@@tristram0073 Cutlass is actually an excellent choice, they were designed to be used aboard ships, after all - IE cramped indoor spaces where you can't manoeuver a large weapon around. Alone they'd be pretty potent, but shove a buckler in as well as it's a definite recipe for success!
You should invite a HEMA instructor on your channel and prove your theories. Spar with weapons and drill a home defense scenario. That’s what this channel is all about! 🎉👏
@@burt2800 Yeah, when he said that an MMA fighter is more dangerous with a sword than a HEMA practitioner, the person in the room who has actually SPARRED HEMA practitioners with swords was like "Yeah I don't think so buddy"
Of course, he's not going to do that. That requires an open and objective mind in such things. This guy, Icey Mike, thinks he has everything figured out and he has nothing to learn from others.
@@shaness112233 Exactly! It's his arrogance and hubris. This guy, Icey Mike, has no objectivity in these matters. Any thinking person should take what he says with more than a "grain of salt". A high level HEMA practitioner would destroy him! He has the arrogance of believing he knows better than anyone else. I watch his videos now and then for satire more than anything. There is not a humble bone in his body.
I gotta say I agree with Matt Easton on this. Watching you guys spar with weapons was immensely entertaining, much like watching the beginners spar for the first time in HEMA class.
Matt Easton mega-missed the point. Why in the name of allholy fuck would you ever train against a sword and shield in a self defense scenario? Is there an epidemic of medieval brigands walking around, breaking into houses? Viking raiders just robbing people in the streets? No, there isn't, so why in the fuck would you ever train for that? You never need to train for a gun cuz guns beat everything (assuming you can wrestle or have distance) and a bat/Crowbar is fairly common.
@@johntheidiot9046 Seems like you're the one who missed the point. SMH. And only in the USA does one have to worry about guns, because the rest of the first world isn't gun crazy.
Interesting vid. There's a big misconception here though. HEMA has absolutely tons of MMA practitioners already. Just in one of my classes I have an MMA instructor and a Jujitsu instructor, and a load of other people who have dabbled in assorted unarmed martial arts. HEMA practitioners often come from other martial arts backgrounds and often keep training other things at the same time as HEMA. Also, we focus on weapons Vs weapons, with most of our training time actually being sparring. So basically not very different to MMA, just that we focus on weapons Vs weapons. Fun vid though.
@@Echo_419 The best thing about HEMA is that anyone can be an authority if they want to because it’s all made up from vaguely detailed manuscripts from 500 years ago. Lol
Well I might have said exactly what you were going to in the video you wanted to make on the best sword for self defence, but I definitely took four times longer to say it ^_^ Fun video mate, you might be surprised about how much I agree, with one larger exception which I think you can guess ^_^ It's going to be a fun discussion. Cheers mate.
@@gromse5616 I love Mike but he clearly disadvanged his opponents. 'OOh I got hit!' while he stabbed them and pushed with his buckler. Cutesy bs. They laid down for him.
The deadliness of a weapon in the main thing setting apart any weapon art with any open fist art. A boxer can go into a fight expecting to take a many hits but keep going, as soon as a weapon is involved you can take maybe one good hit and you're done with the fight, and possibly dead. Two HEMA guys fighting for real, one probably kills the other. Fighting a random street dude, the HEMA guy probably kills them. Fighting an MMA guy who's willing to go in as wonky as Mike does here, you both die.
@@matthewmalleus7135 Whut? That was the whole point of this exercise.. I doubt you'll find a criminal who breaks into peoples' houses with a sword and a shield in the hopes of having an awesome duel if the owner happens to also own a sword and shield. What's the issue for you here? O.o
One thing that I've noticed in pretty much every physical sport I've taken part in is that the same people win everything. I think it's very strange that you draw a fundamental difference between "MMA guys" and "HEMA nerds" Because the people that win in MMA are the same kinds of people that win in HEMA, sometimes literally as I know people that train both simultaneously. They're the tough, athletic, aggressive people that are driven to excel. You take someone like that and put them into any discipline and they will excel. An MMA guy I'm sure would win an MMA match against a HEMA guy but saying that an MMA guy will win against a HEMA guy in HEMA after a couple hours is pretty foolish. Now if you take a high-level MMA fighter and put them in the ring with a HEMA nerd that's been doing it for 6 months and doesn't know their foot work and has no proprioception and doesn't work out then sure. But if you put them in with a high-level tournament HEMA fighter they'll barely be a speed bump until they've been studying for a couple of years bare minimum no matter how good they are at MMA. Most people are shocked at how helpless they are in a sword fight once they've fought someone that has significant training and some real competition under their belt. PS: I know everyone is gonna disagree but Rapier and Dagger ALL DAY for home defense. It mostly occurs in hallways and there's no way anyone is getting around it. If you have a couple of feints and a quick stocatta, Anderson Silva himself isn't getting in on you. And even if he does. Now he has to deal with the dagger. I'd happily run this experiment with you Mike, just hit me up. Love you're content and the fact you're looking at a bit of HEMA.
Italian rapier was my pick as well-at least for long hallways, since you cannot move offline. I think a shorter cut-and-thrust blade (eg gladius or short messer) would be preferable in other room types, though, although the dagger would be second-best to the best in those as well.
Honestly in any unarmored fighting situation where you opponent is armed with anything less than a spear or a big kite shield or obviously a gun and rapier + dagger is straight up abusive. Having to get past the point of a rapier is a challenge enough in itself for even a trained fighter and you have to do it with well enough to then stop the immediate knife attack that's coming your way.
Rapier and dagger seems like more developed version of sword and shield, so I can agree, but you have to be profficient enough. But buckler is still more effective at defence in chaotic low light conditions.
that rapier and dagger will mess you up. but I think replacing the rapier with a sidesword might work in certain situations (but then again I love sideswords).
@@ecgwineicling2543 discovering hema from scratch isnt a thing becose it goes against the whole premise of HEMA itself, wich stands for historical european martial arts and is about learning and using historical techniques from old manuscripts. by definition it cannot be discovered from scratch in the modern world and can only exist in the presence of historical manuscripts. what we see in the video is modern and american, not historical and european, and it doesnt involve any old manuscripts. you entirely missed mike's point about hema. wich is that nobody needs historical european manuscripts to actualy learn how to use a sword. also there is this idea in some hema circles that we should always keep it to what the old masters have written down and never ever build up on it and improve it with new knowledge becose that would not be historical. this is also something that happens in traditional martial arts where they dont adapt over time and that also makes them bad for self defence.
Hema nerd here, nearly one year’s experience. Great video, really interesting. Altough I gotta say, while I know Mike would pulverize me empty handed, after seeing him with sword and buckler, most skilled HEMA practicioners would kill him in 5 seconds with a sword. Its just another ballgame. Martial artists fare pretty well in HEMA, because of stance, power, speed and distance-timing control. But with a sword as with any other MA you gotta learn the moves. Old moves or new, you must learn them.
Even those training for a year can see the obvious flaws to what he is saying. Me thinks also that he's a fraud just trying to get alot of hits for his video to actually come out and say something sooooo ridiculous. That or he is a complete noob when it comes to martial arts and their are plenty of them out there.
@@Huggybear-ot7rv but that is not what Icy Mike said (and pretty bold to call him a fraud 😂). He said, that most guys who train empty handed combat with sparring and all are able to pick up a weapon and use it according to universal principles to some effect, while the other way around a pure Hema swordsman being thrown in an empty handed fight, would be pulverized. And of course he is not really knowing enough about the Hema world to really judge all Hema, but that is of course the provocation for attention as usual, if someone is offended by Icy Mike being himself, then better avoid his videos 😂
@@tuerkefechi He also said an MMA fighter with a sword is mor dangerous than a hema fighter with a sword, while in reality a hema fighter would utterly and instantly pulverize any MMA fighter in a sword fight.
@@stopYmpersonatYngmYacCount Yes, that is of course not really true. Though I think that an MMA fighter can grab a weapon and be more dangerous in a fight vs a trained swordsmen, than the other way round if an untrained swordsman would face an MMA guy in an unarmed fight. And I think, that is what he really meant (besides all provocation).
As a Hema practitioner who also wrestles and agrees with a lot of your takes, a messer is my sword of choice for self defense. Not only can you thrust and cut, but it is designed to excel in the wrestle.
I like how Seth is trying to be so cordial. Mikes obviously talking out of his butt and Seth, who actually has experience, is trying not to offend anyone. 😂
Hey Mike - I'm a HEMA instructor (primarially focused on dagger) who loves your channel. Also a veteran with quite a bit of firearms training, and I've got a little bit of experience in BJJ and Muay Thai as well. I'd love to go over some of the topics you covered in this video, maybe even do a colab if you happen to be in the Northeast sometime and would be willing to come to Connecticut. Feel free to shoot me a message!
Gladius would be great because it’s for stabbing from super close distances which you would do inside the house, like in a hallway. Also you don’t need to see to be able to use it, if it’s dark you could pretty much just feel it out and thrust
I went with gladius at first. But after thinking about the couple of scenarios where Mike lost his sword maybe shorter and less front weighted would work better (assuming opponents aren’t wearing armour)
One absolutely true point - fight sports translate really well. Went to a HEMA class and they were blown away by how quickly I picked it up. Conversely, their understanding of extreme range and speed was a challenge for me for sure. But the footwork, timing, angle work translates very well
There is actually an interesting split in the hema community. One side is very focused on learning through experience, sparing seeing how things workout. They try to relearn mechanics using historically accurate weapons. The other side believes that for it to be hema it must be learned through the medium of historic manuscripts. It can lead to some interesting things. I saw one longsword match where one guy hip tossed the other. The guy didn’t know how to break fall and landed pretty hard.
No both groups spar. Some at an extremely high level from both camps. But the comparison between traditional and modern martial artists isn’t terrible.
for the last bit there, funnily enough theres an actual historical precedent for doing this, its why every heavily armored combatant has a sidearm(mostly daggers). if you cant beat them upright, throw them around and stab the weakpoints in the armor(mostly the eye-slits from what iv seen)...
@@viiltelijamurhaaja7225 Not all classes are the same. You can take ones that focus only on sword, so you spar with sword techniques only. In a different class it'll be "everything goes". That dude that didn't break the fall probably 1 didn't take any grappling class (which are also part of HEMA), 2 didn't know he was in an "everything goes" sparing. Its like you wen't into a spar convinced it'll be just boxing, and then someone knees you in the gut.
Honestly, most groups I'm aware of do both. The manuscripts are inspiration and a short cut to dismiss a number of misconceptions we as modern people have due to not having exposure in our lives to these weapons, but once you've gotten past that point it's mostly the same as any other martial art - good footwork, positioning and efficient handling of their weapon.
Haha, I'm a HEMA practitioner that has been following this channel for a while. I enjoyed the video! I do it as a hobby. Everyone saying he's gonna shake up the HEMA community doesn't know them. Or half of them. I like to think it's a legit martial art in the sense that, we spar, we experiment, and, the more mature ones of us know that we're practicing an ancient art of war/dueling that can't compete with modern things like firearms. Great opinions, suggestions and advice and fun to watch as usual.
I sort of disagree because the thing is in my personal experience longsword has helped me a whole lot in bayonet fighting. When I was in the Marine Corps I essentially did have Longsword and half swording techniques with bayonets and pugil sticks I was extremely effective. The drill instructors had to put two people sometimes three to be a fair fight to fight against me.
define "can't compete with firearms" perhaps on a spiritual level, but firearms very much do compete lol. Is it about the skill ceiling of technicality being higher in HEMA?
I love how you can see the Dunning-Kruger Effect in this video. Mike has a little bit of knowledge and has gone full-blown self-proclaimed expert, whereas Seth has put time and effort training and sparring outside of his comfort zone and realizes how much he doesn't know. It takes years to train any skill to a high level. I'm pretty sure Mike is exaggerating to some degree in this video to stir up discussion and interest, but now I'm thinking about whether or not he would be down for some friendly sparring matches next time I am in NC. I can bring some extra gear he can use and he can show me how an MMA fighter will wreck a HEMA nerd 😇
i think it's less Dunning-Kruger and more so the sheer arrogance of MMA. They legitimately think they are the only style you will ever need, and that they can beat any fighter after 6 months of training in MMA. (expect, of course, another MMA guy with more experience.) they have made similar claims about wrestling, boxing, karate, capoera, tdk, name a style, and i guarantee someone in the MMA community has said a trained BJJ fighter can wreck shop.
I definitely agree with you about the arrogance in MMA. I watch these guys playing with their weapons in the video and I just want to help them learn. I also want to exploit their weaknesses. People who don't practice HEMA often fail to realize how nerdy we really are and many of us love to test our skills against other fighters just to see if we can learn anything new. We often hold our own quite well because we tend to pressure test our skills on a regular basis against many different styles. Make it interesting enough and you might find a line of people waiting for their opportunity to test their skills against you (the general "you", not the specific "you", although I never turn down a friendly sparring match). I have to admit, my initial reaction when I saw this video was to check travel expenses to NC to see if my finances would enable me to propose a friendly sparring match with these guys. Unfortunately, the answer was no. I am poor lol
@@davidegaruti2582 This is very correct. It's a ruled sport. Even guys that only have done combatives lose going into this because combatives are not designed for ruled sports. Any martial artists that knows has done both combatives and MMA would say in the real world combatives will win. It is designed to seriously injure, maim, or kill an opponent. Something MMA fighters and most other martial arts do not train to do.
@@maddogs1989Joachim Meyer's has cited pulling a man's testicles off because it was an available option in combat. This is how they trained for combat way back in Germany. To be prepared for anything as well as be prepared to do anything to give yourself an unfair advantage or win the combat.
I've enjoyed your channel for a long time now. It's a lot of fun to watch and provides some great content. I've spent nearly 20 years training in and instructing HEMA. I've never seen HEMA as "the way," but a way that has some very useful tools one can add to his/her toolbox. We train at my school with a very open mind and I encourage the study of other arts as well. It makes for a well-rounded, more knowledgeable fighter. Some of my students also like your channel, by the way. I'm not a TH-camr as it's not something I'm seriously into doing myself, though I've thought about it. I enjoy watching though and while I think you may have been a bit too critical of HEMA (a technique found in Fiore's fight book along with me being alert helped prevent me being stabbed in the face or neck by an attacker once) you do also have some very good points as well. HEMA , like other arts has it's share of martial arts snobs (shrug). Even within the art you have people I call "purists" and others I call, "thinkers." That's a larger conversation though... Anyway, keep doing what you're doing. You've got an informative and entertaining channel and I'll keep watching.
@@Grandmas_Favorite it's a joke, look at all the clubs, only a percent of a percent are fit the rest are morbidly obese, unfit and unconditioned not to mention weak.
Whats interesting about a lot of the hema stuff on daggers and grappling is its pretty much the same thing you are teaching with a slightly different flavor. That seems to be the case for any kind martial arts that actually work. Same thing different flavor.
That's the thing. He's talking about a subject he only has a superficial understanding of. I don't think he is 100% serious. I think he just wants another related community to come check out his channel.
@@The_Gallowglass now that I have a minute of your time I'd like to contact you about your car's extended warranty... JK! How about you dear random TH-cam fight fan? What medieval armament are you going to use to defend yourself with?
None of your opponents had a sword even though a home invasion with a machete is quite realistic. Training with a sword (like they do in HEMA) would allow you to end a fight against someone untrained with a machete waay quickly and safely. Those aspects are really important in a home defence scenario. Training and sparring with a weapon you intend to use to defend your home makes you more effective in using it, who would have said
This people are not training good. Sei have to be careful not to heart each other. They should wear face protection and armor. For sword i prefer a short one with hand coverage like a falcheon. The round shield should be a little big bigger around 45 centimeters. And it is not only a shield. It's a second weapon for the other hand too. You can hammering in with a front of the shield, are using the ring for attacks.
I've done mixed martial arts most of my life. I've done HEMA for a few years. I get wrecked by people that are better trained. HEMA is very technical. You don't just pick that up from knowing martial arts. Sure, I have an advantage from knowing how to move my body and having a good center of balance. That's just an advantage over beginners. The trained HEMA dudes have that too and the techniques. No comparison. Keep in mind that HEMA source materials were written by knights trying to teach others how to effectively kill other trained knights. So, yes, randomly flailing a sword and a confused home invader is probably fine but you're boned if your home invader has a solid knowledge of HEMA.
"you're boned if your home invader has a solid knowledge of HEMA." That's a risk that one might be willing to take. I don't really get strong thug vibes from the HEMA community (as opposed to MMA, sadly).
