What’s the most important part of all kinds of sword fighting?
Tai Sabaki.
Foot movement.
A great deal of time in Kendo is spent practicing proper foot movement. The most common used is a gliding movement that disguises the chosen moment of attack.
Another movement is Fumikomi – the sudden step forward – loud, with all your weight, almost a falling forward.
Whether it’s fencing, swashbuckling, or Kendo, the most important part is foot work.
The feet in Kendo are placed along a straight line, a little apart, front foot straight, back foot slightly bent to the side to give stability. Aikido practitioners recognize it immediately – it is their only stance.
I know you practice your sword grip, your 9 basic cuts and the 4-7 basic Kamae, but foot movement is key.
In fencing, the step often is to straighten the front foot forward while the rear leg uncoils. The body is driven forward, and the front foot drops…
…just like in fumikomi! Once the front foot drops, the rear leg slides forward, and the knee bends again. It’s kind of funny, but Danny Kaye (the actor) had fairly good fencing footwork. His sword skills were not as pronounced as Errol Flynn – but he actually had slightly better footwork.
The things we notice!
Swash buckling, on the other hand, has very little foot work. Pirates were not the romantic thing people try to make them out to be – pirates were outlaws, criminals. The charged forward in a run, swinging a sword. Many got somewhat good at sword fighting if they stayed alive long enough – because at some point the first mate or the Captain ran into you, and they usually had some sword skills. That’s why the Pirate often fired his flintlocks first as he charged on the ship at the first person running towards them – odds are good that was the mate or the Captain. The shot usually dispatched them, and the sword took the rest.
For those of you who obsess about your pirate stories, let’s please remember they’re never protagonists. Pirates are the same as today – it meant cruel treatment to those who fell into their hands, and death guaranteed.
Pirates, in your novels, are best depicted as the scum of humanity, human refuse without conscience, destined for the gallows if caught.
Okay, rant over! Back to sword fighting.
Pirates simply had one or two slashes, and no real stabs. The pirate simply swung the cutlass around.
To swing a cutlass, one has to learn something very quickly – don’t let the cutlass carry you around. you’re liable to slash yourself and bleed to death…
…or the swing will turn you around, your feet will trip you, and you’ll end up in the drink.
Right between two hulking ships, lashed together and slamming together in the surf.
Pirates who fall overboard like that end up splattered along the hull.
The pirate sword slash is really simple. Make a right to left downward diagonal cut.
Now make a left to right diagonal cut.
That’s it. All they had. Sorry if this disappoints you. A few like Edward Teach (Blackbeard) were legendary sword fighters, but I suspect that was an “in comparison to” and a combination of legend. But sure, if you want to write a Disney style series of YA books on Blackbeard studying Kendo or learning fencing, sure.
Just remember that French style fencing is useless with a cutlass. Remember part 1! Sword fighting evolves based upon the battlefield and the opponent’s sword and clothing.
Could Edward Teach possibly have learned the nine possible cuts with the cutlass? Sure. Your fiction is up to you. I’ll tell you that any historical novel work – unless you’re doing some kind of alternate reality thing – has to stand the test of history, and you’ll lose any readers who know their sword fighting and their history.
Now, if you have Blackbeard perhaps in a street market in Zanzibar, where a merchant with one green eye and one red one sells him a Japanese Katana, then is gone when Blackbeard turns around – okay, now you set up a believability factor. (WHY do I ALWAYS come up with these great ideas??? I think I have more novel and movie ideas than I can get to in two lifetimes!)
More coming up!
