This blog is anonymous for a reason. That reason is not because I am a coward who won't put their name to their thoughts. I will happily espouse the same thoughts in person and by name on the internet. I'll use the words of James Marwood of safeism.com to explain the reason.
"Blogs like HEMAboy, whilst amusing, also serve to surface tension. To show where conflict exists and get people talking about it. For example I was politely critical of the decision of the Hammaborg guys to drop out of the recent Open Championships and then make a point of implying they would have won if they hadn’t. I thought this churlish and unsporting. HEMAboy had similar concerns and took the piss a bit. This got some of us talking more about what happened which has lessened the emotion involved. Once Roland calms down I’m sure all will be well again."
If you think you know who I am then please keep it to yourself. If you need to be certain then email me at hemaboy99@gmail.com and I'll let you know if you're right.
In the mean time please don't kill the blog.
Friday 17 October 2008
Silver
What is it with Silver?
What's the deal? I don't get it. It's an awful lot of overweight guys, who aren't skilled enough to do proper medieval swordwork, flouncing about looking camp isn't it?
Is it because it is written in English? That must make it easier to interpret right?
Maybe it's because he clearly doesn't like rapiers. No-one with any sense likes them do they?
Is it just that he tells you if you do what he says then you'll be better than everyone else?
Or is it just that people are hooked by the idea that if they do Silver then they are in fact a proper English Gentleman?
If they quote George's xenephobic rants they can pretend that they get to sit at a small table on a hill being served fine roast beef by their butler, while directing a battle in the valley down below?
They can dust off their nylon dinner jacket once a year and drink port with their friends and imagine they really are the last bastion of the British Empire.
Of course I might be wrong.
Silver may indeed describe a wonderful martial art.
But most Silver practitioners don't. They just bore us with the same few tired old quotes and same few ineffective moves.
Take your cheap tweed and leave the fighting to those of us who want to do it properly.
What's the deal? I don't get it. It's an awful lot of overweight guys, who aren't skilled enough to do proper medieval swordwork, flouncing about looking camp isn't it?
Is it because it is written in English? That must make it easier to interpret right?
Maybe it's because he clearly doesn't like rapiers. No-one with any sense likes them do they?
Is it just that he tells you if you do what he says then you'll be better than everyone else?
Or is it just that people are hooked by the idea that if they do Silver then they are in fact a proper English Gentleman?
If they quote George's xenephobic rants they can pretend that they get to sit at a small table on a hill being served fine roast beef by their butler, while directing a battle in the valley down below?
They can dust off their nylon dinner jacket once a year and drink port with their friends and imagine they really are the last bastion of the British Empire.
Of course I might be wrong.
Silver may indeed describe a wonderful martial art.
But most Silver practitioners don't. They just bore us with the same few tired old quotes and same few ineffective moves.
Take your cheap tweed and leave the fighting to those of us who want to do it properly.
Thursday 16 October 2008
Removed post 4
Poteet in Texas is a small rural community in trouble. Its population is 3300 and it has 30 registered sex offenders, that is one for every 110 people. Even the Mayor is a convicted child molester.
Thinking about a community with so much wrong with it got me to thinking about the international WMA community.
There is however a problem with that.
There isn’t an international WMA community.
There isn’t even a national one, whichever country you happen to live in.
Do I really need to explain?
If you’re the leader of a pseudo-medieval “Order of Chivalry” then what the hell do you have in common with Thrusty McDojo rapierboy?
Nothing.
There is no way you and your group in your perfectly authentic wool-effect doublets would gain from being associated with him and his in their matching t-shirts and hero worship training syllabus.
In the same way that there is no reason the academic giants among us (and I use the term with a pinch of irony) would seek to benefit their practise by associating with Sir Rattan of Renfair and his assorted retainers.
So why do people still talk about the worldwide HES (or WMA, or HEMA, or HF, or HWMA depending on which bit of the non-existant community you are in) community?
Because they want to feel that they are part of a giant growing organisation.
I’ve got news for you.
It’s never going to happen. Groups don’t get more cohesive as they grow, they get more divisive and exclusive.
If you need to associate with other people then why not choose people you like? Just do what you do as well as you can and if it’s good enough it will grow.
If it isn’t then it won’t, but at least you’ll have stopped pretending that your Fiore Longsword classes are the same thing as the next town’s Highland Broadsword.
It isn’t all bad news though.
At least you don’t live in Poteet.
Thinking about a community with so much wrong with it got me to thinking about the international WMA community.
There is however a problem with that.
There isn’t an international WMA community.