Nearly all the historical books are not instruction manuals but advertisements to nobility for their schools. Read about it, this is why they suck 90% of the knowledge is lost and they're trying to reinvent it. Hilariously enough very few do any conditioning when these advertisement books even displayed fitness exercises as part of the schools curriculum.
I am the other way around, i would probably get wrecked in the octagon by anyone who knows what they are doing, but i would probably defeat any professional MMA fighter in a sword fight, unless they have a year of sword training with regular sessions against resisting opponents. If they visit a hema school once or twice a month it would probably take many years. Distance is way different, and tanking a blade the way you can a punch is... Unhealthy.
Even though Icy Mike mostly talked about HEMA, I as a HAMAA guy who mains Takoba and Shield feel called out and would love to meet up so he can test that theory. Anyway, great video, seems like yall had fun.
@@bonogiamboni4830 thing is asia has HCMA-historical chinese martial arts, gatka as one of the most well known indian sword arts, JSA for japanese sword arts(and battojutsu as a common but not complete catch-all for most other weapon-based martial arts), and in south america you dont have that many folks trying to revive/keep old fighting traditions alive outside of stuff like capoiera(which is in many ways an issue of first regular colonization and then neo-colonialism so no shade towards southamericans). All that being said HMA-historical martial arts is a legit term to encompass it all,and if it's just a sword art from anywhere historical fencing tends to do it.
FINALLY! I can be the comment nerd! What I've always been waiting for! I've been fighting SCA, Hema, Amtgard, basically anything with a stick since like '98. (Yeah, I'm that LARP'ing nerd.) Some basic thoughts: - MMA guys do really well with understanding distance. Also? Their footwork is amazeballs. So, I stab them. Well, except for Kali guys. That shit doesn't work and makes me giggle. - Knuckles are a thing. Cut them off the poor bat guy. - You take a real solid shot to your punch shield, and it's gonna do two things. Flatten out the punch, and open your center...to get stabbed. - Cliff was the most realistic sword fight in the video. Take the one shot to trap the weapon, then take their sword away and beat them to death. Tourniquet as needed. - Put down the shield, go Florentine. (Sword and dagger, sword and sword.) As you saw? Any time someone closes range, you're going to get trapped behind the shield, and your sword is useless because you can't really generate enough force to cause damage beyond, "crap I got nicked." I dunno. Beyond those thoughts, and my voluminous experience playing stick tag, I don't actually have a "home defense sword". Wall hangers, sure. I've even got a really really nice one that I'll love for the zombie apocalypse, but if I can't shoot an intruder? I'm going for a mace, or even that tacticool whip you showed. Hallways suck. Oh! Some earned info? If you're gonna nerd out in the hallway? Watch out for the overhead light fixtures, if you knock one out and it hits you in the head? Game over man.
On the knife thing you were talking about, the reason why it’s shown like that in manuals is because those manuals were meant for noblemen or other people who were preparing for a duel of some kind, where both people would have armor and would start the fight in equal footing. It’s likely that normal “self defense knife fighting” that we see today was similar to how peasants and brigands would have fought eachother with knives. We just don’t know that because peasants and brigands didn’t bother to write it down.
Pretty much. Even for texts written by people who would’ve trained actual warriors and were warriors themselves (the minority of them) they likely were putting down techniques they used under THAT context: 1) they were fighting an experienced weapons user as well 2) they had to have advanced techniques that took armor into account or dealt with things that ignored armor 3) the context of how a battle works is different from a home invasion 4) they had specialized equipment that only exists in reproductions today 5) they were dealing with a variety of opponents from varying backgrounds and wealth statuses, which would greatly influence how complex the techniques would be It’s the same for a bunch of old martial arts techniques where people go “oh holy shit this is actually really good for dealing with these specific movements/techniques”. It’s not generalized training but a specific movement to overcome a specific type of threat. It’s less that 10% of what you’ll put time into, but it does matter at the highest level of mastering the art. It is not, however, necessary for learning how to fight against regular or even trained people.
That's a very good point. Most people depicted in manuals and treaties were nobles, masters or soldiers, not peasants and common folk, but that does not mean they did not have their own fighting styles.
Most of the knife fighting manuals wouldn't be very applicable because it's just one minor aspect of combat taking out of context. For one thing, Nobles wouldn't be very interested in having a duel that starts and ends with knives because they were never considered to be that kind of weapon. As weird as this sounds, knives were more of a GRAPPLING weapon, as in, if you were close enough to use a knife, as in modern times, you're close enough to grapple. Something that always seems to be missing from all the pre gunpowder combat depictions is that grappling was a MASSIVE part of combat training literally since the dawn of warfare. Have you ever wondered why Greco-Roman wrestling is all about taking your opponent down and pinning them? It's been a sport for 2500 years at least, and certainly the premise goes back much farther. It would be a weird thing to just come up with, and why would people bother training for it, unless of course it actually has a purpose, and it does. Taking someone down and taking a good position means you can stab them with your knife, a tool that nearly all soldiers would have on hand at all times, especially during battle. It's not for 'fighting' with, it's for stabbing with, there's a difference. It would only be useful to take out your knife once you were already in the grappling stage, and getting to a dominant position would give you the opportunity to pull it out and stab. If you're close enough to have to drop your spear and shield, you don't have time to draw your dagger. It's not something you would go into a fight with in your hand already and fight with it, it's for finishing up after you 'won' the grappling. The 'pinning' part of wrestling is more interesting because when you pin your opponent and they can't escape, you no longer even have to kill them. If you have a king or general covered in armor that you want alive, even if they are dead set on dying before they're taken alive, charging in, getting to their legs, taking them down and pinning them means that they can be your prisoner no matter how hard they want to fight back. This is why wrestling, judo etc exist, and mostly don't involve submissions. In fact submission martial arts barely existed until recently, as well as striking arts, but wrestling goes back THOUSANDS of years. If you knew how to fight, you were probably a soldier, and if you were a soldier, you would have weapons. I love ju jitsu, but if Gordon ryan tried to pull guard against a Roman soldier with a pugio (very long thrusting dagger that ALL Roman soldiers carried) he's probably going to die. He might get stabbed and bleed out after he chokes the soldier out, but the whole thing about historical martial arts is winning without getting a fatal wound. Beating a knife wielding attacker is a hollow victory if you bleed out anyway. Martial arts are bad at knife defense because they're not made for knife defense. Saying modern martial arts are better against knives than old manuals is dumb because ALL of them are designed around the understanding that your opponent won't stab you, and ALL of the old manuals are based on the understanding that not only can they stab you, but they WILL stab you. The manuals aren't perfect, but the simple fact of then acknowledging the weapon makes it (by default) more useful against knives than any other martial art that doesn't.
Duels were not fought in armour, not in Italy, not since renaissance AFAIK. A knife (a bolognese dagger was 30cm long, BTW) is a short weapon. Not ideal for self defence. A sword (rapier and its evolutions) was much better for people who could afford it. As a second weapon a buckler was much better than a dagger, so much that there are laws of the time against carrying one to limit urban violence. Hence people start defending with a heavy cloak (cape) that is surprisingly effective.
short and stabby seems best for home defense. less awkward indoors, and probably less awkward around the shield. emphasis is on defense though, if you really were trying to chase after someone to cut them down maybe something longer is better in some circumstances
sounds like you want a roman gladius lmao. the best part about them is that theres a bunch of variations of the sword, theres hacky slashy ones like machetes and very stabby thrust oriented ones that are basically hand spears as well as multiple design's in between that are more of a hybridization of stab and slash. also a large dagger could work
I'm not much of a martial artist, i"d love to learn, but getting injured in the Military has left me not able to handle a lot of it. That being said, I love your videos, they bring a real life practicality to the table I find valuable.
This guy's is full of shit. Don't fall for it brother. I've been a martial artist for 30 years and I did 8 years in the infantry. Listen to what he's saying in this video man. He's recommending people use a weapon they don't have any training in. That's dumb and dangerous.
Literally any sword is going to be extremely effective against an unarmed, unarmored opponent. Basically any sword is so effective in that context that it ends up coming down to what you're trained to use. The only exceptions might be due to having to deal with things like cramped hallways. This means that long, two handed weapons would be counterintuitive, and that thrusts would likely play a larger role than cuts. Short swords would also be a solid option in this case, much like how they were used in history. One thing I'd like to point out though, swords take a great deal of training to be effective with. Just because a sword makes contact with the opponent doesn't mean that hit would actually do anything. It takes years of experience with real techniques to consistently be able to deliver effective cuts, especially if you're wanting to do it against a moving target. Thrusts are easier to be effective with, but training with actual techniques helps you do this while keeping yourself protected and making it more difficult for someone to protect themselves from. These things are where arts like HEMA are useful. You won't be effective with a sword unless you practice real sword techniques under some form of resistance. Another side note, the reason HEMA pulls from historical texts is because it's not a surviving art. There is no living tradition or evolution of European sword combat aside from what people have pieced together from historical sources. The closest we have outside of that is Olympic fencing, with all of its obvious limitations. Additionally, this isn't medicine. We've actually dedicated time to developing medicine over the past several centuries. That hasn't happened with sword combat. People stopped doing it for centuries, that's how it got worse. If people forgot how to wrestle for 200 years, then looked back at illustrations of double leg takedowns only to say "nah that's old, I'll stick with my modern football tackle" that would be equally ridiculous. Also, HEMA people spar, extensively and often. They even compete.
For thousands of years the combination of sword and shield or even sword alone was really useful in melee combat and humans survived for hundreds of years when in melee so it is still useful as long as it is melee and the wielder is a skilled fighter (just like with any other weapon type).
The spear has been around longer than homo-sapiens. It has been used and likely killed more (John Keegan "A History of Warfare" among other sources) people than all other weapons combined.
@@vicnighthorse battles weren't one-on-one matches, but many vs many. When spear breaks or stucks in the opponent, you need secondary weapon when the other enemies are coming.
@@mareklame8589 Of course, it still doesn't change that the spear has been the most and most widely used weapon in human history. It was so for reason that proved out for hundreds of thousands of years. The sword is a new comer in the last 3,600 years and has indeed been an excellent secondary weapon as you posit.
@@vicnighthorse Spear and shield seems like the universal foundation for single or group combat in the open, with sword as a back up, and shield and sword as the universal choice for tight quarters.
9:55 with the HEMA it makes sense to look at the old stuff because they don’t fight that way anymore. But they did it more back then so they would be better at sword and shield fighting and etc.
HEMA nerd checking in. You demonstrated it well in the video: a weapon capable of thrusting is optimal, since most often you'll lack space to cut/slash/swing properly. A small shield like that buckler is good, but even a medium-sized shield like the Roman scutum would be great, for blocking off a corridor/door way and offering little opportunity for an attacker to harm or pass you. The best method in the modern day, though, is the art of Click-Pow. Also, I like your analysis towards the end about the "proper way" of using a weapon. It's fun to learn the "proper way," but age (experience, knowledge) and treachery defeat youth and skill.
Cutlass. Punch with the bell, big pommel for striking, short for tight spaces, point for stabbing, curved edge for blocking and slashing. Great tool for untrained folks, designed to be used by sailors who didn't practice a bunch because they were making a ship sail.
@ERRATAS 0202 larping and martial arts are not the same thing. You'd have to be an idiot to think that an mma guy would beat a hema practitioner who's been training for years
13:48 I don't think you'd be able to find many people to tell the story of a fight they lost when it involves lethal weapons. Especially when it's up and close with blades and especially when medicine/emergency calls and responses weren't quite as good as today's.
Paraphrasing your comments here: "Put a sword in an MMA guy's hand and he will give HEMA guys a problem. Bring a HEMA guy into MMA or boxing class... it's not the same" Now, where have I heard this before? O yes. Boxers used to say the exact same thing about MMA not so long ago b/c in their mind MMA took no skill. Any martial art benefits from the quality of the athlete that trains the style, and honestly, I should not need to explain this. Athleticism is very important to MA. Higher levels of coordination, speed agility, power, and conditioning are all essential ingredients to any combat art. MMA fighters have these in spades. We often see D1 wrestlers that have never done MMA before in their lives transition into MMA very easily and dominate after a short time of training. Is that b/c MMA takes no skill....or are they simply just high-level athletes that can adapt quickly to new skill sets? Most HEMA athletes are enthusiast-level weekend warriors that are there to have fun. The level of athleticism on average is going to be lower than in an MMA gym. So I would not be surprised that MMA guys on average are going to pick up HEMA quite quickly.
I think they were afraid to hit you with the bat in case they hurt you. They definitely seemed to be holding back. Use foam weapons like in Dagorhir and wallop each other. Dag doesn't allow head shots but you could put protective headgear on. For a bat swing at the arm holding the sword or at the head would seem to be the strike to take.
Sword and buckler teaches you to fight with your sword arm/hand being covered by your buckler so striking the sword arm is not easy without an offhand of your own.
I think you're breaking one of your own rules. "Name one thing you did and were good at, without ever doing it before. That's right, that has never happened." I think an experienced martial artist with a sword will beat someone who doesn't do martial arts and also has a sword. For the reasons you mention of range management. But someone who practices HEMA will definitely beat a martial artist if they both have swords because of the significant time practicing how to fight with swords. If you're arguing you don't need HEMA for home self defense, you're right. But it's the same way you don't need to be a martial artist to defend yourself. Taking a couple classes, learning to throw something that resembles a proper punch and kick and sparring one to two times will make you way more experienced than most people you encounter. But you still won't be at the level of a true martial artist. This also applies to HEMA
HEMA runs all kinds of tournaments - it's not like just the document. Those texts are super vague and open to much interpretation, they're really a starting point for the martial art.
As an experienced HEMA swordsman, I will say for many people who don’t have any sword using experience, uncontrollable cutting only looks scary but won’t be effective to stop the crazy attacker since most inexperienced swordsman will not use the cutting edge properly while may lead the cut couldn’t even cut through water bottle rather than arms and legs. Therefore, a balance blunt weapon (like a small mace or morning star) might be more effective since the damage come only with impact.
Yeah, no way I could figure out how to cut with a sword without hema. Can’t figure out balance or range at all despite years of MMA and jiujitsu experience and competition. Could never make it work.🙄
My 12 year old sister limbs logs with an axe while i split the bolts. If you think you need to be an expert swordsman to cut, that says a lot about you.
If you can try with a slightly bigger shield, or maybe hold a stick in the same hand that you're holding the buckler. African martial arts do this all the time. That would give you better cover without adding too much bulk to the shield. Also, I would actually like to see some crossover with the HEMA community. I think you both might have something to learn from each other.
This just sounds like one person thinking their art is better than the other to justify the amount of time they've dedicated to it. He should spar with someone who's dedicated even just half their time into practising HEMA that he has put into MMA to see if his assumtion is correct.
For a good sword. A Roman gladius maybe? Designed for short stabbing motions it would seem good for close quarters on a home or hallway. But I am far from any expert on swords.
The difference for dagger work back then was different because of the clothes people wore back then, they wore more layers and were thicker so you would fight a modern person the same way you would fight a person from the medieval or Renaissance Era
I just posted the same thing in a response to someone else. People don't understand the history and how it shapes what was done. But they sure seem to have an opinion on it.
9:30 The problem with Dagger sources in HEMA is that they are mostly made for/against armoured combat. You mostly see techniques which work in a harnisch but not without protection. Also the hits are against the weaknesses in the armour.
Be a ninja … a shadow in the night … a little whisper in the woods … a fear feeling in your neck at midnight… be prepared always for everything everytime everywhere… be the sword ⚔️… 🍀🍀🍀✌️💀👍🔥🔥🔥🌎🔥🔥🔥🔥
There are many types of historical martial arts. I was at a tournament in Vyborg, I saw guys in armor beating each other with halberds, swords, switching to close combat with daggers, there was also a wrestling involved. There were knockdowns, one guy was taken away by ambulance with a shoulder injury. All this in plate armor in hot august. I do not know what exactly Mike means when he says HEMA, but what I saw was a real MMA in armor. They fought according to some tournament rules of 15th century Germany.
If they start stabbing each other with daggers in close range into armor gaps, that's HEMA. If they just whack each other with blunt swords from far range, that would be Buhurt.
@@jaketheasianguy3307 They started from a long distance with two weapons, a sword and a mace, then stayed with one to choose from, in one hand, then moved into close combat with daggers. This is the essence of the rules of the German tournament or something
Blade length of 18-24", that can cut & thrust, with robust hand protection. A naval sabre, for example -- ship combat is fairly similar to in-house fighting.
I don't practice hema, but I know a lot about it just because I like it and watch it. I think any short sword would do for home defense. Whether it be a gladius, 19th century artillery sword, cutlass, falchion (if it's on the shorter end), etc. With a shield, I would pick something with great thrusting ability like the gladius to thrust from behind the shield just like you do in this video!
