Greetings, Duelists! I bet everyone is getting pretty excited for the Multi-Format Tournament coming up this Saturday, June 23rd - Sunday June 24th. I know I'm going to be there--I love watching a good longsword tournament, and I've seen relatively little sidesword sparring at full-speed, so this weekend's starting to look like quite a treat.…
Summer Shakespeare
It is the time of year for outdoor theatre, and there are Shakespeare in the park productions in every major city in the world. But it is also the start of the season for the finest Shakespeare performed indoors, and this is your guide to the tops of the 2012 season (by reputation) Bard on…
What are the legalities of bringing a sword to your martial arts class?
A common question at a sword fighting school is whether it is legal to carry a sword through the streets of Vancouver. This article from the Iaido Journal goes into some length about the legalities for martial arts students carrying swords to and from class. It's a worthwhile read to better understand your rights. The…
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Sword fighting videos for this week at Academie Duello and on Duello.TV
Welcome everyone to another excellent week at Academie Duello and Duello.TV. This week we have some exciting news to report -- we have over 250 videos on Duello.TV about over 40 hours of content now available. We're also nearly all the way through creating lessons for our full Mastery Program calendar, which means we'll be…
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Announcing a special workshop with Luis Preto
Academie Duello is proud to host a longsword workshop not-to-be-missed with guest instructor Luis Preto from Preto Martial Arts! The seminar will be focused on the art of distance management and cover as it appears in a variety of European martial arts with the focus on the longsword. Preto's system is remarkably efficient and…
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Exercises for an Independent Seat
We begin all our riding sessions with warm-ups for both horse and rider. For the horse, this involves progressing walk and trot, circles, changes of direction and suppling exercises to warm up the muscles and joints prior to exercise. For the rider, the warm up serves an additional function: to develop an independent seat. The…
International and Sword-Tech Press
‘Hi-Tech’ initiatives continue offer us interesting tools for supporting our intent to fully and authentically recreate the fighting styles and ‘feel’ of our chosen medieval or renaissance period. Modern metallurgy guided by experienced metal-smithing has resulted in a dependable supply of consistent-quality, practice-ready, metal blades at an affordable price. Chemical engineering yields ‘artificial blades’ and…
The $99 WMA Library
Back in the spring, Clint reminded us about the importance of reading - and understanding - the texts necessary to progress within the Academie Duello ranks. Further, as an Instructor, he also reminded us of the importance to read, and possibly re-read the required texts whenever we have new experiences or knowledge. Reading should not…
Def'n: Robin Hood
Rob'n Hood (verb): to shoot an arrow directly into another arrow that you previously shot. Pictured is one of our Archery apprentice instructors, Aaron, proudly giving us a pictorial example; nice work!
[Photo] Knight Camp is coming!
See the full gallery on Posterous Yesterday saw the long-anticipated arrival of 30 new synthetic sparring swords. We're bringing them in to replace the foam-and-wood simulators we've been using in the youth program, both Knight Camp and the ongoing youth classes. The pommels can be swapped, making either longswords or arming swords, so we can…
Final Countdown...
Multi-Format Tournament Saturday, June 23, 2012 2pm-7pm Sunday, June 24, 2012 10am-5pm Do you have the courage to face an unending tide of opponents? Do you have the skill to protect yourself when the stakes are high? Do you have the endurance to slug it out with the most skilled of your peers until only…
Gentlemanly Conduct: Chivalry in Combat
The concept of chivalry originated with the knight. In fact, that’s all it means: knightly. The French word “cheval” means horse, and the thing that separated a knight from other soldiers was his steed. But we all know that chivalry goes beyond horse grooming, it is more closely related to the code of honour expected…
Sword Fighting Lessons on Duello.TV This Week
As of this week on Duello.TV we have over 250 videos posted! We have content on longsword, sidesword, rapier and dagger, cloak, buckler, and more. It's been exciting getting to this stage and we're looking froward to bringing even more cool stuff soon. This month all three levels of the Mastery Program are focusing on…
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