Couple of weekends ago I had the honor of being a ring director/judge and instructor for Lord Baltimore’s Challenge, a fantastic historical fencing event that gets a fantastic crossover between HEMA fencers and SCA Rapier fencers.

One of the classes I taught was entitled Random Acts of Violence. This explored all the… more unique plays and plates I’ve stumbled across during my studies.

While there are “bread and butter” players found repeatedly in the Franco-Italian-inspired fencing systems, sometimes you run into plays that are weird, different, or very unique. These are a collection of some those plays, including weird engagements, mismatch weapons forms, and two-handing the rapier.

These drills are listed as Student/Coach roles, however, they can be done by two fencers as training partners. They should switch roles after a pre-determined amount of time or reps.

You can download a PDF of these plays here.

Strange Engagements

Johann Daniel l’Ange |Plate 46… aka “Stop Stabbing Yourself”

STUDENT	COACH
	Attacks in seconda from below on the inside line.
Parries with a very strong crossing over the coach’s weapon.
Pushes down against the debole of the coach’s blade with the strong of their own, while reaching for the forte of the coach’s blade with their open off hand, while taking a passing step.
	Receives hit in abdomen.

The coach’s blade should be turned in back toward the coach. This works better if the blades are shorter; if the coach uses a very long blade, the student is more likely to stab the coach in the thigh. The offhand and student’s blade work in tandem to redirect the coach’s blade back toward the coach’s body.

This could also be turned into a standard disarm by twisting the coach’s hand from pronation to supination (quarta position).

Johann Daniel l’Ange |Counter to Plate 46

STUDENT	COACH
Attacks in seconda from below on the inside line.
	Parries with a very strong crossing over the coach’s weapon, and begins reaching for the forte of the student’s blade.
Withdraws sword by pulling it back or performing a yielding parry into a circular movement to present the point back at the coach. They do this while performing a passing step of their own and grasping the forte of the coach’s sword.
	Yields or receives hit to torso.

The yielding parry here would be toward the outside line of the student, similar to a parry seven in Italian dueling saber.

Charles Besnard |Countering a False-Edge Attack to the Inside Line

STUDENT	COACH
	Attacks in quarta to the inside line.
Parries attack.
	Turns hand palm down (seconda) to strike around the parry with the false-edge while taking a passing step toward the student’s outside line.
Takes their sword in their offhand by the forte and thrusts into the coach’s face.

J.P.F. Girard | “Overcoming Those Who Grab You From Behind”

STUDENT	COACH
Faces off against their opponent
	Grabs the student around the arms from behind.
Lowers the point of their sword, passes it between the legs, and bends over.
	Receives hit “in the stomach.”

In this case, the student is about to fight someone when the coach (a third-party) enters into the affair. This is a weird little gem in the smallsword world and I’m super bummed there’s no artwork to go with it.

Two-Hands Are Better Than One

Johann Daniel l’Ange | Two-Handing the Rapier

STUDENT	COACH
Hold your sword near the pommel with your sword hand and place your offhand a comfortable distance down the forte. Keep the sword in a “low terza” position so all attacks are over the weapon.
	Attacks over the student’s weapon.
Parries with a sweeping motion by raising the tip of their sword and crossing it over the coach’s attack, and redirecting it to their outside line. Riposte.
	Receives hit.

L’Ange says that one should only use this guard in “time of need” such as when extremely tired or your swordarm is injured in a duel.

Johann Georg Pascha | The “Guard of the Knee”

STUDENT	COACH
Hold your sword as normal but with offhand a comfortable distance down the forte. Keep the point of the sword raised and lower the hilt so it’s almost resting on knee/thigh. Create a singular invitation for the coach to attack in.
	Attacks to the open line
Parries the attack by crossing the point of their sword over the coach’s attack, and redirecting it outside their presence. Riposte.
	Receives hit.

This guard is more or less the same as L’Ange’s. The difference is you hold the rapier in the sword hand as you normally would (finger around ricasso), and the point of the weapon is raised. This guard can parry attacks to either the inside or outside line.

To counter this guard, Pascha says to attack close to the exposed arm – so tight to the sword arm on the outside line, and tight to the offhand arm on the coach’s inside line.

Like L’Ange, Pascha isn’t a huge fan of this guard and says it’s best saved for the salle or when you’re tired.

Mismatched Forms

Nicholas Giganti | Dagger vs. Rapier

STUDENT	COACH
Armed with only a dagger, creates an invitation on their outside line.
	Attacks.
Parries the attack with the dagger to the outside line. Steps in with a passing step and uses the open offhand to control the coach’s sword/swordarm and then ripostes with the dagger.
	Receives hit.

Nicholas Giganti | Dagger vs. Spear

STUDENT	COACH
Armed with only a dagger, creates an invitation on their outside line.
	Attacks.
Parries the attack with the dagger to the outside line. Steps in with a passing step and uses the open offhand to control the coach’s spear/lead darm and then ripostes with the dagger.
	Receives hit.

This is more or less the same action as the dagger vs. rapier play. Giganti does mention to feign fear while retreating and parrying to force the spearman to get overconfident/frustrated and strongly commit on their attack. When they commit strongly to their attack, the student performs this play.

A lot of these mismatched forms comes down to foundational principles — create a single opening/invitation to which you can predict the attack, making your move easier/simpler. Once you gain control over the opponent’s weapon, press your advantage.

P.J.F. Girard | Smallsword vs. Spear – Sequence #1

STUDENT	COACH
Creates a slight invitation on the outside line
	Attacks with opposition.
Parries prime by yielding to the attack and redirecting the blow to their inside line. Quickly uses the open offhand to grab the haft of the spear, and then riposte in prime/seconde.
	Receives hit.

Instead of an attack with opposition from the coach, they could just attack direct to the student’s inside line. The student can still parry prime, but this action is more fun by performing it as a yielding parry.

P.J.F. Girard | Smallsword vs. Spear – Sequence #2

STUDENT	COACH
Creates a slight invitation on the inside line
	Attacks direct.
Parries quarte, redirecting the blow to their inside line, while performing a small gathering step of their rear foot just behind their lead foot. Quickly uses the open offhand to grab the haft of the spear, and then riposte in quarte.
	Receives hit.

The above fencers show the counter-attack as a void, aka a volte or giratta. Girard’s manual shows a simple lunge in quarte, however, so you have options.

Salvator Fabris | Plate 190 | Rapier vs. Spear

Fabris doesn’t actually say how to use this guard against a spear. He basically says, “If you’ve read and understand my book, you’ll know what to do.” This is a fun guard to take and experiment with. I perform this by creating a singular invitation and walking resolutely (like in Fabris Book II) toward the spearman. When my opponent attacks, parry, and then riposte.

How you do that leaves a lot of room for creativity.

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