In a lot of these bouts, there's an interesting dynamic that varies a lot in HEMA rulesets - the concept of a double tag. In most rulesets, if you tag your opponent with a good cut after getting hit, you both get points. It's meant to discourage people from sparring recklessly, and basically force you to spar as though you were actually fighting a real weapon. If you blitz someone, you can nearly always trade hits, but if you do that versus a real sword you probably aren't going to make it to the hospital. Also, to your point about an MMA fighter picking it up quickly: you already were. Your footwork is like 90% of the way there already, and that's something most people struggle with. Just keeping control of the back foot while managing spacing is about half the difficulty of HEMA sparring.
The biggest problem I've seen experienced MMA or other unarmed martial artists have when they come to try HEMA or other armed styles is that they have a hard time grasping how destructive simultaneous hits can be. Their inclination is often to turtle up or rush in to grapple, which works great when the worst thing that you might eat is a nasty punch or elbow. Even in one of your early sword and buckler vs bat exchanges you took a massive hit to the thigh. With a full powered swing from a wood or aluminum bat that could easily cause the leg to fail and possibly throw off your strike. Weapons are force multipliers, so they make every blow that much more dangerous. This is why skilled HEMA practitioners emphasize not getting hit over landing strikes. It's also why we train the "afterblow", the idea that just because you landed a hit doesn't mean the opponent is going to drop immediately like a Hollywood extra.
To Mike's point about about an MMA fighter with a weapon wrecking folks, most of those ancient manuscripts that were about getting ready for judicial duels tell you that wrestling is the foundation of all fighting.
that;s not exactly accurate,some were,but many manuscripts were meant for fighting in their self-defense contexts,or on battlefields or in duels that may be for life-or-death or may be to first blood,some were for 'sports' of their time(where you'd need to hit the other guy in the head with a dull sword,make them bleed but not kill them or you might get hanged,which means you gotta hit hard enough but not too hard under immense pressure from everyone watching), and some were literally military manuals on how to fight for armies. It really depends. But you are right that wrestling is an important thing in so many manuals and that various ones do say that wrestling is a foundationary thing
It's all about context. If you are in a house that has fairly narrow hallways or in thick woods, a shorter weapon that can stab and slash is your go to choice. Definitely need a shield or some sort of parrying weapon.
A Gladius or Roman sword could be a good choice considering it’s short but not to short, it’s one handed and it’s double edge so if it’s quality your not really gonna wanna grab it
I was literally thinking of emailing you about a video like this yesterday so this was funny to see. I think the better sword for home defense would be a shorter sword like a gladius or a shorter messer. Basically, something 16-25 inches in the blade would be ideal since you probably won't be living in a mansion. You would need a shield or a pistol in your other hand if you wanted to rock this setup though. In terms of HEMA, you're right that you don't need to study it much for home defense. If the other person knows HEMA and you don't then you're at a disadvantage even with MMA. That's not likely though. I love your stuff and would like to see you do try sword and pistol and even just try HEMA out in general.
I think a Spartan xiphos would be one of the best bets for this kind of situation. A leaf blade is gonna do a lot of damage in the thrust and the shorter size compared to most swords would make it ideal in a hallway or grappling scenario.
Italian Side Sword also known as the Spada Dal Lato. Add a buckler in the mix and there you go. It's a cut and thrust sword that was used by Italian infantry. It's shorter than a rapier but better at cuts than a rapier. In a self defense situation it's perfect imo
As the name suggests it was a side arm, worn in a civilian environment for self defence and in war as a backup weapon. And italian mercenary companies in the renaissance were obsessed with heavy cavalry even when it was already obsolete.
Not an expert in swords or anything, though the channel Lindybeige has some awesome videos on it along with historical depictions. In particular, the video he has called “Broadsword and Shield- how Highlanders fought” is pretty awesome. Especially with the combination of the targe and dirk in one hand and sword in the other
Short sword like Gladius or Wakizashi (Japanese side sword / "short katana") should work fine in confined spaces, they were used that way historically too. You could get away with longer blade in order to get more distance if you can commit to thrusting only, but this would require training (discipline in stressfull situation).
I wholly agree with this. My Cold Steel Buckler (thanks, Mike!) + Stabby Machete or Stabby Big Knife - it's going to be hard to get past the vestibule with that combination.
A another good pick is a small messer Hema offers a different prospective on fighting with swords, knives etc . The good thing about hema that you can learn how people that reliaed on these weapons to survive actually fought (it is very difficult today to find many who have relied on swords/axes in life or death situations or if you do they rarely have written techniques for ) . For example yes a mma fighter can use a sword quite effectively but someone who does hema is able to have a much better stance perform better cuts, thrusts,techniques, block and Perry(which is very important when the other person has a bat, sword etc). Also many techniques can be used in modern day, for example(generalizations) Mace =hammer Stick=baton
Ight, since im one of the dudes who wanted to see what you said about HEMA more than once, ill submit myself for critizism. My logic was always that HEMA would maybe make sense since it was develpoed at a time when swords, knives, etc, were the standard weapons of war. They trained with them more than we did, and they got used way more often back then, so thier pool of data to pull from on kife/sword fighting was larger than ours. I still want to see you do some shit with some HEMA nerds though, would be fun.
@@charleshill1906 You would hope this hypothetical historical knight would be better with a sword than someone that trained for a week with it, yeah. But your comparison is so irrelevant. Modern HEMA people aren't professional seasoned knights. If you took an average HEMA practitioner from current year, and put them up against a professional MMA fighter with one week of sword training, it could easily go either way. Historical knights or swordsmen aren't some magical untouchable entity. They just trained with weapons for basically their whole life. If you took a historical knight and put them up against a professional MMA fighter in an unarmed cage fight, the knight doesn't stand a chance. It'd be like taking a badass from UFC 1 and putting them against a well-rounded MMA fighter. Those guys in the 90's were tough. Modern MMA fighters still outclass them.
@@charleshill1906 You've got no self-awareness. "Way to minimize a warriors entire accomplishment" Feel free to worship your idea of historical people. That's your choice, and you're free to play make believe. But in reality, humans are humans, life is life, and training matters. If you put modern people through "historical knights training", as in train them in horse riding, armed combat, armor wearing, and wrestling, since they're basically children to adulthood, the modern people would annihilate a historical knight. We have access to much better food, equipment, nutrition information, training methods, medicine, training partners, all of that. Historical knights aren't magic. They're a product of their environment. And in their environment, they trained for their job, with the technology they had. It's the same for historical Muay Thai fighters. They're absolute badasses. But they're honestly about equivalent to modern day Muay Thai fighters that are poor. They train since childhood in the art, and they're tough as nails. But if you took a modern person, and trained them from childhood (with the money to properly feed them and train them effectively), they'd beat up the historical Muay Thai fighters. For example, if you put Buakaw in his prime against any historical Muay Thai fighter, I think Buakaw would beat anyone from history whose prime was 1990 or earlier. We have access to technology that the people from the past just didn't have. Historical people are not magic. The technology we have is just better than they had. If you took a modern person, and put them through the same amount of hours training as a historical person, the modern training is going to be more effective. Less downtime between training from supplements and good diet and knowing how hard to push them, and better access to medical care. Better quality training because we have more information, more access to good training partners, more coaches, more technical understanding of techniques and anatomy. You'd be able to fit in more hours of training in the same amount of years, too. The thing is, not many people in modern times is training from childhood to be a swordsman. And you know what? The martial artists who do train seriously in weapons in modern times (people alive right now) I'd give a 70% chance to beat your average historical knight. There's nothing mystical about training to fight in armor, hip tossing your opponent, and wrestling a rondel blade into their body. There are absolute badasses alive right now who would eat up your average historical knight if they were given the chance to prepare for the fight. Obviously if you take someone who's never worn full harness, they're going to need time to adjust. But if you give them enough time to train in armor, they're going to ruin a time traveling knight's day.
@@charleshill1906 Well, nothing I can say will make you look as foolish as you've already made yourself. You are the embodiment of a neckbeard weeb meme. "And I would actually put my money on Musashi to defeat John Jones in the Octagon inside the first 2 rounds if not the first round with zero preparation or training." Musashi cheated in all of his fights to win. Obviously if you give yourself a major advantage, and you're a decent fighter, you'll win. But in an octagon, Musashi would have to fight on equal footing, no weapons, and he would lose, zero question. "Because the guy who trained for battle cannot afford to make mistakes or take risks or let the fight drag on. As I said earlier, he's concerned that once the immediate opponent is slain that there are 50, 100, 500, or any number of other opponents he has to also fight so he has techniques available to him that are for killing" In an unarmed Muay Thai fight, the historical fighters aren't magic. They can't just fight 50+ people and win. "This is a false assumption on your part because no amount of training can amount to real battlefield experience." Not true. If you properly accurately simulate war, it's the exact same training as real war, probably better. And you could do it as much as needed. 50 simulated battles is more experience than 1 real historical battle. PTSD isn't a superpower. "How many warriors in a head on battle just die from a stray arrow or sling bullet during their charge into the melee? How many more die from being double or triple teamed? Or being picked off by cavalry?" Exactly. It's not pure skill and effectiveness that causes you to survive a war, it's skill and a huge dose of luck. No amount of training can overcome luck. Even if the "best", most skilled knight ever to exist was born in the wrong country or area, they might just die in a hopeless battle because they were outnumbered, or maybe they get shot with an arrow, or maybe they just die of disease, and they'd be forgotten as a nobody. But anyway, my point still stands. Professional MMA fighters are warriors. They're tough, they're skilled, they're well-rounded. The average HEMA person is going to be less of an athlete. That's just the reality. And giving a more well-rounded athlete sword training is going to make them a more effective fighter than a less athletic sword hobbyist.
@@charleshill1906 "It's why styles that encourage sparring have a greater success rate in self defense than those that don't. Because actual combat experience is more valuable and it affirms your training." Exactly my point. Modern people are able to get more, and higher quality, combat training. Less downtime from injuries, exhaustion, sickness, lack of quality training partners, etc. "Way to project with all that name calling." I will tell you, you are correct about some things that you have said. But the parts that you're wrong about are what's worrying. Partial truth is the worst kind, because I can't make a sweeping statement that everything you've said is wrong. If you were 100% correct, there'd be no issue. If you were 100% incorrect, it'd be super easy for everyone to ignore you and nobody would believe you. But the fact that you're correct about maybe 50-70% makes the 30-50% you're completely wrong about a problem, because people who don't know any better might read what you write and actually believe it and take it to heart. Which is a problem, because that's how misinformation spreads. Don't take it as simple name-calling. This is me expressing that you aren't a reliable source for good opinions. Don't get confused. You are wrong. Don't spread nonsense. That's all I'm saying.
@@charleshill1906 "If the ideal is to get as close to real combat as possible" I wouldn't exactly agree. There are variations on a saying that basically goes "train hard, fight easy". The idea is for training to be more difficult than an actual fight would be, so when you get to the actual fight you're physically and mentally prepared. I genuinely think, if you have the money and resources, you could make simulation battles that are better than real battles for the purposes of useful experience. Surviving a war is not ideal experience for preparing for a duel. "If you were plop John Jones into a field, box him in with a ring" I don't know much about William Wallace, but being 6'7" isn't enough by itself to convince me he'd win in a UFC fight against Jon Jones. Jon Jones isn't just some random 6'4" dude. He's genetically gifted, practically born to fight, and trained specifically for it. Not every tall dude in modern times is a professional fighter, and even the ones who are aren't as oppressively skilled as Jon Jones. The dude who plays "The Mountain" (Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson) is listed at 6'9" 180kg+ is, as far as I understand it, bigger and stronger than William Wallace ever was. The only realistic way I can see William Wallace winning a fight against Jon Jones in an octagon is if William used his size/strength advantage in grappling. The ways I see Jon winning are: Punches, elbows, knees, kicks, grappling. Jon could aim for the chin/head, the liver, the lower legs, and almost certainly is a much more skilled grappler. It comes down to "less skilled, but bigger and stronger" or "smaller and more skilled", and Jon could mess up bigger dudes than 6'7". Anyone that's a more "normal" size from history? They'd only fare worse. "But if you were to do the opposite and plop John Jones down in an open field with a Wallace sword he had to play with for a week, and then William Wallace appeared on the other side of the field, Jones's ONLY advantage would be his conditioning." Let's not get it twisted, Jon should lose that fight. But Jon's advantages aren't just conditioning. Jon would have better stamina, better coordination, faster reflexes, be better at learning and adapting, be physically faster. Who would actually win? I don't know. Could go either way. For Wallace to win, he'd only need a good parry and follow-up. But is Jon Jones only allowed to "figure it out himself for a week"? If Jon was actually trained for a week, I'd probably put my money on Jon to win the sword fight (assuming the weapons were fairly matched). Jon wouldn't need to know every single aspect of swordsmanship, he'd just need to land one hit without getting hit himself. I can practically guarantee that Jon Jones has a genetic advantage, is healthier and more fit in general, and if he were allowed to train in modern swordsmanship for a significant amount of time (like 2 years or something), he would be very likely to win against William Wallace (nothing is 100% in the chaos of a fight with sharp blades, but I'd give him 80%). "Real battlefield experience" isn't what decides a duel. It can definitely help, yes, but the best training is that which most closely resembles the task you're trying to achieve. I think what you're putting the highest value on is "life and death" experience. That's just not big enough of a factor. Nutrition, genetics, quality training, mindset. That's what matters. For example, Kimbo Slice became famous for being a "street fighter", which is as close to "life and death" experience as you can get in fisticuffs. He was outclassed by people who trained to be MMA fighters. A different example, someone who doesn't "tick enough boxes" to be a competitive professional fighter is famously Bob Sapp. Bob Sapp is a big (muscular and tall) fighter who just doesn't seem to have the mindset or genetics (or maybe even training) to be a competitive professional fighter, so he became an entertainer that does goofy fights. Being big isn't everything.
@@hard2hurt the theory that an MMA guy, after couple of hours sword training, would wreck HEMA guys. I think it would be a cool experiment. Edit: re-watched the video. You didn't say that. You did say that 'an MMA fighter with a sword is more dangerous than a HEMA fighter with a sword'. Then Seth got super uncomfortable lol... Anyway, same experiment applies. In fairness though, you mess around with weapons more than the average MMA guy, so maybe one of the guys you coach would be a better test subject?
@@ElDrHouse2010 sure, that could be interesting too, for contrast. In all honesty though, virtually any moderately athletic person with a sword and shield should have a pretty good chance against someone with a bat. Sword and shield is the superior weapon system. I'd be more interested to see some sort of crossover video where some of Mike's MMA students did a full day of basic sword training and then fought some HEMA practioners in a tournament or some such. I'd be interested to see how they'd do.
The Gladius, it’s a fast ferocious cut and thruster. Regardless of the sword all techniques have basis in unarmed fighting. For example in Jiu Jitsu the wrist and neck are primary targets, so too with sword fighting. In Jiu Jitsu there is a term called Ko-te which means wrist or small hand but also refers to subtle but important details, such as attacking your opponent’s wrist or hand to stop the fight.
This is gold! Very good I think a short sword and decent shield 🛡️ is actually pretty good for home defense and might really scare the piss out of an invader armed or not they'd b afraid of being impaled
When I watched this video I realised something. You don’t need to be super trained to win a fight. You don’t need to have the best technique. You can win by avoiding mistakes. The first (and arguably the most important) thing you learn in any art is how to stop making mistakes. This is key to understanding all art v’s art debates. Different arts train for different situations and what constitutes a mistake varies with the situation. Lose position on the ground and you have lost. Drop your guard striking and you have lost. Try fighting against a joint lock with strength and you have lost. Exchange hits while weapon fighting (Icy mikes mistake) and you have both lost. Practice the art that most closely simulates a given situation if you what to win in that situation. That way you learn the common mistakes in that situation and how to avoid them.
Ramsey Dewey said you will win against 3 types of opponent: A)The one who is making more mistakes B) the one who is athletically inferior C) the one who is better than you but injured or having a bad day
Roman Gladius or Greek Xiphos would be an excellent sword for self defense when paired with a shield, I personally used a Greek Xiphos and home made shield for home defense before I owned firearms. With an appropriately large shield that covers your entire torso, you can block off the narrow hallways and doorways of a typical home, the attacker would be bottlenecked to face you head on and right behind that shield is your compact Xiphos or Gladius in your dominant hand ready to strike from behind the shield. The small size of the sword makes it easy to conceal behind the shield, meaning you could take your opponent by surprise or even if he already knows you have the weapon, the shield would still conceal your movement and what angle the strike is coming from, giving you a huge advantage. The compact size of the sword also means you can more easily swing it in the confined spaces of a home and generate the incapacitating power needed to lop off literal pieces of the offender. And both the Gladius and Xiphos have blade tips that widen substantially just a few inches from the tip, making thrusts a devastating attack and they are very easy to perform from behind a shield, going under, beside, above etc. with rapid speed. I don't think any attacker stands a chance in such a situation unless they are armed with a gun, in which case you would be royally screwed anyway. But just think about the WTF factor as well, if some punk broke into somebody's house to try and steal something and are faced with that? I think they would be very intimidated and probably leave in much the same way as someone staring down the barrel of a gun.
