lot better than me.

Good Luck.

Ive always been under the impression that high style involved a person holding their shield out a bit to keep it mobile, and the sword is held with the hilt up around eye level and the blade pointed down.

of course i may be, and probably am, mistaken.