The stillness that isn’t still - Cornelius Berthold

Here is your dose of fencing theory musings for the weekend: Ridolfo Capo Ferro explains his tempo theory by distinguishing between movement and stillness. Indeed, imagining the phases between fencing actions as pauses makes sense to gain an understanding of what happens in a fight in temporal terms. However, as soon as one increases the speed (or rather: frequency?) of actions, it becomes clear that coming to a stop can be a hindrance to follow-up actions. By using a limited set of actions by Fabris, both from an on-guard position and from proceeding with resolution, we will see how we can make the stillness between actions vanish - or almost so.
About the instructor: Cornelius Berthold started Olympic sabre fencing in 2004 and soon found into HEMA. He teaches sword & buckler according to MS I.33, and Italian rapier according to the tradition of Salvator Fabris at DIMICATOR Schola in Hamburg. He prefers The Expanse over Star Wars.
In historical fencing or HEMA (for Historical European Martial Arts) we reconstruct sword fighting systems from historical sources. Our club focuses on Italian medieval and renaissance sources, fencing with the Spadone (Two-Handed Sword), Spear, Sidesword (One-Handed Sword) together with Shield, Cape, Dagger, you name it!
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[@SchildwachePotsdam]

Cornelius talks German for the first 5 minutes, but I added subtitles for that bit. After that he switches to English. Enjoy!

[@Davlavi]

Great lecture

[@MartinGreywolf]

This is practically identical to footwork Thibault has you do, only with a weirder stance... well, not weirder, Thibault has a really weird stance himself, just weird in a distinct way. This is especially ironic since Thibault has an entire chapter dedicated to throwing shade at Fabris specifically.

[@JaredThorlakson]

That was what occurred to me as well. The tempo is broken into the part that doesn't commit you and the part that does.

[@DimicatorSchola]

@@JaredThorlakson In a sense yes, but at the same time, every action is a tempo in itself (hence the breaking up in the first place) and, therefore, it requires commitment. Even preparatory movements can be countered, so they need the same degree of care, strictly speaking.

[@MoshHewson]

There is a humourous amount of similar ideas, done mechanically different, between Thibault and Fabris