Our sister school, Barbasetti Military Sabre since 1895, recently held its annual SabreSlash event in Prague, Czechia (Oct. 1 & 2). Maestro Michael Kňažko, a dear friend and one of the chief organizers of the event, related that it was the largest crowd they’ve yet had. As one of the best events I’ve ever had the privilege to attend, this naturally makes me happy, and having left most social media I’ve been slowly gathering what news I can from him, attendees, and those following the various stories on sites like facebook.
Of these, one of the more interesting if tragic tales related to me was about the confusion so many in “HEMA” have around right-of-way (ROW) and how it works or used to work in sabre. Much of this is explained by a lack of familiarity or experience with sabre pre-electric as well as electric. As someone who competed before the widespread adoption of electric scoring for sabre, and suffered for several years trying to make it work, I have some perspective that might help should they chance to read this.
One of the comments shared with me was this:
AFAIK, what they wanted to do with electric sabre didn’t work due to the technology. They experimented with sabres that had motion measuring devices, to try and only score proper cuts, and also looked at how to only have the edge and point score. In the end none of it worked properly and they gave up and ended up with the current ‘touch with any part of the magic wand’ result, and I guess in that context they thought they needed to have ROW for some reason. I don’t actually know why they chose ROW for Olympic sabre, but certainly in the late 1800s sabre rules ROW was not universal, and in at least one of the early Olympics they still allowed legs as a target. There was a lot going on at that time and it’s difficult to know why they landed on certain decisions, such as no-legs and ROW. But it was clear by the 90s that everyone was gaming the ROW horribly in sabre.
I don’t know who wrote this, but they raise key points that are worth examining.
First, sabre, like foil, employed ROW before the adoption of electric scoring. The only weapon that does not use ROW is epee. Officially, electric scoring for sabre was adopted in 1988, was first used at a major event in 1989, and was adopted for NCAA fencing in the mid-90s. It was a complete disaster and led, so the author above remarked, to “the current ‘touch with any part of the magic wand'” calamity that has dogged the sport ever since.
Second, the use of the capteur or accelerometer was short-lived. This device, a small gauge inserted into a port in the knuckle-bow of the bell-guard, more often created foil and epee-like mechanical issues on the strip than it did assist in determining the impact of a cut.
As I understand it, there is now a move afoot to reintroduce the capteur as well as the fleche. Good luck FIE, you’ll need it: at least two generations of sabre fencers have learned how not to fence and have about as much notion of proper edge alignment as they do why not getting hit might have value (a failing they share with their cousins in “HEMA”).
Right of Way
This concept is misunderstood and much abused in historical fencing. I get it, I do. As I’ve written here ad nauseam the logic behind ROW is solid–it’s the abuse of the rules around it that is the problem. Briefly, this is what ROW is:
IF threatened/attacked, one’s response should be defensive
In terms of specifics, the Refereeing Handbook provides a nice, short list:
- A properly executed attack has priority over a counterattack
- A properly executed stop-hit (attack in preparation) has priority over an attack
- A riposte has priority over a remise
- A properly established point-in-line has priority over everything
- None of this applies in epee [1]
Fencers love arguing over what constitutes a “proper” attack, etc., but the first point “should” make sense: if something sharp is speeding toward one, the absolute stupidest thing one can do is counterattack–sure, maybe one hits, but one also failed to defend. Not smart.
The exception, point two, is a counterattack made in the right situation, and thus, at the right time and measure–normally this means one has at least one tempo of fencing time to attempt the counter. Such a tempo is often created by an attacker starting out of distance or attacking poorly, say with their arm too exposed. Ideally one has enough time to make the counterattack AND parry-riposte should that counter fail.
The riposte trumps a remise for the same reason as point one–the initial attack was parried and the initial attacker “should” expect that having lost their initiative, that their opponent is going to make a return. Thus, ignoring that riposte in order to push through a remise, that is a second attack in the same line, is utterly daft.