Shadaversity has great content and his opinions and conclusions about weapons always seem to make sense to me. The fact that you came to the same conclusion about the gladius makes me feel good that I watch both your channels. You should put your hypothesis about mma vs hema to the test. Get a hema guy to train wonderboy for a few hours and then simulate a home invasion.
I actually came here from shads video myself as well. I will however say this. I comment on shads video saying this as well. He has no real understanding of anatomy and it shows when he gets in the conversation of getting hit in the same video
I'd say any arming sword, something one handed with the center of mass close to the hilt for extra agility. I think "best sword" for self defense is a bit silly, considering the odds of the other person having a melee weapon are exceptionally low, but under the context of home defense (assuming for the US, you wouldn't walk around with a sword), the only criteria is that it can't be overly long. I also agree with thrusting, but I don't think you need a dedicated thrusting blade especially considering body armor is nonexistent nowadays.
4:40 In a modern home defense context, HEMA isn't a big deal for effective sword use since you're not going to be facing someone with a sword. Depending on how your house is set up, a rapier is probably your most lethal, and easiest to use sword. You can stick them with the pointy end from a long ways off, and it will cut sorta OK. Cuts are less lethal than thrusts, but debilitate faster, so a short cutting sword like a falchion, falcata, messer, hangar, gladius, cutlass, cutoe, scimitar, khopesh, etc, or large knife like a khukri, machete, or big bowie knife that you can swing in your living room without being inhibited by furniture is probably more practical.
Rapier is good for those Who can properly trust. With such unskilled fencer There is a high chance He can stuck it in the flesh without making decisive injury which is not really what you want. I think its better to stick to anythink else you mentioned.
I respectfully disagree. Yes, that thrust will be lethal (without rapid modern medical attention), but there are plenty of historical accounts of people having been run through, yet continuing to fight for several seconds afterwards. It's simply not a reliable, instantly debilitating wound.
We're here in my area as a hema guy who transitioned to mma. If you already know how to fight all you would need to do is look up a few basics for the weapon you're thinking of. The treatises are advanced techniques for people who already know how to fight. You're right they're unnecessary but they give you an edge over someone who's as good as you. Best weapon for home defense in my opinion is a messer with a blade length somewhere between 18 and 24 inches. But realistically any short sword would work because that's what they're for. As for you're saying that a fighter transitioning to hema is better than hema transition to fighting. You're right but fighters still make bad mistakes that hema guys can easily take advantage of but if the guy has boxing expierience they're really dangerous with a bowie knife sized knife more than anything which also works with a buckler in close quarters pretty well. Try that one out next. Cold steel has some bowie trainers. Bowie and buckler vs baseball bat in a hallway.
The thing Mike and his LARPing buddies don't seem to understand is weapon intent which can only be done with protection on. Having a bat swung at 1/2 of less speed and hitting teaches nothing. Some simulators get dangerous on the thrust so you can't do actual thrust so people discount them. Mike needs to go to a HEMA school with real safety equipment and go bout then go back and re-evaluate. This is the difference between swinging a stick around and watching the Dog Brothers.
@@ElDrHouse2010 and? There is still zero intent to hit with anything Mike and his LAPRing buddies were doing. Trying to block a crowbar with the noob techniques Mike thinks he knows would get him hurt even worse.
@@SwordFighterPKN I think the bat was foam and they did hit with intent but I think they panicked from Mike rushing them. Happens quite a bit when new guys play with shields.
Did just a bit of HEMA in my life. A short, mostly stabbing sword and a buckler is a fantastic combo for home defense if we are not talking guns here. And guys with baseball bats in the vid showed one of the main probs with a blunt-force weapon and no training with that. But at the same time, they showed what they could do once they've made it to the brawl phase. Loved the video, the concept, the idea, and the openness to change if something proves to be a better option. How could I see when you have a seminar in California to join? Is there anything like a mailing list or something like this?
He said a hema guy cannot go in reverse to a boxing class as easily as mma to hema, but the funny thing is boxing comes from Hema. Boxing was made as a way for hoplite soldiers to practice sword and shield tactics in a safe way. The lead hand is the off hand, same as a shield while the rear hand is dominant, the one that would hold the sword. Boxers use the lead hand to defend & set up for a power shot, hoplites use the shield to defend and set up for a sword strike. The correlation in tactics is there, if someone knows to look for them.
This video is an eye opener to me. In hema training I like to rush close to my enemy because most of them can't handle this. Now I understand that it is really important to keep the distance because you don't know if a random opponent got better clinch or grappeling skills. This will improve my fencing skills. Thanks
Most HEMA people dont train grappling because its a hobby for them. As a saber fencer I am aware of some techniques but I dont train/use them, cuz I need my training buddies next week. Things like: low kicks to the knee/groin, striking with the crossguard/pommel in the face, armbars, etc. We should use them in sparring, but no one figured how to make it sparring-safe yet.
Thrusting will work, but not as dramatically as a hacking blow. A short sword, tomahawk, or even a Smatchet can cause a debilitating strike that will end the contact immediately.
I love the bold hypothesis that an MMA fighter with a sword beats a HEMA fighter with a sword. Thing is though, this is an absolutely testable hypothesis, and you absolutely should test it! I would love nothing more than to watch you and shadeversity spar with swords.
It makes sense that a sword would "work": it literally was the weapon of choice for THOUSANDS of years. I would think something like a Roman short sword would be the right choice. It's not so heavy & long that a normal person would have trouble controlling it. You don't need the William Wallace sword. Just something short & practical & vicious.
Reminds me of a debate I had with my now-wife at one point. She had a fencing background and I did kung fu. My point was that a martial artist can pick up a weapon and do fairly well without it even if that weapon wasn't specifically trained. But in kung fu, you train with a staff, a sword, and some flexible weapon to cover the basic types of weapons (long/short/flexible) and techniques to use with those kinds of weapons and then later learn more about specific things. (Like everything from staff is still valid for spear, but now you have a cutting/stabbing metal point.) But saying things like an MMA guy can just pick up a sword and wreck HEMA people while HEMA people will go to a boxing gym and suck is just rubbish, or saying that an MMA person with a sword is more dangerous than a HEMA person with a sword is nonsense for people of equivalent training/experience. Of course HEMA people will lose an MMA match to MMA people; MMA people will lose a HEMA match to HEMA people (for equivalent levels of fighters). Thinking differently is just fantasy.
totally agree just as fighter train with the weapon he uses (punches, elbows, kicks, grappling) its the same for hema or another weapon based martial art no matter the background excellence comes from practice. so if a hema guy will fight against a mma fighter in unarmed fight i bet my money on the mma dude but if they gonna have a swordfight my money is on the hema guy. (assuming both are pro in each of their disiplines)
I think that it would be easier for an MMA fighter to reach basic competency in HEMA than vice versa. I remember watching s series of videos where a team of fencers and point karate fighters tried each other's sports. Both teams had the footwork, timing and distance management down, but the karate fighters learned how to thrust and parry a lot more quickly than the fencers learned how to punch and kick. If we're talking about HEMA and MMA, HEMA is a bit more diverse than fencing, which would make it harder, but MMA has an enormous range of physical skills you need to learn before you can fight competently. Not to mention learning how to take a punch or the amount of energy it takes to fight full contact with your whole body. This doesn't mean that an MMA fighter could walk into a HEMA class and expect to dominate. But the number of hour they would need to put in to be competitive would be a lot lower.
No. A mediocre MMA fighter can absolutely hold their own against the best HEMA guys given a few days of training. The best HEMA guys will still get folded by blue belts after 6 months of practice. I do both MMA and HEMA. The caliber of athlete in both are worlds apart.
@@heraclius4077 HEMA also has an enormous range of physical skills. Wrestling/grappling, a variety of weapons, all the same basics of distancing and footwork. Getting clocked with a steel bar isn't easier than getting hit with a punch. I've experienced both. HEMA also does full contact with the whole body. Sport Olympic fencing is not HEMA. HEMA people already punch and kick. Many of us also practice other martial arts. I saw a couple MMA guys try to do a HEMA tournament a while back. They thought they were real macho and used less safety gear. They were idiots and couldn't finish because of injuries.
@@SolidStructureWC Found the Mr. Macho fantasy man. You're talking people who train a lot versus hobbyists, not comparing people who equally practice their arts. A lot of the HEMA people I know train multiple arts, some including jiujutsu. There's a lot more diversity between schools/clubs than there is between arts.
@@favkisnexerade I respectfully disagree. Depending on location, pokey swords are good for heavy clothing. Slashy swords are good for loose clothing. So in the winter, someone wearing heavy leather coats, or puffy coats it is best to use a pokey sword. Like firearms, you need to find the right one for the area you are in.
@@navajador @Nix oh yeah for sure different swords have different pros and cons, but what I mean is for example if you have bad static strength or endurance but good explosive strength or endurance, instead of using thrust centric technique or sword, you'd be better off using a bit heavier saber to compensate for it. Or if you have one eye or bad sight, some binding or distance judgement is bad for you anyways, so you learn other skills, and naturally because of that weapon that is not heavy on binding or distance management would be better for you.
Okay, couple of things. We don't say go back to the manuals because we wanna jerk off about how great the past was. We go back to the manuals because they were written by people who did this shit for a living and learned from a long line of people who did this for a living. If all knowledge of BJJ disappeared tomorrow except for one Gracie book and people decided to bring it back of course you'd pour over the book. How long do you think it would take people just screwing around on a mat with no training to invent a Buggy choke? They were masters and they have real things to teach. Not to mention that the old masters made it clear that weapons training was meant to happen after an already established martial training with wrestling as a specific focus. Many of the old masters go so far as to say that wrestling is the foundation of their martial art. As for the when HEMA fighters not giving a boxer or wrestler trouble I think you're not looking at the core of competitive fighters and just looking at the larger number of less invested in competition level guys. There is absolutely a small core of competitive fighters. You can head out to SoCal swordfight in about 2 months to see for yourself. Hell I've been traveling all over North America this year competing and I be happy to stop by and take up your challenge (what are you guys in the Carolinas?).
I've always have thought that a spear and standing in a bladed crouched stance would be a good home defense option. Or if you had something more like a nagamaki and held the sharp edge up so it could not be grabbed and stood in the bladed crouched stance. The only draw back I really see with these two options would be , being in a narrow hallway and turning into a doorway going into a bedroom as in a offense situation looking for a bad guy, and not being able to do what's called slicing the pie or the room . In my home I have only one spot that I would have a potential problem with , but knowing it I have set up a mirror in the room to see into the blind spot without committing my self to inter the room and choke point .
Another is that a spear is easier to grab if you miss or hesitate, while a bladed weapon is easier to keep control of, especially double edged ones as you just have to pull to slice off the grabbing hand. And also it has not to be too long or it'd be too unweildy to be usable properly.
Your argument is basically the same as telling someone to buy a gun or knife for defence and telling them they don't need to train with it. Someone who is a trained fencer has a massive advantage with a blade.
While I used to own a katana and it actually helped me during a home invasion. I would say the best sword for self-defense depends on the size and strength of the individual. In ancient Japan the women used to have a staff with a blade on the end for their home self-defense and they would teach their daughters how to use it. But, I think the best sword is as varied as the individual. Although, I could see I see Mike wielding a bastard sword 😂
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Best sword I feel like would be a cutlass, hand guard to punch and block with also great slashing power without having to use much strength
I was ready to skip over the cringy ad, but the HEAD MOO-MENT made laugh. You got me
Roman Gladius. Short. Stabby. all you need
Chase that bag Mike
@@tristram0073 Cutlass is actually an excellent choice, they were designed to be used aboard ships, after all - IE cramped indoor spaces where you can't manoeuver a large weapon around. Alone they'd be pretty potent, but shove a buckler in as well as it's a definite recipe for success!
You should invite a HEMA instructor on your channel and prove your theories. Spar with weapons and drill a home defense scenario. That’s what this channel is all about! 🎉👏
I volunteer as tribute.
This is exactly what we need
@@burt2800 Yeah, when he said that an MMA fighter is more dangerous with a sword than a HEMA practitioner, the person in the room who has actually SPARRED HEMA practitioners with swords was like "Yeah I don't think so buddy"
Of course, he's not going to do that. That requires an open and objective mind in such things. This guy, Icey Mike, thinks he has everything figured out and he has nothing to learn from others.
@@shaness112233
Exactly! It's his arrogance and hubris. This guy, Icey Mike, has no objectivity in these matters. Any thinking person should take what he says with more than a "grain of salt". A high level HEMA practitioner would destroy him! He has the arrogance of believing he knows better than anyone else. I watch his videos now and then for satire more than anything. There is not a humble bone in his body.
I always carry my sword and shield with me when I know I'm in a dangerous area. Draugrs get pretty deadly in packs.
Somewhere in this comment section is a guy wearing an iron helmet complaining about ghouls.
i just kill zombies with a shotgun
Until they shout disarm you
just happened to see this video while looking for background noise while storming nordic crytps
just the deathlords, the rest are pretty trivial
I gotta say I agree with Matt Easton on this. Watching you guys spar with weapons was immensely entertaining, much like watching the beginners spar for the first time in HEMA class.
Hahaha I know right? 🤣🤣🤣 He has no idea
@@jacobharris3208A perfect example of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
Matt Easton mega-missed the point. Why in the name of allholy fuck would you ever train against a sword and shield in a self defense scenario? Is there an epidemic of medieval brigands walking around, breaking into houses? Viking raiders just robbing people in the streets? No, there isn't, so why in the fuck would you ever train for that? You never need to train for a gun cuz guns beat everything (assuming you can wrestle or have distance) and a bat/Crowbar is fairly common.
@@johntheidiot9046
Seems like you're the one who missed the point. SMH.
And only in the USA does one have to worry about guns, because the rest of the first world isn't gun crazy.
@@johntheidiot9046 why wold you ever train ageinst a gun is there epidemic of third world Amerikans.
Interesting vid. There's a big misconception here though. HEMA has absolutely tons of MMA practitioners already. Just in one of my classes I have an MMA instructor and a Jujitsu instructor, and a load of other people who have dabbled in assorted unarmed martial arts. HEMA practitioners often come from other martial arts backgrounds and often keep training other things at the same time as HEMA. Also, we focus on weapons Vs weapons, with most of our training time actually being sparring. So basically not very different to MMA, just that we focus on weapons Vs weapons. Fun vid though.
Oh snap we got Matt Easton up in here!
@@Echo_419 The best thing about HEMA is that anyone can be an authority if they want to because it’s all made up from vaguely detailed manuscripts from 500 years ago. Lol
@@TesticularDancer please keep telling yourself that.
@@Echo_419 Stay mad 🤷🏻♂️
@@TesticularDancer this sounds like the words of someone too dumb to follow links about sources.
Well I might have said exactly what you were going to in the video you wanted to make on the best sword for self defence, but I definitely took four times longer to say it ^_^
Fun video mate, you might be surprised about how much I agree, with one larger exception which I think you can guess ^_^ It's going to be a fun discussion. Cheers mate.
Glad you enjoyed it! Did you spot your cameo? It was in the title card
@@hard2hurt Yes, lol, right there with fantasy Ronda Rousey, with all the weapons I had on me I might be able to hold my own against her.
I smell a colab!
Now we just need a video with the two of you talking about it together and comparing notes
YOOOOOOO Y'all should collab
A main thing with hema is defending the 'double'. Not getting killed in the act of killing. Not easy.
This. Mike even said "I stabbed him and took a baseball bat to the head". Good sword and buckler fundamentals would have easily stopped that.
@@gromse5616 I love Mike but he clearly disadvanged his opponents. 'OOh I got hit!' while he stabbed them and pushed with his buckler. Cutesy bs. They laid down for him.
@@gromse5616 Gave them a bat. He had a sword and buckle
The deadliness of a weapon in the main thing setting apart any weapon art with any open fist art.
A boxer can go into a fight expecting to take a many hits but keep going, as soon as a weapon is involved you can take maybe one good hit and you're done with the fight, and possibly dead.
