Hi!

I’m currently working on a new online course- a set of wrestling plays from Von Baumann, which Jessica Finley has interpreted, and we shot together in July this year. It’s a fascinating little mini-system embedded in the larger treatise. Watch this space…

Speaking of online courses, I’m working out ways to open up my platforms to other instructors. I have two services for distributing courses: teachable, and swordpeople.com. These cost several thousand dollars a year to maintain, which is a barrier to other historical fencing teachers who are perhaps earlier on in their career or have smaller followings.

My goal is to make the best historical fencing material available to my people, and not limit that to the work I can do myself. It’s also good to expose my people to the work of other instructors- when I ran my school in Finland we averaged 3-4 guest instructor seminars per year. If I can find the right way to do it, it’s a triple win: the students get access to material they wouldn’t otherwise see; the instructor gets to make a better living communicating their material; and my own platform also grows.

I’m not one to plan everything down to the last flicker of an eyelash, so I’ve invited my first guest instructor to host a course on my teachable platform.

We have just put the last finishing touches on a course created by Finnish instructor Esko Ronimus, in which he will teach you his interpretation of dall’Agocchie's Varying Guards Form.

This course offers an in-depth introduction to Bolognese fencing, focusing specifically on one-handed sword techniques as presented in the "Varying Guards" form from Giovanni dall'Agocchie’s 1572 book Dell'Arte di Scrima Libri Tre (The Art of Fencing in Three Books)​. Through a series of carefully selected plays, students will explore the foundational principles of Bolognese swordsmanship, gaining a clear understanding of its core techniques, tactics, and applications.

By the end of the course, participants will have a strong grasp of the basic concepts of Bolognese fencing and a repertoire of representative techniques. This course serves both as a perfect starting point for beginners to embark on the study of historical fencing and as a comprehensive stand-alone module for those looking to refine their skills through the lens of the "Varying Guards" form.

The work is entirely Esko’s: I’ve seen him teach, and know him personally, so I’m sure you’re in good hands. But the point of this experiment is to give my students access to other instructors, to give their students access to courses that the instructor may not otherwise be able to host, and to help defray some of the costs of running my platform.

The course has just gone live, and you can get 40% off until the end of this month with this link: https://swordschool.teachable.com/p/introduction-to-bolognese-swordsmanship-dall-agocchie-s-varying-guards-form?coupon_code=BOLOGNESE40&product_id=5936031​

If you have any trouble with that link, go to https://courses.swordschool.com/p/introduction-to-bolognese-swordsmanship-dall-agocchie-s-varying-guards-form and use the code BOLOGNESE40 at checkout.

Part of the deal is that for some months after the launch, the course will only be available to buy at courses.swordschool.com. But after that, it will be added to the subscription plans on there and on swordpeople.com, and Esko may also choose to distribute it elsewhere (such as his Patreon).This is an experiment- if it goes well, I look forward to hosting other instructors too. If you’re interested in sharing your own work this way, then email me directly and we can discuss the details.

Cool stuff from the internet

Have you ever experienced freeplaying with someone, and the intensity starts to escalate? What starts out as a gentle play gets more and more intense, which can be frustrating and dangerous. My friend Martin Höppner has written a fascinating article on game theory and how it may apply to escalation during freeplay, you can read it here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/prisoners-of-in-115300476​

This week on the podcast: Safety Testing Swords, with Jamie MacIver

Jamie MacIver is a historical martial arts instructor who co-founded the London Historical Fencing Club in 2016, which has grown to over 120 members and now has his own permanent training space.

We start our conversation with Vadi, and why Jamie prefers Vadi to Fiore. We have a discussion about guards and whether Vadi is more defensive than Fiore.

Next, Jamie explains about taking the plunge into getting his club its own permanent space. The London Historical Fencing club is one of only around three in the UK that has a permanent home, so we hear how it was possible post-pandemic, and how they manage the classes to make it financially viable. Jamie also explains about the steps they have taken to ensure diversity within the club.

Having been involved in running lots of tournaments, Jamie found he was having to make decisions on what HEMA kit is safe enough with nothing much to back up those decisions. So he set up the Historical Research Company Ltd to research historical martial arts safety, starting with research into sword tips. What is the difference between having a tip and no tip on your rapier? And which tips are the safest? Do different tips affect how likely it is for sword to glance off a mask or to stick to a mask, causing concussion and other injuries?

You can find the episode here, including shownotes with links to the safety project and other things here:

What I’m reading

There are some books I find myself dipping into just to re-read a particular scene. Most recently, that was my favourite of the Vorkosigan saga books, Memory (they’re all good- the one I’ve re-read the least I must have read at least five times). Memory is kind of a whodunnit, and it’s unusual for a mystery to be so incredibly re-readable. Finding out who did it might get you through the first read, but it won’t get you through the next ten. I dipped in to read one of my favourite scenes (when Miles goes to ask Gregor for oversight in the investigation), and ended up re-reading the whole book.

Then going on to the next one in the series (Komarr), and I’m now a few chapters in to the one after that, A Civil Campaign. These books are a kind of comfort food to me, and I love them all. Lois McMaster Bujold writes the best characters and puts them in the worst situations, and there’s an underlying decency about them all. So good.

I’m not sure why I would be craving spiritual comfort in the form of space opera at the moment, but I’m not one to question these things. Speaking of comfort, I’ve also finally written up a blog post about the food in Mexico, along with some tips for travellers, here: https://guywindsor.net/2024/11/viva-mexico-part-two-the-amazing-food-and-some-tips-for-travellers/​

Hungry now?

cheers,

Guy