As an example, a close friend and old comrade from college, recently bouted in longsword with a KdF club in his area. His opponent made an Oberhau, or a descending cut from above and my friend parried this with Ochs; the attacker ignored the parry and thus the riposte and continued to push through, sans any force (it having been spent when parried) and received a Mittlehau or horizontal cut to the abdomen. The attacker was upset with my friend, but the weight of the riposte’s impact was entirely his fault. My friend, realizing that his opponent didn’t have the foggiest notion of the logic of the sharp point/edge attempted to explain it to him, but came away feeling that he had both failed and poisoned the well. It didn’t matter that he himself had been hit, only that he had eventually made contact, however weakly, with my friend’s mask.
Herein lies the major stumbling block with HEMA–getting the touch is not everything, it’s how we get the touch. If the only virtue is making contact, then one doesn’t need classes, drill, or practice. Find a friend, armor up, and just whack away–it requires no art, no science to do that.
The point-in-line, again a subject of pointless (haha) debate among fencers, is a simple concept: if someone is pointing a sharp thing at one, then it behooves one to deal with the sharp thing first before trying to reach target. [2] Put another way, don’t run onto a sword. The line has priority, and thus ROW, because it is, again, rather silly to rush upon something sharp.
ROW as Pell
When historical fencers raise their hackles about ROW it is, nine times out of ten, not ROW they’re upset about but the ways in which their Olympic colleagues game it and/or misapply it. The examples of this are legion and cataloguing them of little value, so I’ll share two classics.
Exhibit A: Slappy Sabre
It would seem illogical that one could score by striking the strongest part of an opponent’s defense, but… one can. Thanks to the nature of the Olympic blade, a well-placed blow–yes, even with the s2000–can whip over the guard and hit. Because the rules allow any part of the blade to score, it’s irrelevant in the sport if one hits flat. This was a major problem in the 90s and one of the things that drove some of us out of competition–the choice was leave or adapt to the idiocy of some game divorced from fencing. Careers and more than one generous commercial deal were made this way.
It didn’t used to be like that. Before electric, before the director had to obey the box, they listened for the sound of steel or fabric, or the order they were in, and moreover, looked to see if a thrust was passe, that is, whether it had brushed against the target rather than sticking or slicing into it. The entire approach to sabre, even to how much of it is taught, exploited the disappearance of these critical nuances and does so still.
Exhibit B: Floppy Foil
Changes in timing within the box have helped, but a standout example from foil is the infamous “flick.” If one has ever held an actual smallsword or epee d’combat, one will realize instantly how insane this attack is. The argument for it was that it constituted an attack because the fencer had “forward momentum.” It was irrelevant that their blade might be pointed towards the sky or behind them.
Many of these flicks landed on the back and no one was turning tail, so… how an ostensibly rigid thrusting weapon should reach the back when no back was in view might have raised some doubts, but nope. Coaches and fencers eagerly adopted it and referees and rulebooks bent over willingly. For a time the language in the ruleset changed from “extended” arm to “extending” arm, a subtle but important distinction. [3]
It’s not just Making the Touch
Both “HEMA” and Olympic fencing struggle with poor understanding of what a touch means, and thus it’s little wonder they resemble one another more and more. There is a difference between making a touch at the right time and way and just merely making contact, however powerfully or “martially.” IF the goal is to fence as realistically as one can and/or in accordance with the principles that aimed to keep fencers of the past alive, then focus ought to be first on defense and second on reaching target without being hit oneself.
This changes how we fence. We attack less often or haphazardly; we’re more careful. It takes considerable effort and practice to do this at all, let alone well, for as I’ve blathered on and on about we feel safe and do this for fun. There is nothing wrong with fun–it’s maybe the best reason to fence. Likewise, it would be moronic not to fence safely, least in my country where legal and insurance reasons make not following safety protocols truly unwise choices.
