Feder & Pell

A Historical European Martial Arts & Crafts Laboratory

The Wound Index - Historical Accounts of the Effects of Wounds Sustained in Combat

WoundingWilliam BuschurComment

Those moments of time travel are what I personally chase in my HEMA practice, but the glosses of the zettel often make it difficult. They leave out a great deal of information related to the context and conventions of their time.

One such gap is the paucity of information about wounding in the glosses, so I’ve spent the better part of a year trying to fill it in with historical examples of the effect of swords in combat.

Pell Zettel Part 2: Duplieren & Mutieren

Zettel Pell TrainingWilliam Buschur

Liechtenauer transitions from a winden set-play - Be [he] Stronger against, Wind, Stab. If he sees, then take it down. - to a more general teaching on the role of the bind in the Art and how to conceptualize the fight. The Zornhau section finishes with the Duplieren and Mutieren techniques for fighting from a hard and soft bind, respectively. 

Pell Zettel Part 1: Zornhau Ort

Zettel Pell TrainingWilliam BuschurComment

Training without a partner is typically very limiting - many techniques are hard to simulate when practiced on your own. A single pell is a good solution for some techniques, but Liechtenauer's Art relies heavily on winding in the bind to attack the opponent behind the sword. Using two pells, one behind the other, is a great approximation of such a scenario - by treating the closer pell as a pseudo-bind, you can practice Liechtenauer's Zettel on your own.