Blades of Glory

If you have been reading my blog entries for the last week, you might have noticed my interest in medieval weaponry. One of the exemplar weapons of the period would have to be the broadsword. It is a weapon about 40 inches long and weighs about three pounds, with a sharpened edge on both sides. Not heavy, not unwieldy. It is a weapon used one-handed, though one can cup the pommel with the other hand to give it a bit of balance. Usually, though, your other hand is busy with a buckler (small shield—the buckling part of swash-buckling), or a dagger.

 

Most of us are familiar with sword-fighting through the movies. But most of this theatrical fighting is, shall we say, less than accurate. You want it to look good and exciting on film, but the reality is a lot different. What you see is men fighting with broad swords as if they were rapiers. A rapier can stab with accuracy. But broadsword fighting is more about chopping, not so much the lunging. There's a lot of starting and stopping, sort of a whack, whack, step back. Whack, whack, step back. (Remember, when you see sword-fighting on film or on stage, they are trying to hit the opponent's sword, not the opponent. In real physical combat, you darn well want to hit the other guy and hit them hard).

 

I wanted to know what it was like to feel a dagger blade or a sword blade sinking into flesh or glancing off bone, but as you can imagine, I didn't have any volunteers. So I did what any red-blooded American would do: I went to Costco and found the biggest slab of meat I could--with ribs--and nailed it to a post in my backyard. First, I took my dagger and stabbed the poor fellow repeatedly, just in the flesh and later near the bone. I wanted the experience of the shock of the blade, the feel of the grip and my hand against the guard as it sunk in.

 

That was one well-tenderized bit of meat when the dagger was through with it.

 

But then it was time for the sword!

 

The blade isn't very sharp on my sword. It can be, but it isn't. I thought it best not to have it sharpened when my son was in high school and had his other friends over. Any sort of blade is a boy magnet and my sword was hanging on the wall between the living room and dining room. They all wanted to play with it. (I never thought I'd hear myself say the words, "A sword is not a toy!").

 

That didn't stop my own little backyard CSI experiments, however. First, I tried my hand at pumpkin scalping. Though while it is true that my pumpkins don't have skulls inside them (that would be so cool, though, if they did!), it didn't take much for the swing of even a dull blade to lop off their scalps. But that was just my warm-up. It was time to give ye olde side of beef a shot.

 

Since a broadsword is mostly a chopping weapon (yes, you can stab with it, but it isn't it's main function. Indeed, you can grasp the blade with your free hand and have a focused jab into your opponent's helm, but it's better to chop) I was raring to go to smite it athwart.

 

Even with a dull blade, it cracked easily through the bone. Definitely a death blow.

 

The swing of the blade, the feel of the grip in my hand, the sounds of bone crunching, all informed what I later wrote about such mayhem.

 

And "the body" made quite a few good dinners afterwards. 

 

Comments

[Julie]

Jeri-I've been reading your posts all week, but I think this one is my favorite! Can't wait to read your book.