This said, as a community we ought to focus a bit more on being honest about what it is we’re doing. If one is not concerned about being hit, only hitting, there are better and less expensive venues for living out sword and sorcery fantasies. You’ll get no judgement from me, I don’t kink shame. You be you and find like-minded consensual folks with whom to play. However, for so many in HEMA to insist upon a “martial” approach and then jump into the fray without any concern for protecting themselves and solely focus on getting the touch, whatever happens, is about as close to gaming the system in Olympic fencing as it gets.
ROW–Theory vs. Practice
Returning to ROW, the principles behind it are sound. They make sense, but importantly these ideas only work if one abides them, and, attempts to fence correctly. Playing to the director and/or judges, exploiting weaknesses in the rules, etc. are all part of fencing and have been for a long time, but one doesn’t have to fence that way. One can fence properly and in accordance with ROW–the problem is most people don’t, whether Olympic or HEMA. They want to win, not necessarily win and fence well, and too many people don’t realize that there is a difference. As I’ve commented more than once, one doesn’t need to fence expertly to win–if one knows the rules and how to massage them, if one is focused on making the touch at any cost, one can go super far.
Events like SabreSlash, in employing an interpretation of ROW, are raising the bar–appropriately–for competition in historical fencing. To anyone who understands ROW, and how it attempts to introduce the reality of the sharp point, most HEMA competitions look exceedingly poor. For all the time and effort HEMA players put in, the average skill level, if competitive bouts are any guide, is low. One reason for this is that too few fighters approach the bout with the logic ROW attempts to instill.
For colleagues in “HEMA,” learning to distinguish between theory and practice (exploiting rules, poor judging, etc.) will do a lot to lower one’s blood pressure. Learning to fence according to the logic of the sharp point will, if one works at it, improve one’s understanding and skill. [4] There is nothing to lose, and much to gain.
The Unexamined Training Regimen is not Worth Pursuing
ROW is not perfect. It’s just a concept meant to capture some of the reality behind fighting with actual swords. Like any theoretical framework it is subject to human foible, but this doesn’t mean that the core of ROW is silly–it isn’t. The whole point is first, not to be hit, and second, to strike the opponent in ways that minimize risk to oneself.
It’s difficult to understand why this would be such a point of contention in a pursuit like “historical martial arts.” It begs the question: why is it such a problem for some HEMA players? In this instance I think it perhaps comes down to being unable to reach the bar that events like SabreSlash present.
Looked at another way, many if not most of the directors that Barbasetti Military Sabre use are masters. They know more about fencing, and more about competitive fencing given their decades of experience, than most anyone competing. Some attendees have next to no experience outside of HEMA’s flawed rule-sets, and so stepping back, which is more likely, that a collection of masters with decades of experience are worthless, or, that the HEMA players whining are unhappy that their usual approach failed them? It is easier to cry foul than face the possibility that their training, years of hard work, and ability are flawed, that they may have in fact wasted considerable time and effort on poor interpretations and training.
My heart goes out to them, honestly, because that is a wretched place to land. They have a choice, though, and if anything it’s a harder one than facing the reality that their skill level is inferior, their years of training wasted. Anytime our sense of self is tied so intimately to training and where we believe ourselves to be with that training, we face two options. One, the easier and more popular choice, is to blame others, the ruleset, and seek communal support.
The other choice, is to step back from one’s sense of self, and examine the facts more objectively, to entertain the possibility that the real issue might be ourselves and not something else. It takes considerable strength to make this second choice, because if we intend to continue study it means starting over, at least in part, and acknowledging that some of the ideas and practices we’ve railed against for so long might, in fact, have merit that would have saved us from being in the very sport we’re in. It can be done. A good friend of mine, who started out in HEMA, faced this very situation and made the hard choice–he’s not only a better fencer now, but a happier one.
If I’ve learned one thing with these posts it’s that they are mostly a vox clamantis in deserto–my audience is extremely small and oddly enough, with less than five exceptions, comprised of European, East Asian, and South American readers. If anything I post here helps anyone, anywhere, even one person, then great. Site stats for this post have proved no exception to the handful o’ readers rule, which is too bad as I think this piece could help some HEMA players better understand ROW, and, what it might do for them, but as a teacher and fencing instructor I feel duty-bound to do what I can to help regardless of the actual impact it might have (its a lot like teaching freshman survey courses actually).
