I can probably trace my fascination with swords and sword fighting back to my dad, who had a wild appreciation of Errol Flynn’s swashbuckling in films like the 1938 classic Robin Hood. As I grew up, dashing swordsmen continued to monopolize my adolescent affections, from Luke Skywalker (a lightsaber is still a sword!), to Connor MacLeod, to Madmartigan, to Inigo Montoya. Literary swordsmen like Aragorn and Richard St. Veir only fueled the flames, while the 1990s added some women sword fighters to the mix: Xena and Gabrielle, Yu Shu Lien and Jen Yu. And of course the Musketeers fit in there somewhere, too.
For all this fascination with swords and sword fighters, I don’t actually know that much about sword fighting. I’ve never even taken a basic fencing class, unless text RPG dueling lessons count, which I’m pretty sure they don’t. I do own one sword (a decorative replica) and I’ve written plenty of stories about people who are avid sword fighters. I keep promising myself I will take some lessons some day, but never get around to it. It’s probably just as well – there’s no telling what mischief I might get up to if I could actually use a sword.
Until someday gets here, I content myself learning about odd pockets of sword history like those presented here. Also, since I couldn’t figure out how to embed a TikTok video in Substack, here’s a link to a demonstration of what it really sounds like when swords clash. Enjoy!
If All Else Fails, Just Throw It
“Then there's the images. At the time, it wasn't yet common to draw or paint in three dimensions. So while this emerging fashion in art was being finessed, attempts to convey depth in pictures could often be confusing – and this includes those in fight books. ‘Sometimes you can't actually work out which of the two fencers involved is supposed to be winning,’ says MacIver. ‘There's one in particular… both fencers have a sword against their neck.’
“To get to the bottom of what knights were really doing, all this needs to be untangled. But even when it is, there are countless other unknowns, such as exactly how often the most peculiar techniques were actually used.
"‘Some [fight books] bring in stuff that's so weird you're going 'this cannot be used with any frequency',’ says Grant. He gives the example of a sequence of fight books known as The Gladiatoria Series, which contains some eyebrow-raising tips. ‘One of the moves involves unscrewing the pommel of your sword [the circular fitting by the handle] and throwing it at somebody,’ he says.”
[The lost medieval sword fighting tricks no one can decode - BBC]
Mysterious Word Origins
“Sword is equally mysterious. If it is not a Germanic noun, but a so-called culture (migratory) word that traveled form land to land with soldiers, we have little chance of finding its ancient source. Attempts to trace it to a Germanic root have also been moderately successful. Let us note that from a historical point of view awl does not mean ‘piercer,’ ax does not mean ‘cutter,’ and so on. We have also seen that the same word may mean ‘knife; dagger; razor,’ and then ‘sword.’ By the way, the origin of knife is obscure, and the same holds for bodkin. In any case, sword need not have meant ‘piercer’ or ‘cutter’ and been an analog of razor, which is, raz(e) + –er.”
[Returning to the cutting edge: “sword”- Oxford University Press]
Secrets Only Old Swords Know
“‘When I got this sword, it was completely covered in blood rust.’ Sword maker Francis Boyd is showing me yet another weapon pulled from yet another safe in the heavily fortified workshop behind his northern California home.
“‘You can tell it’s blood,’ he says matter-of-factly, ‘because ordinary rust turns the grinding water brown. If it’s blood rust it bleeds, it looks like blood in the water. Even 2,000 years old, it bleeds. And it smells like a steak cooking, like cooked meat. I’ve encountered this before with Japanese swords from World War II. If there’s blood on the sword and you start polishing it, the sword bleeds. It comes with the territory.’
“Blood rust: I hadn’t thought of that. I guess it would turn water red, but the steak comment is kind of creeping me out, as is the growing realization that if these swords could talk, I couldn’t stomach half the tales they’d have to tell.”
[Blood, Sweat, and Steel: My Afternoon with the Ace of Swords - Collectors Weekly]
So brilliantly inspiring! Awesome!