There isn’t even a national one, whichever country you happen to live in.
Do I really need to explain?
If you’re the leader of a pseudo-medieval “Order of Chivalry” then what the hell do you have in common with Thrusty McDojo rapierboy?
Nothing.
There is no way you and your group in your perfectly authentic wool-effect doublets would gain from being associated with him and his in their matching t-shirts and hero worship training syllabus.
In the same way that there is no reason the academic giants among us (and I use the term with a pinch of irony) would seek to benefit their practise by associating with Sir Rattan of Renfair and his assorted retainers.
So why do people still talk about the worldwide HES (or WMA, or HEMA, or HF, or HWMA depending on which bit of the non-existant community you are in) community?
Because they want to feel that they are part of a giant growing organisation.
I’ve got news for you.
It’s never going to happen. Groups don’t get more cohesive as they grow, they get more divisive and exclusive.
If you need to associate with other people then why not choose people you like? Just do what you do as well as you can and if it’s good enough it will grow.
If it isn’t then it won’t, but at least you’ll have stopped pretending that your Fiore Longsword classes are the same thing as the next town’s Highland Broadsword.
It isn’t all bad news though.
At least you don’t live in Poteet.
Removed post 3
This is going to be a quicky so brace yourself.
All across the internet there are arguments about what the best weapons to train with are. Wooden wasters break all the time and don’t balance properly, modified shinai bounce too much and just look wrong. Nylon won’t bind properly. You’ve seen the posts. You know what I mean.
I have one thing to say to everyone who worries about how they are going to get the perfect training weapon.
You are an idiot.
You are supposed to be practising a martial art. The idea is to improve your own technique and abilities, not simply search for something that is a sharp sword in every respect but the one that matters.
Just fucking train with with what you’ve got and stop ruining our lives by moaning to us about how we’ve all got it wrong.
Is it a coincidence that the only significant injury at Art of Mars’ recent international tournament was caused by someone who claimed the safe tournament weapons weren’t good enough for them to be able to use?
I doubt it.
If you can fight then you can fight with whatever you have got. If you can only fight with your own cunningly modifed Albion Lichtenauer then you can’t fight at all.
All across the internet there are arguments about what the best weapons to train with are. Wooden wasters break all the time and don’t balance properly, modified shinai bounce too much and just look wrong. Nylon won’t bind properly. You’ve seen the posts. You know what I mean.
I have one thing to say to everyone who worries about how they are going to get the perfect training weapon.
You are an idiot.
You are supposed to be practising a martial art. The idea is to improve your own technique and abilities, not simply search for something that is a sharp sword in every respect but the one that matters.
Just fucking train with with what you’ve got and stop ruining our lives by moaning to us about how we’ve all got it wrong.
Is it a coincidence that the only significant injury at Art of Mars’ recent international tournament was caused by someone who claimed the safe tournament weapons weren’t good enough for them to be able to use?
I doubt it.
If you can fight then you can fight with whatever you have got. If you can only fight with your own cunningly modifed Albion Lichtenauer then you can’t fight at all.
Removed post 2
Many years ago Sword Forum was the place to be. The discussions there were in depth, they were relevant and they involved some of the most educated and experienced practitioners and researchers from around the world. These days it would seem that it is a different story altogether.
If you want to worship at the altar of a select group of “names” (I include the word in quotation marks because it is a word that has been used on that very forum to describe the people in question) and bask in their reflected glory then it is the place for you. If you want to find out what the difference between two almost identical production swords is when used to practice Ringeck’s system as described by Christian Tobler, then it is the place for you. If you want to discuss (at length) what sort of footwear you should be wearing if you dedicate your life to Viggiani’s system then it is the place for you.
If however you want something other than idol worship, or mundane trivia then I’d stay away. Not that there are many better places to be, they all have their clique, but the select group on SFI has had much more time to evolve and become irreversably entrenched. They reflect many different schools and traditions, but together they work as one. It didn’t used to be that way, there were many big names. But they have been whittled away one by one.
First the HACA were removed (now the ARMA for those of us who are new to this game). Almost to a man the SFI clique closed ranks on John Clements, then slowly but surely all his closest disciples were banned. Anyone who vocally supported what the ARMA were doing and stood by the man who started it all for them fell by the wayside. Lots of others followed over the next few years. Matt Easton left with the Schola crowd following on behind him en masse. Bob Charron used to a regular but is now hardly every to be seen. Milo Thurston has vanished, and almost every person who is entitled to the description “Maestro” now stays away. Scott Brown was the latest casualty to fall to this cleansing.
