You are here

Wednesday (Manciolino)

Submitted by Ludwig von Rege... on September 21, 2011 - 12:00am

Class: Plays with single sword (spada da filo)

The plays start in Porta di Ferro Stretta stepping towards the opponent (gathering steps) to provoke a response. 

Against a thrust the instruction is to "hit into it with the false edge and turn a half riverso to his thigh".  If the thrust is on the inside then a soft parry (with the forte) works well.  For a thrust on the outside this must be a beat (with the debole) [which I couldn't get to work] followed by a step offline for the Riverso.  The parry could be accompanied by footwork: both stepping forwards (with the right foot) and slipping back worked (but with correspondingly different tactical considerations).

The next instruction is to deliver an ascending Falso to the sword-hand.  It was hard to get a good angle on this (tends to cut into the guard), but we might not have been properly accounting for the opponent's response.  In any case, finish with a cut back into Porta di Ferro Stretta.

The next play is if "he attacks with a thrust to your face in order to then strike you with a mandritto or a riverso".  I think this means: he thrusts, you parry (as above), so he converts to a cut on the other side; so a thrust on the inside turns into a Riverso.  The response to the cut is, "if his mandritto comes to your head, parry it by going into Guardia di Testa".  Parrying a Mandritto in this way seems unnatural to me, but it is a common response for Manciolino.  Presumably it means making a counter-cut (a Riverso) ending in Guardia di Testa.

No instruction is given for parrying a Riverso, but Guardia di Testa seems to work naturally against one.   In any case, the final action is to "respond with a similar blow to his head or leg".

Blog classifications: