Dr. Guy Windsor is a world-renowned instructor and a pioneering researcher of medieval and renaissance martial arts. He has been teaching the Art of Arms full-time since founding The School of European Swordsmanship in Helsinki, Finland, in 2001. His day job is finding and analysing historical swordsmanship treatises, figuring out the systems they represent, creating a syllabus from the treatises for his students to train with, and teaching the system to his students all over the world. Guy is the author of numerous classic books about the art of swordsmanship and has consulted on swordfighting game design and stage combat. He developed the card game, Audatia, based on Fiore dei Liberi's Art of Arms, his primary field of study. In 2018 Edinburgh University awarded him a PhD by Research Publications for his work recreating historical combat systems. When not studying medieval and renaissance swordsmanship or writing books Guy can be found in his shed woodworking or spending time with his family.
Why Fiore scholars should study the Twirchringen
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Hi! Last June I flew to Kansas to shoot Fiore dagger plays with Jessica Finley. While I was there she asked if we could also shoot a course on Von Baumann’s wrestling plays, because they formed such a handy mini-system. A great introduction to German wrestling, and also useful to broaden the education of Fiore scholars. She had helped me with the Abrazare (Fiore’s wrestling) course the previous year, so she knew what it Fiore covered- and what he left out. And she thought Von Baumann’s Twirchringen plays would fill some of the gaps. That was a very easy HELL YES! for me, and so we set to work. I love Fiore, as you probably know. And I think his abrazare section, taken in context with especially the dagger plays, is relatively complete. But it’s not intended to be anything like a comprehensive wrestling method: it’s just the abrazare plays you need as a foundation for the entire knightly combat system. Assisting Jessica on this course on the Twirchringen added a great deal of breadth to my own wrestling knowledge, and I think every Fiore scholar who doesn’t yet have a solid wrestling background (which includes me! My unarmed experience is mostly punching and kicking) will find this a really useful way to broaden their base. I mean, does Fiore show us this? I mean, it looks like a gambarola, but it is really not... Check out the video here!
And here’s the obligatory reminder to go buy the course before the discount expires:
Remember to share that link, or this whole email, with your friends! And can we agree that this is a much better way to run a launch sequence? If you’re not even a bit interested in Von Baumann’s wrestling stuff, then click on this link, which will take you to a post about syllabus design for rapier fencing, and also tell my very clever email system not to send you any more of these emails about the wrestling course. And if you are a Patron, or have bought the Abrazare or Hauptstucke courses, you should already have received an even bigger discount code. If that's not the case, reply to this email and I'll send it to you. Yours, Guy |
Guy Windsor's Swordschool
Dr. Guy Windsor is a world-renowned instructor and a pioneering researcher of medieval and renaissance martial arts. He has been teaching the Art of Arms full-time since founding The School of European Swordsmanship in Helsinki, Finland, in 2001. His day job is finding and analysing historical swordsmanship treatises, figuring out the systems they represent, creating a syllabus from the treatises for his students to train with, and teaching the system to his students all over the world. Guy is the author of numerous classic books about the art of swordsmanship and has consulted on swordfighting game design and stage combat. He developed the card game, Audatia, based on Fiore dei Liberi's Art of Arms, his primary field of study. In 2018 Edinburgh University awarded him a PhD by Research Publications for his work recreating historical combat systems. When not studying medieval and renaissance swordsmanship or writing books Guy can be found in his shed woodworking or spending time with his family.
Hi!I’m back from Helsinki, having taught a couple of seminars for Gladiolus School of Arms. It was lovely being back in the salle! We did a day of Syllabus Form (longsword), and a crash course in Capoferro’s rapier. Lots of fun. The Form covers a huge amount of material when you start to unpack it- enough that it comprises most of the content of my Advanced Longsword book (the Farfalla di Ferro and the Cutting Drill take up most of the rest). I don’t believe in teaching choreography and...
Hi! Fair warning- this is the beginning of a launch sequence. Which means a pile of emails in your inbox over the next week or so. If you’ve been on my list for a while, you’ll know that it’s sadly necessary to send out a sequence of launch emails to generate course sales. This is just because people need reminding. I avoid making the emails too fancy because I don’t want to persuade anyone to buy the course. If Medieval German Wrestling: The Twirchringen of Von Baumann taught by Jessica...
Hi! I’m actually writing this last week, as I’m dashing off to Helsinki on Monday 13th, for seminars at the weekend (18th and 19th). So, greetings from snowy Finland! On New Year’s Day I went into my shed to sharpen a scraper, and while testing it for sharpness cleaned a patch of something off my bench top. This lead me to dress the bench. For non-cabinetmakers: dressing the bench means planing it flat, something you need to do every now and then because wood changes shape over time, and it’s...