Clips from Richard Marsden's Polish Saber seminar, 19 July 2015
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- Опубликовано: 13 авг 2015
- The seminar was given by the co-founder and principal instructor of the Phoenix Society of Historical Swordsmanship and hosted by the Blood & Iron historical martial arts school in New Westminster, BC, Canada (Greater Vancouver area).
In this video you'll see a few excerpts from the seminar, with demonstrations of attacks, parries, footwork and overall strategy. The footage was recorded and uploaded with the instructor's permission. I added captions to make it easier to understand what is being said despite the limited audio quality.
** Where to get his book if you want to learn more about Polish saber fencing **
US:
www.amazon.com/gp/product/0984...
Canada:
www.amazon.ca/gp/product/09847...
UK:
www.amazon.co.uk/Polish-Saber-...
More about Richard Marsden and his HEMA school:
www.worksofrichardmarsden.com
www.phoenixswordclub.com/
/ swordpals
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My favorite online store for buying swords (worldwide shipping):
ww4.aitsafe.com/go.htm?go=kult...
Some recommended knife makers on Amazon:
www.amazon.com/s/?_encoding=UT...
Want to help fund future videos?
/ skallagrim
My Facebook page:
/ skallagrimyt
This guy is legit. Informative and entertaining. Good teacher.
Xarko
Yes, absolutely..
Xarko Thanks! Don't tell anyone but, I'm a teacher by profession, so I've had over a decade of experience doing that every day all day!
Xarko But......, but its a trap!!!
Nice, I'd like to see more on Saber fencing. After all, it's an art that lived up to the 20th century. Even some shorter types like the cutlass, very popular in sea battles
There are lots of treatises on various saber fencing, and it all has a different 'flavor' to it. Cutlass, for example, is usually found in military drill books- so not much on details.
However, DA Kinsely's book, Blades of the British Empire has tons of first hand accounts of such things. Worth a read if you can find it.
Techniques he presented look so elegant, graceful and fluid. I may be biased because I'm Pole, but I think the overall aesthetics of this particular sword and fighting style can be universally appreciated.
CrazyChemistPL I made this book partially to bring YOUR culture and ideas and history to an English speaking audience. I have much respect for your country and its history.
Richard Marsden I must say, I never expected reply from the author himself. I feel... well, I think "honored" is, bluntly, a little too big of a word in this situation, but let's just say it was very nice to read your reply.
Skallgrim's fans deserve attention! If you're in Poland look up Silk Fencing, find Yurek, tell him Richard sent you.
Richard Marsden Thank you very much for the information. However, right now my interest, for various reasons I don't want to bore you with, has to be limited to theoritical, technical and historic aspect, not the actual practice, but who knows what future will bring.
Also, I'm fairly new fan to be honest. Came pretty much by accident, random video suggested by youtube, stayed because I enjoyed overall content and the work Skall does to debunk some long lasting myths.
Richard Marsden youre the instructor ? Youre an awesome guy and I wish we had something like this near me in germany ! Keep your good work up !
It's really amazing that the most traditional Polish fighting style with the most traditional Polish weapon has enthusiasts over on your side of the globe. As a Pole I feel really happy and proud of that fact. Btw. If you are interested in some more in depth, practical and historical info about the Polish Szabla, (as well as many other types of sabers, swords and martial arts in general) look up some books by Wojciech Zabłocki. (the english wikipedia page is quite limited, but I'm sure you can find more detailed info about him and his achievements and books).
Cheers from Poland, and keep up the great work.
I liked the captions, they were helpful and funny.
P.S. and the admiral Ackbar insertion was a very nice touch!
Zombigotron or not, it may have been a tarp
Awesome Dude "Don't mind me, I'm just a random fish, here for the lols."
Zombigotron it made it worth watching twice
The deeper you go, the better
6:35 Poles called it "Cięcie Eunusze (Eunuch Cut)" :D
Many thanks, hehe for obvious reasons lol
Leaves nothing to the imagination.