Two HEMA guys fighting for real, one probably kills the other. Fighting a random street dude, the HEMA guy probably kills them. Fighting an MMA guy who's willing to go in as wonky as Mike does here, you both die.
@@matthewmalleus7135 Whut? That was the whole point of this exercise.. I doubt you'll find a criminal who breaks into peoples' houses with a sword and a shield in the hopes of having an awesome duel if the owner happens to also own a sword and shield. What's the issue for you here? O.o
One thing that I've noticed in pretty much every physical sport I've taken part in is that the same people win everything. I think it's very strange that you draw a fundamental difference between "MMA guys" and "HEMA nerds" Because the people that win in MMA are the same kinds of people that win in HEMA, sometimes literally as I know people that train both simultaneously. They're the tough, athletic, aggressive people that are driven to excel. You take someone like that and put them into any discipline and they will excel. An MMA guy I'm sure would win an MMA match against a HEMA guy but saying that an MMA guy will win against a HEMA guy in HEMA after a couple hours is pretty foolish. Now if you take a high-level MMA fighter and put them in the ring with a HEMA nerd that's been doing it for 6 months and doesn't know their foot work and has no proprioception and doesn't work out then sure. But if you put them in with a high-level tournament HEMA fighter they'll barely be a speed bump until they've been studying for a couple of years bare minimum no matter how good they are at MMA. Most people are shocked at how helpless they are in a sword fight once they've fought someone that has significant training and some real competition under their belt.
PS: I know everyone is gonna disagree but Rapier and Dagger ALL DAY for home defense. It mostly occurs in hallways and there's no way anyone is getting around it. If you have a couple of feints and a quick stocatta, Anderson Silva himself isn't getting in on you. And even if he does. Now he has to deal with the dagger. I'd happily run this experiment with you Mike, just hit me up. Love you're content and the fact you're looking at a bit of HEMA.
Italian rapier was my pick as well-at least for long hallways, since you cannot move offline. I think a shorter cut-and-thrust blade (eg gladius or short messer) would be preferable in other room types, though, although the dagger would be second-best to the best in those as well.
Honestly in any unarmored fighting situation where you opponent is armed with anything less than a spear or a big kite shield or obviously a gun and rapier + dagger is straight up abusive. Having to get past the point of a rapier is a challenge enough in itself for even a trained fighter and you have to do it with well enough to then stop the immediate knife attack that's coming your way.
Rapier and dagger seems like more developed version of sword and shield, so I can agree, but you have to be profficient enough. But buckler is still more effective at defence in chaotic low light conditions.
Gor to give.ya.this one. Positively hate facing classic Rapier and dagger with anything less than a round shield and sword. And.rather have a Glave
that rapier and dagger will mess you up. but I think replacing the rapier with a sidesword might work in certain situations (but then again I love sideswords).
Mike's trying to shit stir the HEMA community and it will ABSOLUTELY work lmao
anyway, i do have a sword for home defense. just as god intended.
Yep. 😂
"I think HEMA is unnecessary and stupid" ...
... proceeds to enthusiastically re-discover HEMA from scratch.
@@ecgwineicling2543 discovering hema from scratch isnt a thing becose it goes against the whole premise of HEMA itself, wich stands for historical european martial arts and is about learning and using historical techniques from old manuscripts. by definition it cannot be discovered from scratch in the modern world and can only exist in the presence of historical manuscripts. what we see in the video is modern and american, not historical and european, and it doesnt involve any old manuscripts.
you entirely missed mike's point about hema. wich is that nobody needs historical european manuscripts to actualy learn how to use a sword.
also there is this idea in some hema circles that we should always keep it to what the old masters have written down and never ever build up on it and improve it with new knowledge becose that would not be historical. this is also something that happens in traditional martial arts where they dont adapt over time and that also makes them bad for self defence.
They're gonna do a gym invasion on Mike in full plate armor
Shad gon git mad
Hema nerd here, nearly one year’s experience. Great video, really interesting. Altough I gotta say, while I know Mike would pulverize me empty handed, after seeing him with sword and buckler, most skilled HEMA practicioners would kill him in 5 seconds with a sword. Its just another ballgame. Martial artists fare pretty well in HEMA, because of stance, power, speed and distance-timing control. But with a sword as with any other MA you gotta learn the moves. Old moves or new, you must learn them.
He probably wouldn't even beat you barehanded. This guy's is a fraud. No martial artist will tell you training isn't necessary for a weapon.
Even those training for a year can see the obvious flaws to what he is saying. Me thinks also that he's a fraud just trying to get alot of hits for his video to actually come out and say something sooooo ridiculous. That or he is a complete noob when it comes to martial arts and their are plenty of them out there.
@@Huggybear-ot7rv but that is not what Icy Mike said (and pretty bold to call him a fraud 😂). He said, that most guys who train empty handed combat with sparring and all are able to pick up a weapon and use it according to universal principles to some effect, while the other way around a pure Hema swordsman being thrown in an empty handed fight, would be pulverized. And of course he is not really knowing enough about the Hema world to really judge all Hema, but that is of course the provocation for attention as usual, if someone is offended by Icy Mike being himself, then better avoid his videos 😂
@@tuerkefechi He also said an MMA fighter with a sword is mor dangerous than a hema fighter with a sword, while in reality a hema fighter would utterly and instantly pulverize any MMA fighter in a sword fight.
@@stopYmpersonatYngmYacCount Yes, that is of course not really true. Though I think that an MMA fighter can grab a weapon and be more dangerous in a fight vs a trained swordsmen, than the other way round if an untrained swordsman would face an MMA guy in an unarmed fight. And I think, that is what he really meant (besides all provocation).
He is officially in the swordtube now, even raid adds included
As a Hema practitioner who also wrestles and agrees with a lot of your takes, a messer is my sword of choice for self defense. Not only can you thrust and cut, but it is designed to excel in the wrestle.
Short messer or langmesser? I,E One handed or two handed?
I agree. I did S&B while I did hema and quite enjoyed the Messer. Condor offers a decent one in the 350 dollar range.
@@antonakesson langmesser were one-handed. Kriegmesser were two-handed.
@@batteredwarrior Ah, alright.
I'm just looking at pictures of messers (?) online, & I'm trying to imagine deploying that metal monster in a narrow hallway. Idk...
I like how Seth is trying to be so cordial. Mikes obviously talking out of his butt and Seth, who actually has experience, is trying not to offend anyone. 😂
Hey Mike - I'm a HEMA instructor (primarially focused on dagger) who loves your channel. Also a veteran with quite a bit of firearms training, and I've got a little bit of experience in BJJ and Muay Thai as well. I'd love to go over some of the topics you covered in this video, maybe even do a colab if you happen to be in the Northeast sometime and would be willing to come to Connecticut. Feel free to shoot me a message!
Challenge him on Street Beefs with your dirk n shield.
@@kevingonzalez3673 great, can he have a real blade?
@@tsaxondale2499 He can bring whatever he wants
@@kevingonzalez3673 A sword fight in street beefs?
@@stopYmpersonatYngmYacCount yeah I like that idea
Gladius would be great because it’s for stabbing from super close distances which you would do inside the house, like in a hallway. Also you don’t need to see to be able to use it, if it’s dark you could pretty much just feel it out and thrust
I went with gladius at first. But after thinking about the couple of scenarios where Mike lost his sword maybe shorter and less front weighted would work better (assuming opponents aren’t wearing armour)
Yup the sword designed for closed range.
Second this!
like little hand spears or like machetes
@@KineticZen not all gladius are the same size, some are much shorter which would be better
One absolutely true point - fight sports translate really well. Went to a HEMA class and they were blown away by how quickly I picked it up. Conversely, their understanding of extreme range and speed was a challenge for me for sure. But the footwork, timing, angle work translates very well
There is actually an interesting split in the hema community. One side is very focused on learning through experience, sparing seeing how things workout. They try to relearn mechanics using historically accurate weapons.
The other side believes that for it to be hema it must be learned through the medium of historic manuscripts.
It can lead to some interesting things. I saw one longsword match where one guy hip tossed the other. The guy didn’t know how to break fall and landed pretty hard.
So one group who spars and one that think they are too deadly to spar?
No both groups spar. Some at an extremely high level from both camps. But the comparison between traditional and modern martial artists isn’t terrible.
for the last bit there, funnily enough theres an actual historical precedent for doing this, its why every heavily armored combatant has a sidearm(mostly daggers). if you cant beat them upright, throw them around and stab the weakpoints in the armor(mostly the eye-slits from what iv seen)...
@@viiltelijamurhaaja7225 Not all classes are the same. You can take ones that focus only on sword, so you spar with sword techniques only. In a different class it'll be "everything goes". That dude that didn't break the fall probably 1 didn't take any grappling class (which are also part of HEMA), 2 didn't know he was in an "everything goes" sparing. Its like you wen't into a spar convinced it'll be just boxing, and then someone knees you in the gut.
Honestly, most groups I'm aware of do both. The manuscripts are inspiration and a short cut to dismiss a number of misconceptions we as modern people have due to not having exposure in our lives to these weapons, but once you've gotten past that point it's mostly the same as any other martial art - good footwork, positioning and efficient handling of their weapon.
Haha, I'm a HEMA practitioner that has been following this channel for a while. I enjoyed the video! I do it as a hobby.
Everyone saying he's gonna shake up the HEMA community doesn't know them. Or half of them. I like to think it's a legit martial art in the sense that, we spar, we experiment, and, the more mature ones of us know that we're practicing an ancient art of war/dueling that can't compete with modern things like firearms. Great opinions, suggestions and advice and fun to watch as usual.
I sort of disagree because the thing is in my personal experience longsword has helped me a whole lot in bayonet fighting.
When I was in the Marine Corps I essentially did have Longsword and half swording techniques with bayonets and pugil sticks I was extremely effective. The drill instructors had to put two people sometimes three to be a fair fight to fight against me.
define "can't compete with firearms"
perhaps on a spiritual level, but firearms very much do compete lol. Is it about the skill ceiling of technicality being higher in HEMA?
I love how you can see the Dunning-Kruger Effect in this video. Mike has a little bit of knowledge and has gone full-blown self-proclaimed expert, whereas Seth has put time and effort training and sparring outside of his comfort zone and realizes how much he doesn't know. It takes years to train any skill to a high level. I'm pretty sure Mike is exaggerating to some degree in this video to stir up discussion and interest, but now I'm thinking about whether or not he would be down for some friendly sparring matches next time I am in NC. I can bring some extra gear he can use and he can show me how an MMA fighter will wreck a HEMA nerd 😇
i think it's less Dunning-Kruger and more so the sheer arrogance of MMA. They legitimately think they are the only style you will ever need, and that they can beat any fighter after 6 months of training in MMA. (expect, of course, another MMA guy with more experience.)
they have made similar claims about wrestling, boxing, karate, capoera, tdk,
name a style, and i guarantee someone in the MMA community has said a trained BJJ fighter can wreck shop.
I definitely agree with you about the arrogance in MMA. I watch these guys playing with their weapons in the video and I just want to help them learn. I also want to exploit their weaknesses. People who don't practice HEMA often fail to realize how nerdy we really are and many of us love to test our skills against other fighters just to see if we can learn anything new. We often hold our own quite well because we tend to pressure test our skills on a regular basis against many different styles. Make it interesting enough and you might find a line of people waiting for their opportunity to test their skills against you (the general "you", not the specific "you", although I never turn down a friendly sparring match). I have to admit, my initial reaction when I saw this video was to check travel expenses to NC to see if my finances would enable me to propose a friendly sparring match with these guys. Unfortunately, the answer was no. I am poor lol
@@davidegaruti2582 This is very correct. It's a ruled sport. Even guys that only have done combatives lose going into this because combatives are not designed for ruled sports. Any martial artists that knows has done both combatives and MMA would say in the real world combatives will win. It is designed to seriously injure, maim, or kill an opponent. Something MMA fighters and most other martial arts do not train to do.
@@maddogs1989Joachim Meyer's has cited pulling a man's testicles off because it was an available option in combat. This is how they trained for combat way back in Germany. To be prepared for anything as well as be prepared to do anything to give yourself an unfair advantage or win the combat.
@@maddogs1989
Combatives do most certainly not win in comparison to MMA.
I've enjoyed your channel for a long time now. It's a lot of fun to watch and provides some great content.
I've spent nearly 20 years training in and instructing HEMA. I've never seen HEMA as "the way," but a way that has some very useful tools one can add to his/her toolbox. We train at my school with a very open mind and I encourage the study of other arts as well. It makes for a well-rounded, more knowledgeable fighter. Some of my students also like your channel, by the way. I'm not a TH-camr as it's not something I'm seriously into doing myself, though I've thought about it. I enjoy watching though and while I think you may have been a bit too critical of HEMA (a technique found in Fiore's fight book along with me being alert helped prevent me being stabbed in the face or neck by an attacker once) you do also have some very good points as well. HEMA , like other arts has it's share of martial arts snobs (shrug). Even within the art you have people I call "purists" and others I call, "thinkers." That's a larger conversation though... Anyway, keep doing what you're doing. You've got an informative and entertaining channel and I'll keep watching.
I had no idea what HEMA was… appreciate the insight brotha !
@@Grandmas_Favorite it's a joke, look at all the clubs, only a percent of a percent are fit the rest are morbidly obese, unfit and unconditioned not to mention weak.
Whats interesting about a lot of the hema stuff on daggers and grappling is its pretty much the same thing you are teaching with a slightly different flavor. That seems to be the case for any kind martial arts that actually work. Same thing different flavor.
That's the thing. He's talking about a subject he only has a superficial understanding of. I don't think he is 100% serious. I think he just wants another related community to come check out his channel.
@@The_Gallowglass and hey it worked flawlessly
@@michaelclark7787 Oh man believe me respek da hustle
@@The_Gallowglass now that I have a minute of your time I'd like to contact you about your car's extended warranty... JK!
How about you dear random TH-cam fight fan? What medieval armament are you going to use to defend yourself with?
@@michaelclark7787 Trebuchet. No brainer.
None of your opponents had a sword even though a home invasion with a machete is quite realistic. Training with a sword (like they do in HEMA) would allow you to end a fight against someone untrained with a machete waay quickly and safely. Those aspects are really important in a home defence scenario.
Training and sparring with a weapon you intend to use to defend your home makes you more effective in using it, who would have said
Thanks you for saying this. Someone needed to. Machete or a hatchet.
This people are not training good. Sei have to be careful not to heart each other. They should wear face protection and armor. For sword i prefer a short one with hand coverage like a falcheon. The round shield should be a little big bigger around 45 centimeters. And it is not only a shield. It's a second weapon for the other hand too. You can hammering in with a front of the shield, are using the ring for attacks.
I've done mixed martial arts most of my life. I've done HEMA for a few years. I get wrecked by people that are better trained. HEMA is very technical. You don't just pick that up from knowing martial arts. Sure, I have an advantage from knowing how to move my body and having a good center of balance. That's just an advantage over beginners. The trained HEMA dudes have that too and the techniques. No comparison. Keep in mind that HEMA source materials were written by knights trying to teach others how to effectively kill other trained knights.
So, yes, randomly flailing a sword and a confused home invader is probably fine but you're boned if your home invader has a solid knowledge of HEMA.
"you're boned if your home invader has a solid knowledge of HEMA." That's a risk that one might be willing to take. I don't really get strong thug vibes from the HEMA community (as opposed to MMA, sadly).
@@richardmetzler7909 HEMA thug life.
Nearly all the historical books are not instruction manuals but advertisements to nobility for their schools. Read about it, this is why they suck 90% of the knowledge is lost and they're trying to reinvent it. Hilariously enough very few do any conditioning when these advertisement books even displayed fitness exercises as part of the schools curriculum.
@@PauloGarcia-sp5ws I want that on a shirt
I am the other way around, i would probably get wrecked in the octagon by anyone who knows what they are doing, but i would probably defeat any professional MMA fighter in a sword fight, unless they have a year of sword training with regular sessions against resisting opponents. If they visit a hema school once or twice a month it would probably take many years. Distance is way different, and tanking a blade the way you can a punch is... Unhealthy.
Even though Icy Mike mostly talked about HEMA, I as a HAMAA guy who mains Takoba and Shield feel called out and would love to meet up so he can test that theory. Anyway, great video, seems like yall had fun.
That would be interesting
Hamaa? "Historical asian martial arts" or smth like that?
@@bonogiamboni4830 Historical African Martial Arts Association
@@warriorsesh619 ah, african, gotcha. Kinda annoying that more than half of the continents start with the letter A.
