The Armour Archive

learned fencers what is the deal with the ?spanish? circle. Do any of you use it.

well its more of a mathmatical principle to dealing with rapier combat.
works well for some but there is very much a cadance to the style and claiming the cadance usualy shows who will win the match.

LA Destreza is a good search term wikipedia has a short article that has some Info but hear are some better links.

http://sjaqua.tripod.com/spanishc.htm

http://www.martinez-destreza.com/articles/spanish1.htm

http://www.thearma.org/Manuals/destreza.htm

Puck and Mary Curtis' site has some of the basic information: http://www.plumes.org/destreza/

The idea that you see in the Spanish circle repeats itself (in a less complex format) in various other rapier manuals -- Viggiani has his tree of cuts, Meyer has a couple of diagrams laid out in the woodcuts.

It's the if-then chart for footwork and lines/angles of attack based on your position and your opponent's position. I don't use it, but Blackstone's cadet, Tomas, spent quite a bit of time working with it and I'd say it improved his fencing greatly.

It's a useful tool for being able to plan out your attack several moves/actions/tempos ahead of where you need to be...just a bit complex to try and tackle right off the bat.

Puck & Mary Curtis are probably the foremost experts in Spanish Circle in North America, if not the world. If memory serves, Mary is getting her PhD by translating the work of Destreza. I wouldn't trust anybody else's judgements about it, including my own. This isn't to say that other people aren't using it correctly, but I would say that if I were going to seriously study it, I would go knocking on their door.

The problem, if I understand it correctly, is that for several hundred years the Spanish Circle was forgotten. There is no direct lineage for it (despite what anybody might claim), so all knowledge of it is reconstructed.

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 presentations.

John Michael Greer's translation of Girard Thibault's L'Academie d'Espee contains instructions for construction of a Circle. I've made one and have worked with it some. It is a method of learning range, angle, and footwork; Thibault's book was written for a fencer to be able to learn from with no instructor, so he included a very clearly labeled system of movement and distance.

It's probably the second best fencing book I own (Fabris is #1 by far) and I highly recommend it. I would easily recommend it to someone looking to pursue a historical style.

read a book called "By the Sword" that talked about this Spanish school along with the English. French and Italian schools.

The English basically said it was way over complicating things. There is a reason why you don't hear about many Spanish rapier masters in history. When you start mixing complex geometry/math and physics into your game your head will be swimming over in the math world when it should be focused on overwhelming and destroying your opponent in the here and now.

Baron Alejandro wrote:Puck & Mary Curtis are probably the foremost experts in Spanish Circle in North America, if not the world. If memory serves, Mary is getting her PhD by translating the work of Destreza. I wouldn't trust anybody else's judgements about it, including my own. This isn't to say that other people aren't using it correctly, but I would say that if I were going to seriously study it, I would go knocking on their door.

The problem, if I understand it correctly, is that for several hundred years the Spanish Circle was forgotten. There is no direct lineage for it (despite what anybody might claim), so all knowledge of it is reconstructed.

Myself, I would recommend Maestro Ramon Martinez at the Martinez Academy of Arms, if you are interested in practical applications of Spanish fencing theory, followed by Antone Blair at Destreza Pacifica in Arcata, CA. I'm not not recommending Puck & Mary, but these are the folks that I have a lot of experience with regarding Destreza.

Also, as a student of Spanish rapier, I'd warn against getting too hung up on the circle diagrams as Maps to Ultimate Knowledge the way that some folks seem to. They are illustrations of small slices of fencing theory, and incomplete by themselves. Destreza is arguably the most difficult form of rapier to master, and learning it well without an experienced instructor (be it Maestro Martinez, Antone, or Puck) is unlikely bordering on impossible.

-William

The problem I have with Ramon Martinez is that he awarded himself his title.

Baron Alejandro wrote:Puck & Mary Curtis are probably the foremost experts in Spanish Circle in North America, if not the world. If memory serves, Mary is getting her PhD by translating the work of Destreza. I wouldn't trust anybody else's judgements about it, including my own. This isn't to say that other people aren't using it correctly, but I would say that if I were going to seriously study it, I would go knocking on their door.

The problem, if I understand it correctly, is that for several hundred years the Spanish Circle was forgotten. There is no direct lineage for it (despite what anybody might claim), so all knowledge of it is reconstructed.

Mary's PhD is on Carranza, but as it is a PhD, its on cultural context as well. Carranza was well considered in Spain. They also know their stuff concerning the other authors, although I suspect their focus is earlier r.t. later.

M. Martinez specializes in a later method, mostly derived from La Rada, although he knows of material up until the 19th century--the Spanish, in particular concerning the saber, retained the verdadera destreza until the 19th century. His work on the Spanish school is a studied recreation. I happen to know and have known Ramon for 30 plus years, and while we have our differences, he was a true student of M. Rohodes, of whom I personally heard M. Gorgio Santelli speak as a master due respect.

For those of you who are interested, la Rada has even more complex diagrams than Thibaults, 3 dimensional projections, etc.

Thibault represents the Spanish method, the low countries had an indigenous style, and also a hybrid style that borrow most from the Spanish. Some of this shows up in Thibault's grip, which is similar to that of other Dutch and Flemish masters. Matt Galas has a paper that is among the precedings from the University of Dijon on Pieter Bailey's fencing MS, and has done extensive work on the fencing of Belgium and the Netherlands. Pieter Bailey's work precedes Thibaults by 15 years or so, and his son was an artist who was involved in the later work.

There are many IN SPAIN, who are well researched in the Spanish method, enough that we have a Carranzanists versus Pachecoists versus Esgrima Comun argument among them sometimes cropping up