People like David Rawlings, Martin Austwick and Colin Richards still post every now and again, but over the last year they seem to have been effectively sidelined and labelled as trolls who don’t want to be part of the great love-in that is SFI.
So now we just have Greg Mele, the one true authority on all things Italian, or all things renaissance, or maybe just all things period.
We have Christian Tobler. The Lichtenauer guy. A man who is doggedly publishing every manuscript every written.
We have Terry Brown. He rarely posts, but question anything to do with English Martial Arts and his opinion will be stated for you. Normally by Greg.
We have Stephenpaul Wagnerhand, the amorphous Australian duo who have so far managed to get I.33 wrong, Silver wrong and are currently working on getting the collected medieval English manuscripts wrong. Did I mention Page?
There are also a few groupies, hangers-on like Steven Reich and Sean Hayes. They float around and point out that they are cleverer than you, they also like to point out that Guy Windsor is cleverer than you too.
Now I could be doing them an injustice, they could truly be a nice group of guys who have, by a freak of chance, been involved in every major split in WMA since the birth of the internet. They could indeed be the guiltless parties in every falling out that has occured.
Or perhaps maybe not.
If you want to worship at the altar of a select group of “names” (I include the word in quotation marks because it is a word that has been used on that very forum to describe the people in question) and bask in their reflected glory then it is the place for you. If you want to find out what the difference between two almost identical production swords is when used to practice Ringeck’s system as described by Christian Tobler, then it is the place for you. If you want to discuss (at length) what sort of footwear you should be wearing if you dedicate your life to Viggiani’s system then it is the place for you.
If however you want something other than idol worship, or mundane trivia then I’d stay away. Not that there are many better places to be, they all have their clique, but the select group on SFI has had much more time to evolve and become irreversably entrenched. They reflect many different schools and traditions, but together they work as one. It didn’t used to be that way, there were many big names. But they have been whittled away one by one.
First the HACA were removed (now the ARMA for those of us who are new to this game). Almost to a man the SFI clique closed ranks on John Clements, then slowly but surely all his closest disciples were banned. Anyone who vocally supported what the ARMA were doing and stood by the man who started it all for them fell by the wayside. Lots of others followed over the next few years. Matt Easton left with the Schola crowd following on behind him en masse. Bob Charron used to a regular but is now hardly every to be seen. Milo Thurston has vanished, and almost every person who is entitled to the description “Maestro” now stays away. Scott Brown was the latest casualty to fall to this cleansing.
People like David Rawlings, Martin Austwick and Colin Richards still post every now and again, but over the last year they seem to have been effectively sidelined and labelled as trolls who don’t want to be part of the great love-in that is SFI.
So now we just have Greg Mele, the one true authority on all things Italian, or all things renaissance, or maybe just all things period.
We have Christian Tobler. The Lichtenauer guy. A man who is doggedly publishing every manuscript every written.
We have Terry Brown. He rarely posts, but question anything to do with English Martial Arts and his opinion will be stated for you. Normally by Greg.
We have Stephenpaul Wagnerhand, the amorphous Australian duo who have so far managed to get I.33 wrong, Silver wrong and are currently working on getting the collected medieval English manuscripts wrong. Did I mention Page?
There are also a few groupies, hangers-on like Steven Reich and Sean Hayes. They float around and point out that they are cleverer than you, they also like to point out that Guy Windsor is cleverer than you too.
Now I could be doing them an injustice, they could truly be a nice group of guys who have, by a freak of chance, been involved in every major split in WMA since the birth of the internet. They could indeed be the guiltless parties in every falling out that has occured.
Or perhaps maybe not.
Removed post 1
Remember Cityboy? Well perhaps not, but I do. He wrote a column in the daily press exposing what actually went on in the financial world. Well we all know the financial world is screwed now so there’s not much point in carrying on with that. Besides, he’s gone public and recanted all his sinful ways so is now dull as fuck.
This is an insider’s Blog about the international world of Historical European Martial Arts. I’m not planning on being tactful, I’m not planning on making friends. I am however planning on being honest and telling it how it is. You may think you know who I am, you may be right, but then again you may not. I could care less either way. I’ll give you a couple of clues though. I’m a native English speaker and I’ve taught in The States and in one or two places in Europe. That’s as good as you get.
Before I leave you to your frenzied contemplation about my true identity I’d like to offer a thought to occupy your lonely evenings.