@@bonogiamboni4830 thing is asia has HCMA-historical chinese martial arts, gatka as one of the most well known indian sword arts, JSA for japanese sword arts(and battojutsu as a common but not complete catch-all for most other weapon-based martial arts), and in south america you dont have that many folks trying to revive/keep old fighting traditions alive outside of stuff like capoiera(which is in many ways an issue of first regular colonization and then neo-colonialism so no shade towards southamericans).
All that being said HMA-historical martial arts is a legit term to encompass it all,and if it's just a sword art from anywhere historical fencing tends to do it.
FINALLY! I can be the comment nerd! What I've always been waiting for!
I've been fighting SCA, Hema, Amtgard, basically anything with a stick since like '98. (Yeah, I'm that LARP'ing nerd.)
Some basic thoughts:
- MMA guys do really well with understanding distance. Also? Their footwork is amazeballs. So, I stab them. Well, except for Kali guys. That shit doesn't work and makes me giggle.
- Knuckles are a thing. Cut them off the poor bat guy.
- You take a real solid shot to your punch shield, and it's gonna do two things. Flatten out the punch, and open your center...to get stabbed.
- Cliff was the most realistic sword fight in the video. Take the one shot to trap the weapon, then take their sword away and beat them to death. Tourniquet as needed.
- Put down the shield, go Florentine. (Sword and dagger, sword and sword.) As you saw? Any time someone closes range, you're going to get trapped behind the shield, and your sword is useless because you can't really generate enough force to cause damage beyond, "crap I got nicked."
I dunno. Beyond those thoughts, and my voluminous experience playing stick tag, I don't actually have a "home defense sword". Wall hangers, sure. I've even got a really really nice one that I'll love for the zombie apocalypse, but if I can't shoot an intruder? I'm going for a mace, or even that tacticool whip you showed. Hallways suck.
Oh! Some earned info? If you're gonna nerd out in the hallway? Watch out for the overhead light fixtures, if you knock one out and it hits you in the head? Game over man.
On the knife thing you were talking about, the reason why it’s shown like that in manuals is because those manuals were meant for noblemen or other people who were preparing for a duel of some kind, where both people would have armor and would start the fight in equal footing. It’s likely that normal “self defense knife fighting” that we see today was similar to how peasants and brigands would have fought eachother with knives. We just don’t know that because peasants and brigands didn’t bother to write it down.
Pretty much. Even for texts written by people who would’ve trained actual warriors and were warriors themselves (the minority of them) they likely were putting down techniques they used under THAT context:
1) they were fighting an experienced weapons user as well
2) they had to have advanced techniques that took armor into account or dealt with things that ignored armor
3) the context of how a battle works is different from a home invasion
4) they had specialized equipment that only exists in reproductions today
5) they were dealing with a variety of opponents from varying backgrounds and wealth statuses, which would greatly influence how complex the techniques would be
It’s the same for a bunch of old martial arts techniques where people go “oh holy shit this is actually really good for dealing with these specific movements/techniques”. It’s not generalized training but a specific movement to overcome a specific type of threat. It’s less that 10% of what you’ll put time into, but it does matter at the highest level of mastering the art. It is not, however, necessary for learning how to fight against regular or even trained people.
That's a very good point. Most people depicted in manuals and treaties were nobles, masters or soldiers, not peasants and common folk, but that does not mean they did not have their own fighting styles.
Most of the knife fighting manuals wouldn't be very applicable because it's just one minor aspect of combat taking out of context. For one thing, Nobles wouldn't be very interested in having a duel that starts and ends with knives because they were never considered to be that kind of weapon. As weird as this sounds, knives were more of a GRAPPLING weapon, as in, if you were close enough to use a knife, as in modern times, you're close enough to grapple. Something that always seems to be missing from all the pre gunpowder combat depictions is that grappling was a MASSIVE part of combat training literally since the dawn of warfare. Have you ever wondered why Greco-Roman wrestling is all about taking your opponent down and pinning them? It's been a sport for 2500 years at least, and certainly the premise goes back much farther. It would be a weird thing to just come up with, and why would people bother training for it, unless of course it actually has a purpose, and it does. Taking someone down and taking a good position means you can stab them with your knife, a tool that nearly all soldiers would have on hand at all times, especially during battle. It's not for 'fighting' with, it's for stabbing with, there's a difference. It would only be useful to take out your knife once you were already in the grappling stage, and getting to a dominant position would give you the opportunity to pull it out and stab. If you're close enough to have to drop your spear and shield, you don't have time to draw your dagger. It's not something you would go into a fight with in your hand already and fight with it, it's for finishing up after you 'won' the grappling. The 'pinning' part of wrestling is more interesting because when you pin your opponent and they can't escape, you no longer even have to kill them. If you have a king or general covered in armor that you want alive, even if they are dead set on dying before they're taken alive, charging in, getting to their legs, taking them down and pinning them means that they can be your prisoner no matter how hard they want to fight back. This is why wrestling, judo etc exist, and mostly don't involve submissions. In fact submission martial arts barely existed until recently, as well as striking arts, but wrestling goes back THOUSANDS of years. If you knew how to fight, you were probably a soldier, and if you were a soldier, you would have weapons. I love ju jitsu, but if Gordon ryan tried to pull guard against a Roman soldier with a pugio (very long thrusting dagger that ALL Roman soldiers carried) he's probably going to die. He might get stabbed and bleed out after he chokes the soldier out, but the whole thing about historical martial arts is winning without getting a fatal wound. Beating a knife wielding attacker is a hollow victory if you bleed out anyway. Martial arts are bad at knife defense because they're not made for knife defense. Saying modern martial arts are better against knives than old manuals is dumb because ALL of them are designed around the understanding that your opponent won't stab you, and ALL of the old manuals are based on the understanding that not only can they stab you, but they WILL stab you. The manuals aren't perfect, but the simple fact of then acknowledging the weapon makes it (by default) more useful against knives than any other martial art that doesn't.
Duels were not fought in armour, not in Italy, not since renaissance AFAIK. A knife (a bolognese dagger was 30cm long, BTW) is a short weapon. Not ideal for self defence. A sword (rapier and its evolutions) was much better for people who could afford it. As a second weapon a buckler was much better than a dagger, so much that there are laws of the time against carrying one to limit urban violence. Hence people start defending with a heavy cloak (cape) that is surprisingly effective.
@@restitvtororbis5330totally agree. Mike is comparing apples and oranges, out of context.
short and stabby seems best for home defense. less awkward indoors, and probably less awkward around the shield. emphasis is on defense though, if you really were trying to chase after someone to cut them down maybe something longer is better in some circumstances
What about 6 foot tall longsword that you just stab them with from far away?
Too unwieldy
sounds like you want a roman gladius lmao. the best part about them is that theres a bunch of variations of the sword, theres hacky slashy ones like machetes and very stabby thrust oriented ones that are basically hand spears as well as multiple design's in between that are more of a hybridization of stab and slash. also a large dagger could work
@@joethetoad Does that matter? Just keep it pointing at them and stick it in their abdomen. They can get close to you
@@viiltelijamurhaaja7225 if they hit it with a bat and knock it off course u gonna struggle
I'm not much of a martial artist, i"d love to learn, but getting injured in the Military has left me not able to handle a lot of it. That being said, I love your videos, they bring a real life practicality to the table I find valuable.
This guy's is full of shit. Don't fall for it brother. I've been a martial artist for 30 years and I did 8 years in the infantry. Listen to what he's saying in this video man. He's recommending people use a weapon they don't have any training in. That's dumb and dangerous.
Literally any sword is going to be extremely effective against an unarmed, unarmored opponent. Basically any sword is so effective in that context that it ends up coming down to what you're trained to use. The only exceptions might be due to having to deal with things like cramped hallways. This means that long, two handed weapons would be counterintuitive, and that thrusts would likely play a larger role than cuts. Short swords would also be a solid option in this case, much like how they were used in history.
One thing I'd like to point out though, swords take a great deal of training to be effective with. Just because a sword makes contact with the opponent doesn't mean that hit would actually do anything. It takes years of experience with real techniques to consistently be able to deliver effective cuts, especially if you're wanting to do it against a moving target.
Thrusts are easier to be effective with, but training with actual techniques helps you do this while keeping yourself protected and making it more difficult for someone to protect themselves from.
These things are where arts like HEMA are useful. You won't be effective with a sword unless you practice real sword techniques under some form of resistance.
Another side note, the reason HEMA pulls from historical texts is because it's not a surviving art. There is no living tradition or evolution of European sword combat aside from what people have pieced together from historical sources. The closest we have outside of that is Olympic fencing, with all of its obvious limitations. Additionally, this isn't medicine. We've actually dedicated time to developing medicine over the past several centuries. That hasn't happened with sword combat. People stopped doing it for centuries, that's how it got worse.
If people forgot how to wrestle for 200 years, then looked back at illustrations of double leg takedowns only to say "nah that's old, I'll stick with my modern football tackle" that would be equally ridiculous.
Also, HEMA people spar, extensively and often. They even compete.
Waiting for the video where he finds a real hema practitioner.
I swear I was thinking the other day that Mike would probably love the nerdy and technical side of hema
he probably would like if people walked with full plate armor in the street. He is talking about self defense.
For thousands of years the combination of sword and shield or even sword alone was really useful in melee combat and humans survived for hundreds of years when in melee so it is still useful as long as it is melee and the wielder is a skilled fighter (just like with any other weapon type).
Eeehhh....sounds like you're talking about the spear to me.
The spear has been around longer than homo-sapiens. It has been used and likely killed more (John Keegan "A History of Warfare" among other sources) people than all other weapons combined.
@@vicnighthorse battles weren't one-on-one matches, but many vs many. When spear breaks or stucks in the opponent, you need secondary weapon when the other enemies are coming.
@@mareklame8589 Of course, it still doesn't change that the spear has been the most and most widely used weapon in human history. It was so for reason that proved out for hundreds of thousands of years. The sword is a new comer in the last 3,600 years and has indeed been an excellent secondary weapon as you posit.
@@vicnighthorse Spear and shield seems like the universal foundation for single or group combat in the open, with sword as a back up, and shield and sword as the universal choice for tight quarters.
MMA guys already do HEMA..and they do ok, it isn't a cheat code.
9:55 with the HEMA it makes sense to look at the old stuff because they don’t fight that way anymore. But they did it more back then so they would be better at sword and shield fighting and etc.
HEMA nerd checking in. You demonstrated it well in the video: a weapon capable of thrusting is optimal, since most often you'll lack space to cut/slash/swing properly. A small shield like that buckler is good, but even a medium-sized shield like the Roman scutum would be great, for blocking off a corridor/door way and offering little opportunity for an attacker to harm or pass you. The best method in the modern day, though, is the art of Click-Pow.
Also, I like your analysis towards the end about the "proper way" of using a weapon. It's fun to learn the "proper way," but age (experience, knowledge) and treachery defeat youth and skill.
Exactly this, I love fencing but my home defense choice is a firearm. Barring that, it's the short sword or messer with a shield.
@@HessianLikeTheFabric Something like a pavise. Scutums, to me, are towards the bigger end of medium shields, since there is the great scutum.
@@HessianLikeTheFabric No, I suppose I was confused. Thank you.
Also the pavese wasn't a shield in that sense. Nobody carried it arround to parry strikes in melee.
Cutlass. Punch with the bell, big pommel for striking, short for tight spaces, point for stabbing, curved edge for blocking and slashing. Great tool for untrained folks, designed to be used by sailors who didn't practice a bunch because they were making a ship sail.
An MMA fighter with a sword and a few hours of experience is not a problem for anyone with HEMA experience 😂
Haha 😂 yeah so true
They've got no idea
Thank you, what martial artist worth their salt discounts the importance of training? A dumb one
@ERRATAS 0202 haha clearly you've never sparred with steel weapons.
No larping involved just pain and sweat
@user-dz8tv4mg5o never done larp but I'd bet they'd take you in a fight lol
@ERRATAS 0202 larping and martial arts are not the same thing. You'd have to be an idiot to think that an mma guy would beat a hema practitioner who's been training for years
13:48 I don't think you'd be able to find many people to tell the story of a fight they lost when it involves lethal weapons. Especially when it's up and close with blades and especially when medicine/emergency calls and responses weren't quite as good as today's.
Paraphrasing your comments here:
"Put a sword in an MMA guy's hand and he will give HEMA guys a problem. Bring a HEMA guy into MMA or boxing class... it's not the same"
Now, where have I heard this before?
O yes. Boxers used to say the exact same thing about MMA not so long ago b/c in their mind MMA took no skill.
Any martial art benefits from the quality of the athlete that trains the style, and honestly, I should not need to explain this.
Athleticism is very important to MA. Higher levels of coordination, speed agility, power, and conditioning are all essential ingredients to any combat art. MMA fighters have these in spades.
We often see D1 wrestlers that have never done MMA before in their lives transition into MMA very easily and dominate after a short time of training. Is that b/c MMA takes no skill....or are they simply just high-level athletes that can adapt quickly to new skill sets?
Most HEMA athletes are enthusiast-level weekend warriors that are there to have fun. The level of athleticism on average is going to be lower than in an MMA gym.
So I would not be surprised that MMA guys on average are going to pick up HEMA quite quickly.
I think they were afraid to hit you with the bat in case they hurt you. They definitely seemed to be holding back. Use foam weapons like in Dagorhir and wallop each other. Dag doesn't allow head shots but you could put protective headgear on. For a bat swing at the arm holding the sword or at the head would seem to be the strike to take.
Not that easy when the guy has a shield, that's the point of it.
Sword and buckler teaches you to fight with your sword arm/hand being covered by your buckler so striking the sword arm is not easy without an offhand of your own.
I think you're breaking one of your own rules. "Name one thing you did and were good at, without ever doing it before. That's right, that has never happened."
I think an experienced martial artist with a sword will beat someone who doesn't do martial arts and also has a sword. For the reasons you mention of range management. But someone who practices HEMA will definitely beat a martial artist if they both have swords because of the significant time practicing how to fight with swords.
If you're arguing you don't need HEMA for home self defense, you're right. But it's the same way you don't need to be a martial artist to defend yourself. Taking a couple classes, learning to throw something that resembles a proper punch and kick and sparring one to two times will make you way more experienced than most people you encounter. But you still won't be at the level of a true martial artist. This also applies to HEMA
HEMA runs all kinds of tournaments - it's not like just the document. Those texts are super vague and open to much interpretation, they're really a starting point for the martial art.
As an experienced HEMA swordsman, I will say for many people who don’t have any sword using experience, uncontrollable cutting only looks scary but won’t be effective to stop the crazy attacker since most inexperienced swordsman will not use the cutting edge properly while may lead the cut couldn’t even cut through water bottle rather than arms and legs. Therefore, a balance blunt weapon (like a small mace or morning star) might be more effective since the damage come only with impact.
ahhh you mad!!!! all hema nerds could never even throw a fucking punch
Bullshit. A 10 year old can use a machete effectively. Don't need to "study the blade" for shit to land a good chop.
Yeah, no way I could figure out how to cut with a sword without hema. Can’t figure out balance or range at all despite years of MMA and jiujitsu experience and competition. Could never make it work.🙄
My 12 year old sister limbs logs with an axe while i split the bolts. If you think you need to be an expert swordsman to cut, that says a lot about you.
@@max-zv7sf yeah, cutting logs and cutting someone in the night while peaking on adrenaline is the same
If you can try with a slightly bigger shield, or maybe hold a stick in the same hand that you're holding the buckler. African martial arts do this all the time. That would give you better cover without adding too much bulk to the shield. Also, I would actually like to see some crossover with the HEMA community. I think you both might have something to learn from each other.
When does the tire and fire come into play?
Larger shield would be hard to justify inside a home with walls and such
Given the damn machete epidemic going on in the UK now Im starting to think sword fighting is getting more and more relevant for self defense.
This just sounds like one person thinking their art is better than the other to justify the amount of time they've dedicated to it.
He should spar with someone who's dedicated even just half their time into practising HEMA that he has put into MMA to see if his assumtion is correct.
I smell a Hard 2 Hurt/Shadiversity crossover coming and I'm all for it!
Shad sucks I'd rather he meet with literally any other hema tuber. Maybe skall.
I see Mike just making fun of Shad a bunch for being a nerd lol. I like em both though btw
@@michaelfranciotti3900 IMHO, Shad is funny and Matt is bitchy. Still hart2hurt is such a douche, that I really wait for scholagladiatoria response
Shad is not open to admit he´s not experienced in something
I'd love to see a Hard 2 Hurt/Skallagrim crossover, personally. I like his take on things more than Shad's.
For a good sword. A Roman gladius maybe? Designed for short stabbing motions it would seem good for close quarters on a home or hallway. But I am far from any expert on swords.