Love it
I really liked the way he was talking on this one. Much more down to earth and relaxed. Thanks for sharing Skall! :)
+John Sia I really like the way you commented on this comment. Much more down to earth and chill. Thanks for commenting John:)
John Sia i really like the way you commented on this video. Very down to earth and chill. Thanks for commenting John :)
Badger With A Troubled Past And Nothing To Lose i really like the way you commented on this video. Very down to earth and chill. Thanks for commenting Badger :)
What the hell is going on? Lmao!
I really like the way my boot fits in all of your asses. Very down to earth and chill. Thanks for the lunch money....NERDS!
*runs away*
I'm a self taught HEMA practitioner and what makes me happy with watching these is seeing that in places where Ive put my own spin on things, in other words things I was too lazy to look up or fact check, I ended up having built up a technique backed style. I.e. foot placement and strike body alignment. I guess it just shows what's comfortable is usually (note I said usually) what will work best because you can do it the easiest and typically the quickest.
I've lost it at Admiral Akbar. Damn Skall, your little commentary have made my day! :)
No matter the domain or field, I find people who know their stuff incredibly engaging.
Ive been looking for lectures/ seminars about Polish sabre fencing for quite some time now, thank you for uploading its a huge resource to have :)
SuperMoviebuster I have a book out that may really meet your needs. Check it out in the description. Sienawski does stuff as well, but not really geared towards English speakers.
Looks like it was a great seminar!!
I am seriously tempted to put my life on pause for a year or two and go study Polish saber...
What an elegant style of fighting, its like a dance when done quick. I love Polish saber fencing:D
And a big applause for Richard Marsden, Looks like a great teacher who really has a way of innovating people, its hard not too listen to him especially because of the humor he brings along:)
He's the type of guy i would want to have pizza with
Joshua Brown One pizza for you when you end up in Phoenix.
Just make sure to order the pizza unsliced, so he can do it
That was really enjoyable. Well done to Richard Marsden. Thank you for sharing this, Skall!
Lots of interesting stuff again, especially the techniques showcasing how to use that specific blade shape to your advantage. Thanks again Skall and Richard for all the nice footage.
GT-Alex Thank you for watching!
Thanks for the upload Skall and thank you Richard Marsden, that was very interesting.
And this is a point when I'm proud of Polish swordsmiths.
Kłamca Liar!
Mateusz K. Still better to belive me than politics, but who care?
Kłamca one of the few things you have these days...
Yay, finally a reason to be proud I'm polish xD
dylank10101 Really? Copernicus,Sklodowska,Banach or Wilczek sound familiar to you?
Those who fixate on the beard, are just letting their guards down for when the mustache strikes.
love these kind of videos, very fun and informative!
Nice! Very Informative, very fun! Glad you could be there, Skall!
Love the caption because I am Deaf. Thanks a lot. Would be very nice if you do the same for others like you explained why viking swords were designed with pommel and crossguard that way.
"Attacking the sword is risky"
Yeah... kept making that mistake the first time I tried longsword sparring, which was only during my first class with the weapon.
Still, this makes me want to learn more about Polish sabre now. Just a shame there aren't any clubs near me that teach it. Ah, well. This was informative and fun to watch.
"It's a trap."
This looked like a great seminar, thanks for sharing. :)
These polish sabre tecnics are very special, it is amazing
I find Polish Saber to be much more challenging than longsword. Though the satisfaction is bigger when it works out :)
Richard is a natural teacher! Very friendly and engaging.
Captions were great. loved this vid. Great attitude
awesome video Skall! loved it. it looks a lot like fma. can't wait to try this out.
added this to my favorites, thank you!
Amazing! Please, don't stop sending this kind of videos *-*
yeah awesome video! more of these please! :) I think no one can become good sword fighter with just these videos but they sure give inspiration to join some sword fighting schools etc :D keep up the good work
It's nice that you subbed it, because I'm not a native english speaker, and as nice as this guy looked, I couldn't figure anything out of what he was saying before
Amazing video. It's so hard to find anything about Polish saber online. It's probably my favorite curved sword! :D
Hey Skall/Richard
Do you have any recommendation over which sabres to buy if I am starting to go into military sabre swordmanship.
