Dragaera

Swords, and a tolerable acquaintance with their length

Joshua Kronengold mneme at io.com
Sat Aug 17 10:05:16 PDT 2002

Steven Brust writes:
>At 09:52 AM 8/16/2002 -0500, Joshua Kronengold wrote:
>>[um.  I'm a historical and classical fencer with a fair amount of
>>training.  I'll try to explain and/or footnote any terminlogy I use,
>>but I may miss some. ]
>>The initial problem is that, as far as modern terminology is
>>concerned. Vlad doesn't fight with a rapier [1].  He's constantly talking
>>about parry-ripostes, stop cuts, and a bunch of things you can't, or
>>shouldn't do with a rapier
>That's odd.  I've done all of those repeatedly with a rapier in 
>stage-combat classes and informal duels.

Oh, sure -- they work fine, depending on your simulator and
circumstances.  (and stop-cuts work, they're just pretty slow).  But
parry-ripostes, while they can work, were known about by pretty much
all the historical masters...and recommended against as too dangerous
-- there's just too much chance that your opponent will replace their
point when you're riposting.

>The real answer to his question is that he is paying too much attention to 
>the cover, fer chrissakes.  It is a *wonderful* cover, but attempting to 
>translate that kind of detail from text to cover is just asking to be confused.

<grin> This makes a lot of sense, yes, even if the flashstones
contribute to the idea that we're in the Dragaeran Renniscance.

>As for why Vlad uses techniques with a rapier that, in fact, were not 
>developed during the historical period on Earth when the rapier was in use, 

As above, they were -- they were just dicouraged because the weapon
didn't really do them very well.  

>I will only say that there is a reason, and that this is one of the things 
>I had figured out before I wrote the first word of the first story about Vlad.
>Clue: In college, I was a sabre-man as well as doing a lot of stage combat.

Hmm.  I got this impression of both you and Vlad (that he's clearly
studied Sabre, and says so), but am not sure how that reflects on
things.
Hmm.

>My definition of "rapier" includes the sort of weapon in general use in 
>France and England from about 1600-1650, 

Cool.  The kind that Elizabeth's laws said couldn't be more than 36
inches long on penalty of the end being cut off? 

>a weapon originally developed to 
>kill people in plate armour, but gradually modified as armour fell out of 
>use because too many armored men were being killed by assholes with rapiers.

Historical falacy, I think, or at least incomplete -- the Spado de
Lato (er, the Itallian sidesword) -was- an arming sword meant to be
used against people in armor, was a cut and thrust (rather than the
rapier's thrust and cut) weapon, was used in both civilian and
military combat (and was what Di Grassi was writing for, IIRC;
translations of his "spada" as "rapier" were later) (though not,
AFAIK, against full plate); I don't know of a connection between that
and the thrusting weapons developed for use against people in heavy
armor much earlier -- such certainly existed, but they -seem- to me to
be on a different evolutionary tree [but this is somewhat past my
knowledge], and was developed by the Italians into the rapier, a
civilian-only weapon intended to be used against unarmored opponents,
in a period where most people didn't wear armor except in battle.



-- 
     Joshua Kronengold (mneme at io.com) "I've been teaching |\      _,,,--,,_  ,)
--^--him...to live, to breathe, to walk, to sample the   /,`.-'`'   -,  ;-;;'  
  /\\joy on each road, and the sorrow at each turning.   |,4-  ) )-,_ ) /\     
/-\\\I'm sorry if I kept him out too late"--Vlad Taltos '---''(_/--' (_/-'