A new manuscript has recently come to light. Fabrice Cognot from De Taille et d’Estoc in Dijon came across it on the website of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. It turns out that it was only on their website because Ken Mondschein had located it and had it scanned some time earlier. I’d heard on the quiet some time before Fabrice’s announcement that it had been found, but little in the way of details. Had Fabrice? Who knows? Maybe it was a coincidence of truly staggering proportions.
Both of these researchers are “professional” academics, but only one of them is a wanker of truly biblical proportions. One of them diligently searched for years for a manuscript he was sure existed and eventually found it, but kept it to himself. The other found it “by chance” and immediately shared it with the entire worldwide community. One of them searches out knowledge in order to gloat in the darkness of their mind like a bibliophilic golum holding their precious away from anyone who might take it. The other understands that knowledge is power, but you only get to exercise that power by sharing the knowledge.
You guess which one the twat is.
This is an insider’s Blog about the international world of Historical European Martial Arts. I’m not planning on being tactful, I’m not planning on making friends. I am however planning on being honest and telling it how it is. You may think you know who I am, you may be right, but then again you may not. I could care less either way. I’ll give you a couple of clues though. I’m a native English speaker and I’ve taught in The States and in one or two places in Europe. That’s as good as you get.
Before I leave you to your frenzied contemplation about my true identity I’d like to offer a thought to occupy your lonely evenings.
A new manuscript has recently come to light. Fabrice Cognot from De Taille et d’Estoc in Dijon came across it on the website of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. It turns out that it was only on their website because Ken Mondschein had located it and had it scanned some time earlier. I’d heard on the quiet some time before Fabrice’s announcement that it had been found, but little in the way of details. Had Fabrice? Who knows? Maybe it was a coincidence of truly staggering proportions.
Both of these researchers are “professional” academics, but only one of them is a wanker of truly biblical proportions. One of them diligently searched for years for a manuscript he was sure existed and eventually found it, but kept it to himself. The other found it “by chance” and immediately shared it with the entire worldwide community. One of them searches out knowledge in order to gloat in the darkness of their mind like a bibliophilic golum holding their precious away from anyone who might take it. The other understands that knowledge is power, but you only get to exercise that power by sharing the knowledge.
You guess which one the twat is.
An explanation
As a few people correctly guessed Hemaboy was a collaborative venture.
The collaboration is no more. There was a difference in opinion as to how we should react to the mixed reactions presented. To those of you who supported us thank you, to those of you who were offended please do not be (with one exception, you have a right to be offended, we were indeed offensive).
This is why the posts were pulled from the site. As the collaboration is no more you can rest assured that those posts will re-appear shortly. I am truly sorry that the comments have been lost, please feel free to re-post them, they are all welcome.
Even the offensive ones.
No, especially the offensive ones.
I (the remaining member of the collaboration) intend to carry on this blog in the manner it started. I suspect as time passes the original posts that were authored by me will become clear and my identity will become common knowledge. I am more than happy with this, there is little that has been said by Hemaboy that I would not put my name to. I'd like to ask your indulgence and request that you not try too hard to find out the identity of the person or persons who are no longer Hemaboy. They no longer wish to be associated with it. I believe they are wrong but I respect their decision.
Expect to see some more posts on the subjects that have been raised, and expect to see some more examples of what I believe is good in the world of WMA.
The collaboration is no more. There was a difference in opinion as to how we should react to the mixed reactions presented. To those of you who supported us thank you, to those of you who were offended please do not be (with one exception, you have a right to be offended, we were indeed offensive).
This is why the posts were pulled from the site. As the collaboration is no more you can rest assured that those posts will re-appear shortly. I am truly sorry that the comments have been lost, please feel free to re-post them, they are all welcome.
Even the offensive ones.
No, especially the offensive ones.
I (the remaining member of the collaboration) intend to carry on this blog in the manner it started. I suspect as time passes the original posts that were authored by me will become clear and my identity will become common knowledge. I am more than happy with this, there is little that has been said by Hemaboy that I would not put my name to. I'd like to ask your indulgence and request that you not try too hard to find out the identity of the person or persons who are no longer Hemaboy. They no longer wish to be associated with it. I believe they are wrong but I respect their decision.
Expect to see some more posts on the subjects that have been raised, and expect to see some more examples of what I believe is good in the world of WMA.
Wednesday 15 October 2008
Wardrobes and swords
You can have this one back. I like it too much to leave it out.
I bought an flat-pack wardrobe recently.
My wife and I were assembling it together and it caused quite a row. You see I am a man, I don't do instructions. She on the other hand is not a man and so she likes to follow the instructions to make sure she does it properly.