I personally admire the 1796 pattern light cavalry but the only one who are making these is Coldsteel, and apparently they sucked
I suggest to make the seminar on The Hussaria - the most effective tactical formation ever.
it's not his speciality, he is clearly ficused on hences.
Good captions ;)
For the Europeans, Jerzy Miklaszewski (from Poland) and Ties Kool will give a workshop on Polish saber at the International Lowlands HEMA Gathering in the Netherlands in september.
Hans Hanszoon Jerzy helped extensively with my book! Go see them!
Good information. Thank you for the upload.
Mr. Marsden seems like and excellent instructor. Thanks for sharing.
I bought a szabla and used all the moves he showed before watching him. Like it just came naturally. Good teacher.
awesome instructor very entertaining for viewers and informative for students.
love these vids.hope they improve my game
i love these new videos
does anyone know where you can get the practice sticks they were using at the very end?
Looks great Richard!!! We should organize a Polish saber fencing seminar!
Damn, I never realized how similar chinese (wong long) saber/dao can be to european saber. it's awesome!
Greetings from Poland :) Really great seminar. Thanks!!
Necro Travia Thanks for watching. My efforts are to bring Polish culture to an English speaking world with my book and seminars. You guys are already well taken care of! Thanks for watching and much respect!
Richard Marsden You sir should be granted an indygenat!
Too bad it's not a thing any more...
Thanks much!
Some of tactics and moves with Polish saber you can find here on: sieniawskifencing.
This has to be a very fun way to learn
Not gonna lie, those instructors seem pretty cool and fun to be around. Certainly not boring and he does a good job at letting the students be active with him.
Hopefully your channels brings back awesome sword fighting into the real world.
I know it's quite old video, but thanks for Polish accent, I enjoyed!
Excuse me where can I get the exactly same swords they are using?
Can you make a video on your thoughts on the game Chivalry medieval warfare?
I am from Edmonton Alberta and I am very interested in taking a seminar from mr. Marsden. When is his next seminar and where would be the closest place to me I could attend one and how much would it cost me?
Thanks for the integrated subtitles! This way you're sure you've understood everything.
"It's a trap" :D
thanks for the subtitles
Shame I'm in the UK we only have clubs that do JUST longsword or JUST Epee or JUST sabre etc. So it's a little limited, also riding a motorcycle with a sword on my back isn't the most fun so I can't travel much. Richard seems like a great teacher, loving the socks.
love it when im randomly browsing youtube and see my old history teacher with a large weapon, and the expertise to back it up. lol
Kody Anderson Hello! Small world our internet is.
its amazing as an sports sabre fencer to see the classic origins of many of our cuts and parries. especially the open guard to head parry riposte to head or chest is actually one of my favourite attacks, the only difference is i cant grab an opponent.
Aww sabers. My favorite, especially since they still leave my other hand open for a pistol. This is the 21st century after all.
Jesse Sisolack playing dirty :v
(actually, Poles also used pistols in XVII century, just not in a duel ;p)
BrianDMS If I want a fair fight, I will go to a boxing ring.
I could listen to Richard all day. :D
I assume this was used in an environment/era where people didn't really wear heavy armors. Or are there techniques for sabres (or for sword made for cutting in general) to use against armored opponents?
Informative and entertaining is right!
Would it be possible to do these techniques with a straighter sword, like an english backsword or british military sabre, or would these require a dedicated cutter? It seems like balance is an important factor in some of the techniques, and straighter swords are usually balanced such that they can cut or thrust roughly equally well.
Ryan Cauffman Some yes, some no.
We cover in the full seminar techniques specific to the curve. That reverse moulinet to the under-side of the hand for example does not work as well with a straight blade. That cut turned so the point hits the top of the head also doesn't work with a straight blade. The parries are different as well. With a curved blade you need to parry a bit differently to prevent the opponent from 'going around' your weapons, which you don't need to do if you're both using straighter swords.
Deflects, beats, a hanging parry- that's all fine with a straight sword.
***** Do you have clips with polearms training? Halberd, staff or scythe? I would love to see some "flashy" movements with this type of weapon.
