British Military Sabre Instruction - Stance/Footwork 1

This is the first session in the sabre block, so the military sabre block. We're going to be talking about Rowan, so the art of defense on foot, circa 1904. So it ranges all the way from the beginning of the Napoleonic period up until the end of the Napoleonic period, having had a reissue in 1824 in the United States. Okay, so one thing to remember is that most of what we're going to be seeing here is not meant to be used, or better yet, it can be used in terms of salle, so it means like in a room like this, but most of it would be used on the battlefield, so uneven terrain, uneven ground. Okay, so we're going to start off by our posture, how we're going to stand in guard. Some of you already know this because you've already had these blocks before, others it might be entirely new to you. So how are we going to do this? We're going to put our feet in an L with our left heel against the right foot, and from here we're going to walk with our right foot, about a foot, a foot and a half, so make it reasonable, make it comfortable. We don't want to have a super wide stance as if you were doing Reikia, so no need for this super wide stance like we do in Capo Ferro, no, just more upright. Remember, uneven terrain, we don't know what's out, I don't know what's behind me, maybe there's a rock or whatever, no, I want to be firm-footed, firm-planted and facing my opponents. In terms of weight, I would usually say weight on the back leg, but then you have to shift it every time you move, so my personal preference is that we remain with our weight right around in the middle, a little bit back. Okay, so just not all the way back, not all the way forward, middle, so if I'm again using this as a pendulum, so right around the middle, not fully back, not fully forward, okay, so right around the middle, this is a usual and a nice posture to be in. Okay, so make it comfortable, whatever you guys do. From here, what do we do with the left hand? We have two options, I'm going to leave the right hand for last, two options for the left hand. Personally, I like to have the hand on the hip. You can put it wherever you want, so right all the way back on the hip, whatever you do, don't put it up here in the front, otherwise chop-chop goes with the hand. Okay, so all the way back here, that's fine. If you guys prefer, if you are more familiar with small sword, you can leave the hand all the way up here. Don't do it, you know, around here, like in between, so not quite all the way up here, not quite all the way up here, just, you know, leave it on the back, or up here, it's your choice. So for me, I leave it back here. Right arm, we're going to extend the right arm, we're going to go into medium guard, so arm fully extended, and the blade's facing our opponent. This is not a guard, because it doesn't cover anything, so we're going to push our arm back a little bit, rotate the edge outward, and we are going to be on an outside guard. Okay, if I'm facing you, I want my blade to be on my outside, so my hand mustn't be in the center, a little bit towards the outside, so it can cover my entire outside area. Okay, so from here, how do we move? Exactly like we've been moving on every single sword since November. So small sword, rapier, saber, they all move the exact same way, so if you want to go back, left leg moves first, and then right leg accompanies, same thing again. If you want to move forward, right leg advances, and the left leg accompanies. Okay, again, remember, don't move like super wide movements, and super wide steps, no. Remember, you do not know, if you're facing your opponent, you can't really be aware of everything that is below, you can to some extent, but small steps to try and understand the terrain. In terms of right leg and right foot, how do they move? So you need to move heel first, and then toe, so you want to land with the heel first, and then move forward. With the back leg, I tend to go a little bit toe-heel, so the toe goes first, then the heel. Okay, make sense? We're going to be doing some exercises now to move forwards and backwards, and then we're going to go over with the rest. All right? Sounds good? Lovely, everyone on the other side. By the way, questions? Nothing? No? All good? Nice. So, a few things, like I was saying, a few corrections for you guys. So remember, don't make your advance too wide, and your retreat too wide, okay? Try to move your body just about, or better yet, try to walk just about the right distance for your body type, okay? In terms of guard, a few corrections as well to you. Okay, so usually, depending on the sources, some sources will say to have your point a lot higher than my head, for example. Other sources, like road, depending on the edition, might have my eyebrow, so right about my eyebrow should be. Okay, so if you're crossing swords, we want our hands to be on the outside, we want our edge to be on the outside as well. This is going to be our usual outside guard, and we're going to be for the majority of the time, okay? This is the strongest guard, at least according to road, this is like the primary engaging guard, sometimes we might go on to inside, but I'm going to leave that for later. Okay, so for the time being, let's focus on the outside guard, okay? And the same thing here, so if I am to retreat, so you chase, if I advance, there we go. No point in doing two wide steps, so okay, good. So remember, point right around the forehead of your adversary, right about the eyebrow, that should be a right position for you. All right, so can we move on to the next?