NOTES:
[1] USA Fencing Refereeing Handbook, Version 1. 2 (April 2012), 38.
[2] In Olympic fencing a proper point-in-line must be held at the right height, established before an opponent is in range, and is thus often a point of contention despite being a simple concept. In historical fencing, issues of when it is established aside, it doesn’t matter if that line is shoulder-height or not: if made in time, and projecting forward, then one must deal with that point. A surgeon likely wouldn’t ask the person spiked by such a line whether it was at the right height or not.
[3] For an old examination of the “extended” vs. “extending” arm, see JBT Emmons and Dennis Le, “The Difficulty of Judging an Attack in Modern Foil,” 2002, https://saladellatrespade.com/instructors/research-media/
[4] IF HEMA players understood the logic of the sharp point better, the issues they have with double-touches and the afterblow would be greatly reduced. Doubles are often a result of not paying attention or reacting to an attack incorrectly. The afterblow, as used in competitive HEMA anyway, is a way to exploit the rules–it’s the same as doubling out in epee. Get one point ahead, then double or afterblow and win the match. It’s smart gaming, but not good fencing.
Capitale Escrime Historical Fencing 
Hey Jim-
Great piece of explanatory writing here. Your comments about the problems with the motion sensing in electric saber brought back some memories. One of my oldest friends was competing for UCSD when we were at UCSB. He went on to specialize in saber with Vladimir Nazylmov in Kansas. That was right before Mr. Nazylmov headed up to Ohio State. He had quite a few stories about the problems with the capteur.
My own competitive career was haunted by the foil flick; I recall one USFA match I attended in the Midwest and the resident young stud in foil lived by them. He scored three hits on the back of my right shoulder even after a solid parry. I finally started circling out in sixte so far as to look goofy, but it messed up his flick shots. In retrospect, I might have stuck with competition longer if I had switched to epee: no ROW interpretation needed.
JB
P.S. Was that Denis you were referencing in the longsword example?
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JB!!! The capteur was a serious pain in the backside. The idea wasn’t horrible, but the technology left a bit to be desired. Jon Tarantino and I electrified two sabres mocked up with schlager blades, the only reasonable facsimiles to historical blades at the time, and they worked fine, in fact, they solved most of the issues (grounding wires, faulty accelerometers aside).
No, Dennis lives up near me, about an hour away, but still fences a bit when he can. The chap in question I’m not sure you met, but it’s the same sabreur I just mentioned, Jon Tarantino.
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utter trash, you as all of Hema fail to understand why ROW or Priority can never work as a ruleset, don’t get me wrong afterblow is no better. The fundamental assumption that anyone but you is at fault for getting hit is paramount to any discussion of what historical fencing should be about. ROW falls apart if we briefly examine what happens to someone advance lunging an opponent in a properly formed Tierce or Quarte position, regardless of the attack made you will get skewered on their point. Congrats! ROW awarded you a point for jumping in first and not getting hit on the way, you are still dead if the swords were sharp. Frankly ROW is a nice concept but can’t ever work in a setting where any stakes are put on winning. Count no touch you made while getting hit regardless of who had priority or stop using the word art when you talk about fencing!
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Hi Florian,
A better way to introduce yourself, and one more likely to get a polite response in turn, is to start with “hello” rather than a fiery statement of disagreement. Here’s an example:
“Hi Florian, I read your post and found it interesting. With regard to [insert subject here] I take a different view….”
Just a thought. Now, to your point.
IF you read that post, and if you’ve read any of the others were I discuss ROW, then you “should” have noticed the caveats I usually mention. My take is this: ROW, as a concept, is fine in that it dictates that a decent attack should put the defender on defense. That is logical. Works for boxing, fencing, lots of things.
ROW tends to break down in two major ways. The first way is that ROW, say as Olympic fencing defines it, allows for off-target strikes. This allows people to game ROW with blunts in ways they would never do with sharps.