Mr2Helios Scholagladiatoria does for sure if Skal doesn't. I don't think you'll find much in the way of scythe fencing though. It never really was a 'thing'. As much as I'd love to embrace my inner Dark Knight /Reaper, it's not and was never designed to be a weapon. (there ARE in fact treatises for scythes but few ever actually practiced. It was more or less a pastime for rich nobles who had the time to spare)
Disquoveri scythes kind of transfer to crows beaks in weapon form, so i'd say every polearm with a crows beak (angeled spike) takes a bit there right?
+Disquoveri maybe he was referring to the Polish war scythes, which are basically a reverse sharpened glaive.
Well now we're just talking semantics :P
I am curious now about these polish war scythes...
Disquoveri Look up "kosynierzy" on wiki (in Polish means "combat-scythe users")
0:49 does advance refer to a lunge or a simple step?
Good stuff! I would love to hear this guy's opinion on some of Polish movie depiction of sabre fighting e.g. "Fire in the steppe", "The deluge", "With fire and sword".
(Bit of advice - it's not "Star-zewski" - "rz" is one sound, similar to how you pronounce "j" in French (e.g. "je" in "je ne sais pa"). "Stah-'je'-vski".))
Cool video Skall! Does anyone know how to get into polish saber in particular? I usually watch Skall for the German longsword but this looks really interesting.
william mcgregor In the description there is a link to my book which has history, sources, our interpretation and where to get gear.
Cool af. Are you going to make another video about the topic? Your thoughts?
where can i get curved steel training sabre. wehnt all over the internet cant find one :( anyone help please
also looking for one - on most of the reproductions the CoB is way to forward among other things
Oooh I quite like seeing Richard talking. Have to find more videos...! :)
The other day i just realised there is a HEMA club like a 10 min ride away and im kinda intrested in trying to join now :P. Do you need your own blades and masks? Also is it only 18+ or could you get away being 16 . Great vid skall this was very intresting
What brand of Sabre is Richard using?
Great vid, great instructor!
I wonder if on the cross cut, while you are inside after nocking the opponent's blade to the side, if instead of a full true edge cut you could throw a snap cut with a sharpened false edge like he mentioned prior.
Really Cool, I know here in germany by me was a lot about swordfighting,still where I love I dont have anything like that..I wish I could learn those stuff too !
Dużo naszych... :P Skall, i see that you have a lot of Polish fans and viewers. :D
how do i get the wrist flexibility for the backwards moulinets?
+Girthicus Maximus Practice. Alot.
Stretch. The same movement is very apparent in Filipino martial arts which focus on dualwielding two medium length blades, and wrist flexibility is very important.
Hay Richard!If You like Poland XVII look writer Jacek Komuda.You are OK. Do You know when Your book ,,Polish sabre'' will be trnslate on polish language?Greetings
Hello! Just wanted to ask: is holding two weapons in one hand ever useful? Thanks. Interesting video.
Mewcroft two weapons in one hand? Erh... first of all, you'd probably only able to manage that with a tiny one.
Mewcroft Very rarely. I can think of a historical sword and buckler technique where you transfer your sword to your buckler hand up close. That's about it unless I'm spacing on something else.
But does he ave his own channel to post every class?
Interesting to see how it translates to La Canne as well utilizing the back edge as one would use for a back cut. We see this as well in Bowie. Since Bowie knife fighting is modified Sabre
is there this stuff for beginners?
Both side sharp!
I've been hunting these three words for months, commenting and asking questions unnecessarily :)
This gu...Man is truly awesome. I´ve learned couple of things myself.
6:38 Germans called it Hellish Polish Fourth
Very tight space... Very informative video too, hes also chill so its even entertaining to watch.
Elias Reiniat Very tight! You can see me glance back at the mirror I was afraid to hit! Thanks for watching!
Finally ! Thank You !
Michał Przybyłowicz No, thank you. I do hope I can bring Polish culture to the English speaking world.
Good luck. Nice to see, that someone from west is interested in our culture.
Could I ask, why? This is very rare thing.
My book talks about it. It's a strange story in which I sort of fell into it. I also grew up with a Polish girl in the long ago of my fencing days.
This was done on my birthday. Really cool!