I tried to explain that I already understood how it worked and I didn't have to follow instructions written by some mindless cretin in an office somewhere, but she was having none of it.
This of course got me to thinking about swords and HEMA.
Why is it that men the world over are incapable of following instructions when building a piece of furniture, but when it comes to recreating a historical system of combat they will do nothing but repeat what the manuscript tells them?
Let me put that another way.
How many seminars have you been to where the instructor explains what a source says and then proceeds to take you through the techniques as they are described in the manuscript?
A lot I suspect.
How is this a martial art?
It's not. It is re-enactment. It's not even good re-enactment. There are no well endowed women in dresses that are too small, there are no large bits of pig hanging over fires built in oddly unhistorical metal trays.
What makes a martial art different is that it involves understanding of the underpinning concepts. Not just a rote learning of x technique against y technique. A true understanding of exactly why x technique works against y technique, and conversely why z technique would not be appropriate.
There are plenty of Re-enactors masquerading as HEMA instructors out there, but there are precious few martial artists. Next time you go along to your salle ask your instructor why a technique works. Ask them how it fits within the big picture of the system and ask them about what exercises and drills you can practice at home to help you develop your own understanding of the body mechanics behind the system. If they're a martial artist they'll answer without any hesitation. If they can't then you might want to ask yourself why you're paying someone to teach you when they are simply reading instructions from a book.
Any idiot can follow instructions, it takes a real man to throw them away because he understands it already.
It's just a shame my wife disagrees. I have to admit that the wardrobe looks lovely though.
I bought an flat-pack wardrobe recently.
My wife and I were assembling it together and it caused quite a row. You see I am a man, I don't do instructions. She on the other hand is not a man and so she likes to follow the instructions to make sure she does it properly.
I tried to explain that I already understood how it worked and I didn't have to follow instructions written by some mindless cretin in an office somewhere, but she was having none of it.
This of course got me to thinking about swords and HEMA.
Why is it that men the world over are incapable of following instructions when building a piece of furniture, but when it comes to recreating a historical system of combat they will do nothing but repeat what the manuscript tells them?
Let me put that another way.
How many seminars have you been to where the instructor explains what a source says and then proceeds to take you through the techniques as they are described in the manuscript?
A lot I suspect.
How is this a martial art?
It's not. It is re-enactment. It's not even good re-enactment. There are no well endowed women in dresses that are too small, there are no large bits of pig hanging over fires built in oddly unhistorical metal trays.
What makes a martial art different is that it involves understanding of the underpinning concepts. Not just a rote learning of x technique against y technique. A true understanding of exactly why x technique works against y technique, and conversely why z technique would not be appropriate.
There are plenty of Re-enactors masquerading as HEMA instructors out there, but there are precious few martial artists. Next time you go along to your salle ask your instructor why a technique works. Ask them how it fits within the big picture of the system and ask them about what exercises and drills you can practice at home to help you develop your own understanding of the body mechanics behind the system. If they're a martial artist they'll answer without any hesitation. If they can't then you might want to ask yourself why you're paying someone to teach you when they are simply reading instructions from a book.
Any idiot can follow instructions, it takes a real man to throw them away because he understands it already.
It's just a shame my wife disagrees. I have to admit that the wardrobe looks lovely though.
As close to an apology as you are likely to get
I take it all back.
Knowledge is not power
SFI is still the place where all the best debate happens and no-one has ever left
The best way to perfect your technique is to get a better tool
Simply repeating the instructions in a book is a highly complex martial art
and
There is indeed a fully functioning global WMA community.
It would seem that it is impossible to point out negative trends without unwittingly implying personal insults, and as that was never the intention of this blog I have removed the earlier posts.
Though never fear, I have not gone. (I can almost hear the collected sigh of relief)
I will simply try to steer this ship closer to the kittens from now on and further away from the rocky waters of divisiveness.
I do miss the entry about wardrobes though, I was quite proud of that one.
Knowledge is not power
SFI is still the place where all the best debate happens and no-one has ever left
The best way to perfect your technique is to get a better tool
Simply repeating the instructions in a book is a highly complex martial art
and
There is indeed a fully functioning global WMA community.
It would seem that it is impossible to point out negative trends without unwittingly implying personal insults, and as that was never the intention of this blog I have removed the earlier posts.
Though never fear, I have not gone. (I can almost hear the collected sigh of relief)
I will simply try to steer this ship closer to the kittens from now on and further away from the rocky waters of divisiveness.
I do miss the entry about wardrobes though, I was quite proud of that one.
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