The difference for dagger work back then was different because of the clothes people wore back then, they wore more layers and were thicker so you would fight a modern person the same way you would fight a person from the medieval or Renaissance Era
I just posted the same thing in a response to someone else. People don't understand the history and how it shapes what was done. But they sure seem to have an opinion on it.
@@SwordFighterPKN tell me about it.
It depends on time and place. Fashion changed with time, and depending on tge climate clothes varied in thickness. But generally they wore more stuff.
9:30
The problem with Dagger sources in HEMA is that they are mostly made for/against armoured combat. You mostly see techniques which work in a harnisch but not without protection. Also the hits are against the weaknesses in the armour.
Be a ninja … a shadow in the night … a little whisper in the woods … a fear feeling in your neck at midnight… be prepared always for everything everytime everywhere… be the sword ⚔️… 🍀🍀🍀✌️💀👍🔥🔥🔥🌎🔥🔥🔥🔥
There are many types of historical martial arts. I was at a tournament in Vyborg, I saw guys in armor beating each other with halberds, swords, switching to close combat with daggers, there was also a wrestling involved. There were knockdowns, one guy was taken away by ambulance with a shoulder injury. All this in plate armor in hot august. I do not know what exactly Mike means when he says HEMA, but what I saw was a real MMA in armor. They fought according to some tournament rules of 15th century Germany.
If they start stabbing each other with daggers in close range into armor gaps, that's HEMA. If they just whack each other with blunt swords from far range, that would be Buhurt.
@@jaketheasianguy3307 They started from a long distance with two weapons, a sword and a mace, then stayed with one to choose from, in one hand, then moved into close combat with daggers. This is the essence of the rules of the German tournament or something
Mike running around with a rusty machete is both the scariest and funniest thing I've seen in a while
Blade length of 18-24", that can cut & thrust, with robust hand protection. A naval sabre, for example -- ship combat is fairly similar to in-house fighting.
I don't practice hema, but I know a lot about it just because I like it and watch it. I think any short sword would do for home defense. Whether it be a gladius, 19th century artillery sword, cutlass, falchion (if it's on the shorter end), etc. With a shield, I would pick something with great thrusting ability like the gladius to thrust from behind the shield just like you do in this video!
In a lot of these bouts, there's an interesting dynamic that varies a lot in HEMA rulesets - the concept of a double tag. In most rulesets, if you tag your opponent with a good cut after getting hit, you both get points. It's meant to discourage people from sparring recklessly, and basically force you to spar as though you were actually fighting a real weapon. If you blitz someone, you can nearly always trade hits, but if you do that versus a real sword you probably aren't going to make it to the hospital.
Also, to your point about an MMA fighter picking it up quickly: you already were. Your footwork is like 90% of the way there already, and that's something most people struggle with. Just keeping control of the back foot while managing spacing is about half the difficulty of HEMA sparring.
The biggest problem I've seen experienced MMA or other unarmed martial artists have when they come to try HEMA or other armed styles is that they have a hard time grasping how destructive simultaneous hits can be. Their inclination is often to turtle up or rush in to grapple, which works great when the worst thing that you might eat is a nasty punch or elbow.
Even in one of your early sword and buckler vs bat exchanges you took a massive hit to the thigh. With a full powered swing from a wood or aluminum bat that could easily cause the leg to fail and possibly throw off your strike. Weapons are force multipliers, so they make every blow that much more dangerous. This is why skilled HEMA practitioners emphasize not getting hit over landing strikes. It's also why we train the "afterblow", the idea that just because you landed a hit doesn't mean the opponent is going to drop immediately like a Hollywood extra.
To Mike's point about about an MMA fighter with a weapon wrecking folks, most of those ancient manuscripts that were about getting ready for judicial duels tell you that wrestling is the foundation of all fighting.
This! If you can't wrestle, you can't fight, which also applies to weapon based combat.
that;s not exactly accurate,some were,but many manuscripts were meant for fighting in their self-defense contexts,or on battlefields or in duels that may be for life-or-death or may be to first blood,some were for 'sports' of their time(where you'd need to hit the other guy in the head with a dull sword,make them bleed but not kill them or you might get hanged,which means you gotta hit hard enough but not too hard under immense pressure from everyone watching), and some were literally military manuals on how to fight for armies.
It really depends.
But you are right that wrestling is an important thing in so many manuals and that various ones do say that wrestling is a foundationary thing
@@acaristic93 I did say those manuscripts concerned with fighting duels, not that all manuscripts were.
It's all about context. If you are in a house that has fairly narrow hallways or in thick woods, a shorter weapon that can stab and slash is your go to choice. Definitely need a shield or some sort of parrying weapon.
A Gladius or Roman sword could be a good choice considering it’s short but not to short, it’s one handed and it’s double edge so if it’s quality your not really gonna wanna grab it
I was literally thinking of emailing you about a video like this yesterday so this was funny to see. I think the better sword for home defense would be a shorter sword like a gladius or a shorter messer. Basically, something 16-25 inches in the blade would be ideal since you probably won't be living in a mansion. You would need a shield or a pistol in your other hand if you wanted to rock this setup though. In terms of HEMA, you're right that you don't need to study it much for home defense. If the other person knows HEMA and you don't then you're at a disadvantage even with MMA. That's not likely though. I love your stuff and would like to see you do try sword and pistol and even just try HEMA out in general.
I think a Spartan xiphos would be one of the best bets for this kind of situation. A leaf blade is gonna do a lot of damage in the thrust and the shorter size compared to most swords would make it ideal in a hallway or grappling scenario.
Italian Side Sword also known as the Spada Dal Lato. Add a buckler in the mix and there you go. It's a cut and thrust sword that was used by Italian infantry. It's shorter than a rapier but better at cuts than a rapier. In a self defense situation it's perfect imo
As the name suggests it was a side arm, worn in a civilian environment for self defence and in war as a backup weapon. And italian mercenary companies in the renaissance were obsessed with heavy cavalry even when it was already obsolete.
Not an expert in swords or anything, though the channel Lindybeige has some awesome videos on it along with historical depictions. In particular, the video he has called “Broadsword and Shield- how Highlanders fought” is pretty awesome. Especially with the combination of the targe and dirk in one hand and sword in the other
Short sword like Gladius or Wakizashi (Japanese side sword / "short katana") should work fine in confined spaces, they were used that way historically too. You could get away with longer blade in order to get more distance if you can commit to thrusting only, but this would require training (discipline in stressfull situation).
I live in Estonia and we just got electricity and the internet like 2 weeks ago. My friend has a mace in his home for home defense.
I wholly agree with this. My Cold Steel Buckler (thanks, Mike!) + Stabby Machete or Stabby Big Knife - it's going to be hard to get past the vestibule with that combination.
Evil knave! I shall smite you in my vestibule!
@@michaelmorgan8311 😅
A another good pick is a small messer
Hema offers a different prospective on fighting with swords, knives etc . The good thing about hema that you can learn how people that reliaed on these weapons to survive actually fought (it is very difficult today to find many who have relied on swords/axes in life or death situations or if you do they rarely have written techniques for ) . For example yes a mma fighter can use a sword quite effectively but someone who does hema is able to have a much better stance perform better cuts, thrusts,techniques, block and Perry(which is very important when the other person has a bat, sword etc). Also many techniques can be used in modern day, for example(generalizations)
Mace =hammer
Stick=baton
The HEMA community is loving this video, Mike 🤣🤣🤣
Practcing HEMA and the best one for home defense is a short sword. You can really go ham with a bat or a longsword with tight corners
Ight, since im one of the dudes who wanted to see what you said about HEMA more than once, ill submit myself for critizism. My logic was always that HEMA would maybe make sense since it was develpoed at a time when swords, knives, etc, were the standard weapons of war. They trained with them more than we did, and they got used way more often back then, so thier pool of data to pull from on kife/sword fighting was larger than ours. I still want to see you do some shit with some HEMA nerds though, would be fun.
@@charleshill1906 You would hope this hypothetical historical knight would be better with a sword than someone that trained for a week with it, yeah. But your comparison is so irrelevant.
Modern HEMA people aren't professional seasoned knights. If you took an average HEMA practitioner from current year, and put them up against a professional MMA fighter with one week of sword training, it could easily go either way.
Historical knights or swordsmen aren't some magical untouchable entity. They just trained with weapons for basically their whole life. If you took a historical knight and put them up against a professional MMA fighter in an unarmed cage fight, the knight doesn't stand a chance. It'd be like taking a badass from UFC 1 and putting them against a well-rounded MMA fighter. Those guys in the 90's were tough. Modern MMA fighters still outclass them.
@@charleshill1906 You've got no self-awareness.
"Way to minimize a warriors entire accomplishment"
Feel free to worship your idea of historical people. That's your choice, and you're free to play make believe. But in reality, humans are humans, life is life, and training matters.
If you put modern people through "historical knights training", as in train them in horse riding, armed combat, armor wearing, and wrestling, since they're basically children to adulthood, the modern people would annihilate a historical knight. We have access to much better food, equipment, nutrition information, training methods, medicine, training partners, all of that.
Historical knights aren't magic. They're a product of their environment. And in their environment, they trained for their job, with the technology they had.
It's the same for historical Muay Thai fighters. They're absolute badasses. But they're honestly about equivalent to modern day Muay Thai fighters that are poor. They train since childhood in the art, and they're tough as nails. But if you took a modern person, and trained them from childhood (with the money to properly feed them and train them effectively), they'd beat up the historical Muay Thai fighters.
For example, if you put Buakaw in his prime against any historical Muay Thai fighter, I think Buakaw would beat anyone from history whose prime was 1990 or earlier. We have access to technology that the people from the past just didn't have.
Historical people are not magic. The technology we have is just better than they had. If you took a modern person, and put them through the same amount of hours training as a historical person, the modern training is going to be more effective. Less downtime between training from supplements and good diet and knowing how hard to push them, and better access to medical care. Better quality training because we have more information, more access to good training partners, more coaches, more technical understanding of techniques and anatomy. You'd be able to fit in more hours of training in the same amount of years, too.
The thing is, not many people in modern times is training from childhood to be a swordsman. And you know what? The martial artists who do train seriously in weapons in modern times (people alive right now) I'd give a 70% chance to beat your average historical knight. There's nothing mystical about training to fight in armor, hip tossing your opponent, and wrestling a rondel blade into their body.
There are absolute badasses alive right now who would eat up your average historical knight if they were given the chance to prepare for the fight. Obviously if you take someone who's never worn full harness, they're going to need time to adjust. But if you give them enough time to train in armor, they're going to ruin a time traveling knight's day.
@@charleshill1906 Well, nothing I can say will make you look as foolish as you've already made yourself. You are the embodiment of a neckbeard weeb meme.
"And I would actually put my money on Musashi to defeat John Jones in the Octagon inside the first 2 rounds if not the first round with zero preparation or training."
Musashi cheated in all of his fights to win. Obviously if you give yourself a major advantage, and you're a decent fighter, you'll win. But in an octagon, Musashi would have to fight on equal footing, no weapons, and he would lose, zero question.
"Because the guy who trained for battle cannot afford to make mistakes or take risks or let the fight drag on. As I said earlier, he's concerned that once the immediate opponent is slain that there are 50, 100, 500, or any number of other opponents he has to also fight so he has techniques available to him that are for killing"
In an unarmed Muay Thai fight, the historical fighters aren't magic. They can't just fight 50+ people and win.
"This is a false assumption on your part because no amount of training can amount to real battlefield experience."
Not true. If you properly accurately simulate war, it's the exact same training as real war, probably better. And you could do it as much as needed. 50 simulated battles is more experience than 1 real historical battle. PTSD isn't a superpower.
"How many warriors in a head on battle just die from a stray arrow or sling bullet during their charge into the melee? How many more die from being double or triple teamed? Or being picked off by cavalry?"
Exactly. It's not pure skill and effectiveness that causes you to survive a war, it's skill and a huge dose of luck. No amount of training can overcome luck. Even if the "best", most skilled knight ever to exist was born in the wrong country or area, they might just die in a hopeless battle because they were outnumbered, or maybe they get shot with an arrow, or maybe they just die of disease, and they'd be forgotten as a nobody.
But anyway, my point still stands. Professional MMA fighters are warriors. They're tough, they're skilled, they're well-rounded. The average HEMA person is going to be less of an athlete. That's just the reality. And giving a more well-rounded athlete sword training is going to make them a more effective fighter than a less athletic sword hobbyist.
@@charleshill1906 "It's why styles that encourage sparring have a greater success rate in self defense than those that don't. Because actual combat experience is more valuable and it affirms your training."
Exactly my point. Modern people are able to get more, and higher quality, combat training. Less downtime from injuries, exhaustion, sickness, lack of quality training partners, etc.
"Way to project with all that name calling."
I will tell you, you are correct about some things that you have said. But the parts that you're wrong about are what's worrying. Partial truth is the worst kind, because I can't make a sweeping statement that everything you've said is wrong.
If you were 100% correct, there'd be no issue. If you were 100% incorrect, it'd be super easy for everyone to ignore you and nobody would believe you.
But the fact that you're correct about maybe 50-70% makes the 30-50% you're completely wrong about a problem, because people who don't know any better might read what you write and actually believe it and take it to heart. Which is a problem, because that's how misinformation spreads.
Don't take it as simple name-calling. This is me expressing that you aren't a reliable source for good opinions. Don't get confused. You are wrong. Don't spread nonsense. That's all I'm saying.
@@charleshill1906 "If the ideal is to get as close to real combat as possible"
I wouldn't exactly agree. There are variations on a saying that basically goes "train hard, fight easy". The idea is for training to be more difficult than an actual fight would be, so when you get to the actual fight you're physically and mentally prepared. I genuinely think, if you have the money and resources, you could make simulation battles that are better than real battles for the purposes of useful experience.
Surviving a war is not ideal experience for preparing for a duel.
"If you were plop John Jones into a field, box him in with a ring"
I don't know much about William Wallace, but being 6'7" isn't enough by itself to convince me he'd win in a UFC fight against Jon Jones. Jon Jones isn't just some random 6'4" dude. He's genetically gifted, practically born to fight, and trained specifically for it. Not every tall dude in modern times is a professional fighter, and even the ones who are aren't as oppressively skilled as Jon Jones.
The dude who plays "The Mountain" (Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson) is listed at 6'9" 180kg+ is, as far as I understand it, bigger and stronger than William Wallace ever was.
The only realistic way I can see William Wallace winning a fight against Jon Jones in an octagon is if William used his size/strength advantage in grappling. The ways I see Jon winning are: Punches, elbows, knees, kicks, grappling. Jon could aim for the chin/head, the liver, the lower legs, and almost certainly is a much more skilled grappler.
It comes down to "less skilled, but bigger and stronger" or "smaller and more skilled", and Jon could mess up bigger dudes than 6'7".
Anyone that's a more "normal" size from history? They'd only fare worse.
"But if you were to do the opposite and plop John Jones down in an open field with a Wallace sword he had to play with for a week, and then William Wallace appeared on the other side of the field, Jones's ONLY advantage would be his conditioning."
Let's not get it twisted, Jon should lose that fight. But Jon's advantages aren't just conditioning. Jon would have better stamina, better coordination, faster reflexes, be better at learning and adapting, be physically faster. Who would actually win? I don't know. Could go either way.
For Wallace to win, he'd only need a good parry and follow-up. But is Jon Jones only allowed to "figure it out himself for a week"? If Jon was actually trained for a week, I'd probably put my money on Jon to win the sword fight (assuming the weapons were fairly matched). Jon wouldn't need to know every single aspect of swordsmanship, he'd just need to land one hit without getting hit himself.
I can practically guarantee that Jon Jones has a genetic advantage, is healthier and more fit in general, and if he were allowed to train in modern swordsmanship for a significant amount of time (like 2 years or something), he would be very likely to win against William Wallace (nothing is 100% in the chaos of a fight with sharp blades, but I'd give him 80%). "Real battlefield experience" isn't what decides a duel. It can definitely help, yes, but the best training is that which most closely resembles the task you're trying to achieve.
I think what you're putting the highest value on is "life and death" experience. That's just not big enough of a factor. Nutrition, genetics, quality training, mindset. That's what matters.
For example, Kimbo Slice became famous for being a "street fighter", which is as close to "life and death" experience as you can get in fisticuffs. He was outclassed by people who trained to be MMA fighters.
A different example, someone who doesn't "tick enough boxes" to be a competitive professional fighter is famously Bob Sapp. Bob Sapp is a big (muscular and tall) fighter who just doesn't seem to have the mindset or genetics (or maybe even training) to be a competitive professional fighter, so he became an entertainer that does goofy fights. Being big isn't everything.
