I've found out there's a place in Portsmouth that does Scottish broadsword and some quarterstaff work and am off to give it a lookie tomorrow. I wanted to ask though if there's any advice on trying weapons arts in general, or any warning signs to look out for? Never tried weapon work, and I'm aware the club and HEMA type things are meant to be about the history first so my usual ways of judging schools from a sport art basis is a bit useless here. Also, is this finally something I can rock up to in jeans and a t shirt?
You can wear what you want, but you might prefer something a little more loose-fitting than jeans. In terms of what to expect - be prepared to be shown a load of odd stances and footwork, but look for similarities between that and the stuff you already know. For example, stances should be centred, well-balanced, very mobile, etc, whilst guards should generally feel like the close down lines of attack from the opponent. Watch out for whether they spar - I would assume that all good sword classes should spar, though it may be some time before they invite you to join in. Otherwise have fun!
If they ascribe to George Silver's doctrine of True Time, you may find the timing to be counterintuitive, with the hand always preceding any movement of the foot. Primarily unarmed stylists sometimes find that challenging.
Just got back, it went pretty good it seems interesting. Definitely a different thing to try and do especially things related to the feet. My one question was I mentioned being left handed and the instructor said more than happy for me to spar left handed, but for drills train with the right just to make it a bit fairer on my partners. Absolutely fine with that, its a new thing so I'm happy to do it and using my right hand didn't seem too bad. I assume sparring with my left I'd be quicker and would have the advantage of being awkward, but if I'm learning all the techniques right handed is it worth me switching hands to spar, or am I better off just sticking to using my right?
Or ask your partner to be a lefty for you to learn the technique, and then do left on right. I can drill ambidextrously, but when sparring I use my swords left handed. If you can be right handed for them, they can reciprocate.
That would be a possible preference, but I'm a bit loathe to ask them to when the instructor has already said to just practice right handed. Don't want to seem to be ignoring him and all that and its a small quite informal class
Yes. You can find basket hilts reversed for lefties from the period. Even in the 1400's, the Liechtenauer manuals have some short advice for lefties and righties amounting to don't fence from the right if you're left handed and vice versa. Paurnfeyndt has some left handed half swording in his manual from the 1500's. The bias against lefties is comparatively recent, peaking in the 1800's. Pallas Armata has a lot of advice for cross handed fighting for rapier in the 1600's.
