In-Depth # 4 – PE and Due Tempi
I think I owe Mr.Tustin a big thank you. Admittedly, his P.E. class is intense and tiring, but it is helping me immensely with my in-depth. I have only P.E. for a month, but already I am much more fit and far stronger than I was, and I foresee that only improving. Holding the sword up in forward position, arm extended, shoulders forward, hand turned, is a tiring exercise, and for the first time I was able to stop myself from bringing down my arm for the entire duration of our exercises. My arm burned like crazy, but I managed it, and I enjoyed a sense of quiet satisfaction.
In other news, when we finished our simple drills last Saturday – and once my arm stopped burning – we began work on the more advanced skills. Specifically, we mostly worked on ‘due tempi’, on in English, two times. Essentially, this means striking the enemy while they are moving to strike you. It can be confusing – it involves timing and predicting your opponent’s movements, while simultaneously moving to gain their sword. Since you probably have no idea what that means, I’ll try to explain a bit.
The basis of the Italian style of rapier combat is the finding of the sword. This entails three things: crossing over their sword, having your true edge(the stronger edge of your sword) against their weak edge, and have your forte against their debole(which means the thick part of your sword, close to the hilt, over the tip of their sword). If you have these three things, you have found their sword and gained the advantage. But you have not yet gained the sword – to do this, you must use this advantage.
So in due tempi, you find their sword while they are making a move – usually stepping forward – and quickly strike before they react. Of course, most opponents won’t simply let you do that. So in the drill we focused on, we found our opponent’s sword – and they disengaged and found our sword – and we countered, found their sword again, and struck. It is a difficult thing to grasp properly, and I think I will need a lot more practice before I can do it well. But then again, isn’t that the point?
March 4th, 2011 at 10:28 PM
Liam, I like how you appreciate everything around you and even see value in PE. As mentioned many times before, I learn so much from reading your blogs. That is the point as well.
QMtK