As others have said, have a HEMA instructor/competitor on and test your theory. I'd watch that. Genuinely curious.
What theory of mine, specifically, would I need a HEMA instructor or competitor to test?
@@hard2hurt the theory that an MMA guy, after couple of hours sword training, would wreck HEMA guys. I think it would be a cool experiment.
Edit: re-watched the video. You didn't say that. You did say that 'an MMA fighter with a sword is more dangerous than a HEMA fighter with a sword'. Then Seth got super uncomfortable lol... Anyway, same experiment applies. In fairness though, you mess around with weapons more than the average MMA guy, so maybe one of the guys you coach would be a better test subject?
@@ElDrHouse2010 sure, that could be interesting too, for contrast. In all honesty though, virtually any moderately athletic person with a sword and shield should have a pretty good chance against someone with a bat. Sword and shield is the superior weapon system. I'd be more interested to see some sort of crossover video where some of Mike's MMA students did a full day of basic sword training and then fought some HEMA practioners in a tournament or some such. I'd be interested to see how they'd do.
The Gladius, it’s a fast ferocious cut and thruster. Regardless of the sword all techniques have basis in unarmed fighting. For example in Jiu Jitsu the wrist and neck are primary targets, so too with sword fighting. In Jiu Jitsu there is a term called Ko-te which means wrist or small hand but also refers to subtle but important details, such as attacking your opponent’s wrist or hand to stop the fight.
That's what I was thinking too, cause it's perfect for close combat
Yeah, get me a Gladius made by Dan Keffeler and mad science forge with layered alloys (titanium core maybe, for speed).
This is gold! Very good I think a short sword and decent shield 🛡️ is actually pretty good for home defense and might really scare the piss out of an invader armed or not they'd b afraid of being impaled
I appreciate that subtle "head movement" dig at RR
When I watched this video I realised something. You don’t need to be super trained to win a fight. You don’t need to have the best technique. You can win by avoiding mistakes.
The first (and arguably the most important) thing you learn in any art is how to stop making mistakes. This is key to understanding all art v’s art debates. Different arts train for different situations and what constitutes a mistake varies with the situation. Lose position on the ground and you have lost. Drop your guard striking and you have lost. Try fighting against a joint lock with strength and you have lost. Exchange hits while weapon fighting (Icy mikes mistake) and you have both lost.
Practice the art that most closely simulates a given situation if you what to win in that situation. That way you learn the common mistakes in that situation and how to avoid them.
you can win even making all mistakes in the book, but you won't be consistent
Ramsey Dewey said you will win against 3 types of opponent:
A)The one who is making more mistakes
B) the one who is athletically inferior
C) the one who is better than you but injured or having a bad day
@@genezysgoncalves5937 totally agree. making mistakes does not guarantee a loss, not making any mistakes doesn't guarantee a win. But it helps. !
Roman Gladius or Greek Xiphos would be an excellent sword for self defense when paired with a shield, I personally used a Greek Xiphos and home made shield for home defense before I owned firearms. With an appropriately large shield that covers your entire torso, you can block off the narrow hallways and doorways of a typical home, the attacker would be bottlenecked to face you head on and right behind that shield is your compact Xiphos or Gladius in your dominant hand ready to strike from behind the shield. The small size of the sword makes it easy to conceal behind the shield, meaning you could take your opponent by surprise or even if he already knows you have the weapon, the shield would still conceal your movement and what angle the strike is coming from, giving you a huge advantage. The compact size of the sword also means you can more easily swing it in the confined spaces of a home and generate the incapacitating power needed to lop off literal pieces of the offender. And both the Gladius and Xiphos have blade tips that widen substantially just a few inches from the tip, making thrusts a devastating attack and they are very easy to perform from behind a shield, going under, beside, above etc. with rapid speed. I don't think any attacker stands a chance in such a situation unless they are armed with a gun, in which case you would be royally screwed anyway. But just think about the WTF factor as well, if some punk broke into somebody's house to try and steal something and are faced with that? I think they would be very intimidated and probably leave in much the same way as someone staring down the barrel of a gun.
I think a gladiator sword because it’s short enough to be agile in small spaces. Also because of it length you can have a lot better control.
That makes sense. You're right, it's designed for those small spaces
I love that you keep making this stuff, you're the best
Shadaversity has great content and his opinions and conclusions about weapons always seem to make sense to me. The fact that you came to the same conclusion about the gladius makes me feel good that I watch both your channels. You should put your hypothesis about mma vs hema to the test. Get a hema guy to train wonderboy for a few hours and then simulate a home invasion.
I actually came here from shads video myself as well. I will however say this. I comment on shads video saying this as well. He has no real understanding of anatomy and it shows when he gets in the conversation of getting hit in the same video
I have my bolo, I do all kinds of outdoor work with that and I think it will serve me perfectly in a self-defense scenario.
I'd say any arming sword, something one handed with the center of mass close to the hilt for extra agility. I think "best sword" for self defense is a bit silly, considering the odds of the other person having a melee weapon are exceptionally low, but under the context of home defense (assuming for the US, you wouldn't walk around with a sword), the only criteria is that it can't be overly long. I also agree with thrusting, but I don't think you need a dedicated thrusting blade especially considering body armor is nonexistent nowadays.
yup, arming sword and buckler which was the self defense standard for centuries. Maybe something like a gladius in smaller quarters
4:40 In a modern home defense context, HEMA isn't a big deal for effective sword use since you're not going to be facing someone with a sword. Depending on how your house is set up, a rapier is probably your most lethal, and easiest to use sword. You can stick them with the pointy end from a long ways off, and it will cut sorta OK. Cuts are less lethal than thrusts, but debilitate faster, so a short cutting sword like a falchion, falcata, messer, hangar, gladius, cutlass, cutoe, scimitar, khopesh, etc, or large knife like a khukri, machete, or big bowie knife that you can swing in your living room without being inhibited by furniture is probably more practical.
Rapier is good for those Who can properly trust. With such unskilled fencer There is a high chance He can stuck it in the flesh without making decisive injury which is not really what you want. I think its better to stick to anythink else you mentioned.
I respectfully disagree. Yes, that thrust will be lethal (without rapid modern medical attention), but there are plenty of historical accounts of people having been run through, yet continuing to fight for several seconds afterwards. It's simply not a reliable, instantly debilitating wound.
All this experimentation just to prove that the redneck 20 dollar Walmart machete is the move
Hell yeah I would say you Sensei Seth and Jesse would be awesome as characters in that game hell yes
We're here in my area as a hema guy who transitioned to mma.
If you already know how to fight all you would need to do is look up a few basics for the weapon you're thinking of.
The treatises are advanced techniques for people who already know how to fight. You're right they're unnecessary but they give you an edge over someone who's as good as you.
Best weapon for home defense in my opinion is a messer with a blade length somewhere between 18 and 24 inches. But realistically any short sword would work because that's what they're for.
As for you're saying that a fighter transitioning to hema is better than hema transition to fighting. You're right but fighters still make bad mistakes that hema guys can easily take advantage of but if the guy has boxing expierience they're really dangerous with a bowie knife sized knife more than anything which also works with a buckler in close quarters pretty well. Try that one out next. Cold steel has some bowie trainers. Bowie and buckler vs baseball bat in a hallway.
The thing Mike and his LARPing buddies don't seem to understand is weapon intent which can only be done with protection on. Having a bat swung at 1/2 of less speed and hitting teaches nothing. Some simulators get dangerous on the thrust so you can't do actual thrust so people discount them. Mike needs to go to a HEMA school with real safety equipment and go bout then go back and re-evaluate. This is the difference between swinging a stick around and watching the Dog Brothers.
@@ElDrHouse2010 and? There is still zero intent to hit with anything Mike and his LAPRing buddies were doing. Trying to block a crowbar with the noob techniques Mike thinks he knows would get him hurt even worse.
Best weapon for home defense is a gun.
@@QualityPen - true, but not an option around the world or believe it or not there are people that don't want to shoot someone.
@@SwordFighterPKN I think the bat was foam and they did hit with intent but I think they panicked from Mike rushing them. Happens quite a bit when new guys play with shields.
Shadiversity and hard2hurt collab when?
Need this
Did just a bit of HEMA in my life.
A short, mostly stabbing sword and a buckler is a fantastic combo for home defense if we are not talking guns here.
And guys with baseball bats in the vid showed one of the main probs with a blunt-force weapon and no training with that. But at the same time, they showed what they could do once they've made it to the brawl phase.
Loved the video, the concept, the idea, and the openness to change if something proves to be a better option.
How could I see when you have a seminar in California to join? Is there anything like a mailing list or something like this?
He said a hema guy cannot go in reverse to a boxing class as easily as mma to hema, but the funny thing is boxing comes from Hema. Boxing was made as a way for hoplite soldiers to practice sword and shield tactics in a safe way. The lead hand is the off hand, same as a shield while the rear hand is dominant, the one that would hold the sword. Boxers use the lead hand to defend & set up for a power shot, hoplites use the shield to defend and set up for a sword strike. The correlation in tactics is there, if someone knows to look for them.
This video is an eye opener to me. In hema training I like to rush close to my enemy because most of them can't handle this. Now I understand that it is really important to keep the distance because you don't know if a random opponent got better clinch or grappeling skills.
This will improve my fencing skills.
Thanks
You must not spar with many who study Fiore. I've got a few pointers for you about rushing! ;p
Most HEMA people dont train grappling because its a hobby for them. As a saber fencer I am aware of some techniques but I dont train/use them, cuz I need my training buddies next week. Things like: low kicks to the knee/groin, striking with the crossguard/pommel in the face, armbars, etc.
We should use them in sparring, but no one figured how to make it sparring-safe yet.
Thrusting will work, but not as dramatically as a hacking blow. A short sword, tomahawk, or even a Smatchet can cause a debilitating strike that will end the contact immediately.
before i finish this video im going to say a gladius sword is best for home defense. its short, double sided edge, piercing tip.
I agree 100%
I love the bold hypothesis that an MMA fighter with a sword beats a HEMA fighter with a sword. Thing is though, this is an absolutely testable hypothesis, and you absolutely should test it! I would love nothing more than to watch you and shadeversity spar with swords.
I don't recall saying that exactly but yeah sure
Shad is not a HEMA practicioner. He is a self taught.
It would be better to get an actual hema instructor with a competitive background.
It makes sense that a sword would "work": it literally was the weapon of choice for THOUSANDS of years.
I would think something like a Roman short sword would be the right choice. It's not so heavy & long that a normal person would have trouble controlling it. You don't need the William Wallace sword. Just something short & practical & vicious.
Reminds me of a debate I had with my now-wife at one point. She had a fencing background and I did kung fu. My point was that a martial artist can pick up a weapon and do fairly well without it even if that weapon wasn't specifically trained. But in kung fu, you train with a staff, a sword, and some flexible weapon to cover the basic types of weapons (long/short/flexible) and techniques to use with those kinds of weapons and then later learn more about specific things. (Like everything from staff is still valid for spear, but now you have a cutting/stabbing metal point.)
But saying things like an MMA guy can just pick up a sword and wreck HEMA people while HEMA people will go to a boxing gym and suck is just rubbish, or saying that an MMA person with a sword is more dangerous than a HEMA person with a sword is nonsense for people of equivalent training/experience. Of course HEMA people will lose an MMA match to MMA people; MMA people will lose a HEMA match to HEMA people (for equivalent levels of fighters). Thinking differently is just fantasy.
totally agree just as fighter train with the weapon he uses (punches, elbows, kicks, grappling) its the same for hema or another weapon based martial art no matter the background excellence comes from practice. so if a hema guy will fight against a mma fighter in unarmed fight i bet my money on the mma dude but if they gonna have a swordfight my money is on the hema guy. (assuming both are pro in each of their disiplines)
I think that it would be easier for an MMA fighter to reach basic competency in HEMA than vice versa. I remember watching s series of videos where a team of fencers and point karate fighters tried each other's sports. Both teams had the footwork, timing and distance management down, but the karate fighters learned how to thrust and parry a lot more quickly than the fencers learned how to punch and kick.
If we're talking about HEMA and MMA, HEMA is a bit more diverse than fencing, which would make it harder, but MMA has an enormous range of physical skills you need to learn before you can fight competently. Not to mention learning how to take a punch or the amount of energy it takes to fight full contact with your whole body.
This doesn't mean that an MMA fighter could walk into a HEMA class and expect to dominate. But the number of hour they would need to put in to be competitive would be a lot lower.
No. A mediocre MMA fighter can absolutely hold their own against the best HEMA guys given a few days of training. The best HEMA guys will still get folded by blue belts after 6 months of practice. I do both MMA and HEMA. The caliber of athlete in both are worlds apart.
@@heraclius4077 HEMA also has an enormous range of physical skills. Wrestling/grappling, a variety of weapons, all the same basics of distancing and footwork. Getting clocked with a steel bar isn't easier than getting hit with a punch. I've experienced both. HEMA also does full contact with the whole body. Sport Olympic fencing is not HEMA. HEMA people already punch and kick. Many of us also practice other martial arts. I saw a couple MMA guys try to do a HEMA tournament a while back. They thought they were real macho and used less safety gear. They were idiots and couldn't finish because of injuries.
@@SolidStructureWC Found the Mr. Macho fantasy man. You're talking people who train a lot versus hobbyists, not comparing people who equally practice their arts. A lot of the HEMA people I know train multiple arts, some including jiujutsu. There's a lot more diversity between schools/clubs than there is between arts.
The sword to use, IMHO, is the one that you train with the most and legally own.
What is the best sword to legally own and train the most? Assuming you have both a trainer and a real one
@@viiltelijamurhaaja7225 depends on your build, agility, strength, intelligence and other things haha. But there is no best sword
@@favkisnexerade I respectfully disagree. Depending on location, pokey swords are good for heavy clothing. Slashy swords are good for loose clothing. So in the winter, someone wearing heavy leather coats, or puffy coats it is best to use a pokey sword. Like firearms, you need to find the right one for the area you are in.
@@navajador @Nix oh yeah for sure different swords have different pros and cons, but what I mean is for example if you have bad static strength or endurance but good explosive strength or endurance, instead of using thrust centric technique or sword, you'd be better off using a bit heavier saber to compensate for it. Or if you have one eye or bad sight, some binding or distance judgement is bad for you anyways, so you learn other skills, and naturally because of that weapon that is not heavy on binding or distance management would be better for you.
@@favkisnexerade fat, bad, weak and dumb. So whats the best sword for me
Okay, couple of things. We don't say go back to the manuals because we wanna jerk off about how great the past was. We go back to the manuals because they were written by people who did this shit for a living and learned from a long line of people who did this for a living. If all knowledge of BJJ disappeared tomorrow except for one Gracie book and people decided to bring it back of course you'd pour over the book. How long do you think it would take people just screwing around on a mat with no training to invent a Buggy choke? They were masters and they have real things to teach. Not to mention that the old masters made it clear that weapons training was meant to happen after an already established martial training with wrestling as a specific focus. Many of the old masters go so far as to say that wrestling is the foundation of their martial art.
As for the when HEMA fighters not giving a boxer or wrestler trouble I think you're not looking at the core of competitive fighters and just looking at the larger number of less invested in competition level guys. There is absolutely a small core of competitive fighters. You can head out to SoCal swordfight in about 2 months to see for yourself. Hell I've been traveling all over North America this year competing and I be happy to stop by and take up your challenge (what are you guys in the Carolinas?).
Mike what about chains like just chains of different sizes for self defence
I've always have thought that a spear and standing in a bladed crouched stance would be a good home defense option. Or if you had something more like a nagamaki and held the sharp edge up so it could not be grabbed and stood in the bladed crouched stance. The only draw back I really see with these two options would be , being in a narrow hallway and turning into a doorway going into a bedroom as in a offense situation looking for a bad guy, and not being able to do what's called slicing the pie or the room . In my home I have only one spot that I would have a potential problem with , but knowing it I have set up a mirror in the room to see into the blind spot without committing my self to inter the room and choke point .
Another is that a spear is easier to grab if you miss or hesitate, while a bladed weapon is easier to keep control of, especially double edged ones as you just have to pull to slice off the grabbing hand.
And also it has not to be too long or it'd be too unweildy to be usable properly.
Your argument is basically the same as telling someone to buy a gun or knife for defence and telling them they don't need to train with it. Someone who is a trained fencer has a massive advantage with a blade.
While I used to own a katana and it actually helped me during a home invasion. I would say the best sword for self-defense depends on the size and strength of the individual. In ancient Japan the women used to have a staff with a blade on the end for their home self-defense and they would teach their daughters how to use it. But, I think the best sword is as varied as the individual. Although, I could see I see Mike wielding a bastard sword 😂