The second way, is just really bad interpretations/use of ROW. This we see pretty much anywhere, Oly or historical, and it comes down to a failure to understand the primacy of the sharp point or edge. This is the one thing, the most important thing, that ROW does correctly: if something sharp is racing toward you, then defend.*
Why does it break down? There are likely a few reasons, but one is that there is a gulf between what people claim to be doing, in our case doing their best to fence as “realistically” as possible, and, winning pools, bouts, and competitions. In most any tournament if not all, the very nature of competition means that people will game the rules. People want to win, and no one, so far, has started giving out medals to the handful of people who actually fence well, but lose thanks either to daft rule-sets or even dafter judges or both.
Your second to last statement–“count no touch you made while getting hit regardless of who had priority” is half right: but what about that idiot who decided they’d just counter instead of defend themselves? What about that guy? Why are we rewarding a stupid response? You’re just placing bias on getting hit _period_ rather than not fencing like an idiot. NO one should be rewarding the counter-attacker as automatically as most HEMA tournaments and rule-sets do. It’s ridiculous.
IF these were sharp, which is the smarter action:
–counter-attack because one is being attacked irrespective of distance, tempo, or how well covered they are in that attacks,
OR
–defend oneself by parrying, breaking distance, etc.?
That latter is smarter, more conservative, and far less likely to get BOTH people hit. Why HEMA thinks both people getting hit is a good idea and something to reward is baffling. It’s stupid. If someone is thick enough to make a bad counterattack rather than parry, they should be punished for it–how else will they learn not to do it? Whenever I’ve asked people about this, I get the same weird answer: “People doubled in the past.” Uh, yes… but they weren’t supposed to! To double is to fail, and sorry, that is not always on the attacker–in the case I am discussing here, and in the post you read, I’m talking the people who always counterattack rather than defend.
You don’t have to take my word for it—you can read Liancour (among others) where he discusses counter-attacks as something fine for the salle, but super dangerous in actual combat.
*Above I mentioned that one should defend if attacked. That is baseline. However, there are times when a counter-attack is less stupid than those we tend to see in the HEMA-verse. IF the opponent’s attack is bad, say if they start too early, if they are too slow to develop it, or if they are grossly uncovered, then the defender in this case can take advantage of the tempo there to make a counterattack, but! they should only do so IF they can make that counterattack AND then defend. IF they do, then they can hit the attacker twice. I know this because I do it all the time, and, did in competition, yes, even shitty electric sabre when it started, not that did anything but make me feel better.
If the attack is good, if it’s made at the right time, from the right distance, and the attacker hasn’t exposed themselves, then don’t-fucking-counter-attack. Parry, then hit them.
If this doesn’t make sense, let me know, because I am more than happy to show you how this works or provide textual support.
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granted its not nice, but it gets the discussion going, sorry if you took it to heart 😀
I think the sentence: counter attacks are for the salle but not the streets is the essential takeaway.
I somewhat disagree with the sentiment of always going for a parry as a defense. A quick look at other weapons or martial arts (yes fencing is a martial art) shows that a threat of a counter attack is defense, be the counter passive (e.g. tierce, point in line, ochs, longpoint, quarte, a bladed stance or a turned foot ready to deliver a roundhouse kick). Launching any attack without securing the opponents means of attack is dangerous and should be answered with a counter attack. In education because it teaches that your attack was not safe and as such competition should mirror this.
Since I sound like a sword boomer already anyhow I am going a step further and: tournaments are useless if they can be gamed and are not a measurement of skill but rather ability to adapt to a ruleset. If you need to limit an art to be able to compete, than whats the point of training it after all?
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Hi Florian,
Not so much took it to heart as just want to encourage polite discourse—I live in the U.S. and that is something we, apparently, have forgotten how to do (to our detriment). I’m thrilled you responded and happier still for the discussion—it’s a good one!