Elliott Long Happy Birthday!
fishing for birthday comments? lol
Happy birthday :D
Elliott Long Happy B day!
Thanks guys! Finally 21 as of 19/7/2015. will I have hit the bottle, it's only in small amounts, and very spread out.
This HEMA stuff is amazing! IT"S A TRAP!!!! LOL Awesome stuff,Skall.
superb!
Man, i could watch this for hours and i would love a movie with fighting like this shown realistically...
Polish production "Born for the saber" is that kind of thing. It's being made by the people, who's daily job is to train and teach different styles of fencing, they also claim that they recreated Polish "cross cut" saber style fencing...
one handed increased to 21
Wow! Awesome instructor.
Hey Skall, it would be awesome if you made a video talking about dual wielding, if and how it would be practical/effective IRL compared to how it's portraid on movies and series.
Great channel BTW :)
gabriel M I might be able to help.
We do have accounts and SOME techniques for dual-wielding.
farm8.staticflickr.com/7313/9754581413_ab08e9c171.jpg
Agrippa
www.enworld.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=66496&d=1422128619&thumb=1
Not sure
4.bp.blogspot.com/-DEpzco2RjYU/UZwntirqz3I/AAAAAAAAALU/2i7V6Qu3LMk/s320/di+Grassi+-+case+of+rapiers.jpg
Digrassi
Note in all how they keep them apart.
Rapier and dagger was very common, but when most people say dual wielding they usually mean two swords of the same lengths. We do have examples and things to be aware of.
They tangle up, so keeping them apart was the advice of some. Though if I call Gunderodt showed otherwise. My memory isn't serving me well.
They aren't practical. Imagine walking around town with two.
Most people didn't know how to do it. We have an example that Alfred Hutton cited of two men forced to duel with two, couldn't, switched to one, and were both exiled for their troubles.
Hope this helps.
10/10 video editing.
とてもためになるレッスンだ！
私には早口すぎて聞き取れないから字幕に感謝しています…
Quick question: What if you and your opponents have different dominant hands? (Like if you are left handed and your opponent is right handed which causes your blades to be mirrored/on the same side)
Chamyo Wang That does change things a bit. More so with two-handed weapons. Treatises sometimes give advice on what to do about lefties, or what to expect.
A quick example.
A left handed person will be likely to throw left to right strikes, while a right handed person is likely to throw right to left.
But that isn't always the case since both parties can cut from either direction.
Richard Marsden
Okay, following up on that answer: Would the same techniques that work on a right-handed vs right-handed (or left-handed) work the same way against an opponent with the opposite strong hand than yours?
Some yes, some no.
A cross-cut doesn't matter, but you can't do a reverse moulinet because they are on the 'wrong' side of you.
Hand to hand plays can be trickier as well, though not impossible.
We'd have to go through each play and try it out and see how much change (if any) is needed.
Are you a lefty or fighting one?
Richard Marsden
Sorry for the late reply, but I am fighting a left-handed opponent.
OK!
In single-sword systems it's not radically different.
Try working his outside rather than in and practicing that.
Good luck!
polish saber usually has a ring for the thump,do they have any purpose or they are just for protection
Bảo Long Đỗ Đình They do offer some protection but the real advantage is leverage in the grip. Once you try it out and perform a moulinet you can assuredly feel it!
Hey Skall I have a question. How would a sword be repaired in medieval times?
josh rodriguez I might be able to answer this one.
A guy called Oakshott categorized swords. He was a hobbyist who, because he's the only one to really do it, became the defacto standard people label their swords. When he first collected he said he assumed swords were special items, treasured and well-cared for. After decades of collecting he changed his mind, he said the things were disposable, with whole buckets of them being tossed into rivers at times.
So, we have some evidence from him that swords were as likely to be tossed as repaired because they were plentiful.
Then we have some counter-evidence that this wasn't always the case. We have samples of rapiers that are in fact longswords! Or they were, but the owners shaved down the blades.
If there are any smiths reading this, they can tell you more about what is currently hard and easy when it comes to repairs or maybe Skall knows!
Great question.
Richard Marsden Thanks for the answer man.