I don’t think one should always go for a parry, but that it should be first on one’s mind when on defense. As I tried to explain, there are opportunities to counteract, many in fact, it’s just that most people do it _automatically_ rather than think of a blocking defense. As you say, and as your examples illustrate, a counterattack _is_ a defensive response, but it’s a dangerous one and so requires attention to nuances too often ignored.
When it comes to attacking only after having secured or mitigated the opponent’s means of attack, I am in complete agreement. IF we do that correctly, they shouldn’t be able to counterattack successfully, and we should be in far less danger as we go to attack (the attack being arguably the most dangerous moment in a bout—we leave a place of security and invade the opponent’s area of security). And, further, you’re correct—it is precisely when someone hasn’t managed to protect themselves on the way to attack that a counterattack makes perfect sense. I still maintain that one is safest doing so with a tempo to make that counterattack and then parry-riposte, but if all one does is counterattack and stop the attack, great.
Alas, yes. One of the sorrows for me with HEMA is watching how poorly competitions regulate all this and assign clout to victors who have won within a flawed system. I didn’t like it when it was happening in the 1990s in Olympic sabre and foil, so to see the same stupidity again is pretty depressing.
When I say that tourney medals do not equal what most people think they do, this is what I mean—if I win a tournament relying on poor attacks, doubles to lessen my opponent’s attacks, etc., what exactly have I won? I beat a ruleset—that isn’t fencing, that’s just knowing those particular rules. As you say, what is the point of all this training, of trying to approach it like a martial art, if we then throw all that out of the window just to win a trophy? Not much.
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I guess we got that going now then haha
I see your logic and I agree with it. My viewpoint simply lies more on the attacker, as they are the one initiating and therefore, in my eyes, are at “fault” for a double in this situation. Of course it’s not seen that way in most rulesets, which is probably down to judges wanting fast reliable ways to get through a bout.
The question is how to fix this and keep HEMA comps alive. No one winning medals right now is willing to reflect on this as, well they are winning so why should they… As a judge and fencer I think about this though and do not yet have an answer. Longsword suffers less from it, in part I guess because it hurts more and the incentive to not get hit is bigger to begin with. Just increasing weapon weight or stiffness is no solution though as its seriously dangerous after a point.
As you say, the rulesets need to consider the realities otherwise fencing as an art falls apart. The two most promising ideas I saw regarding this where at a tournament in Paris in January and in a tournament run by a Kendo school. Paris basically had afterblow but only to invalidate a hit and with a very tight afterblow tempo, in addition the winner was the first with 3 points or the first to score after the time had passed. It changed how everyone fenced immediately and people started to be way more cautious of any action without control over their opponent, however the time limit still allowed people to game. Kendo then has an interesting dynamic in that only if you hit the target with the appropriate technique (the list is to long to go into here, its a fun read though if you have never watched Kendo before 🙂 ). In addition first to two points wins and both can score in an exchange. So you get a bout in which there is some leniency but if you double once then its all on the line. It had the very nice effect of people only ever doubling once per bout and showing that its really equally bad for both.
The takeaway from this I guess is HEMA will become more sport than martial art and its unavoidable. However even so rulesets that keep the martial identity it has alive are possible
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“counter attacks are for the salle but not the streets”
I get the underlying idea here, but I just couldn’t resist….”street” fencing? I guess I better sharpen up my schlager blades in case this becomes a thing.
JB
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Lol Jon, that was a good one. So, in theory, what separates historical fencing from Olympic etc. is a) reliance on the sources and b) a goal for greater realism.
It’s the second aspect Florian and I were discussing—there’s a lot of debate within historical fencing, especially with competitive rule-sets—about what best represents “realism.”
None of this is meant to encourage actual fighting with swords. There are some infamous groups who do that, but the handful of these nuts tend to be right-wing ultranationalists, which kind of fits their idiocy.
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Oh yes, important part. In case that wasn’t clear I condone fencing with sharps. It’s unnecessarily dangerous and only serves to fuel toxic male ego. I do not care for Mensurfechten or anything fraternities (is that the word in english?) do to get a gash on the face….although some Longsword tournaments I have been to would manage that just fine with masks and training swords.
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