HEMA? Historical European Martial Arts.

I want people to be more knowledgeable about this subject because it is not given enough credit. Please give your knowledge in detail if you have any. If not, do not post a comment because I want this to be a serious discussion.

Sources to refer to:

Koryvantes.org

Thearma.org

Scholagladiatoria, Skallagrim, Lindybeige and various other videos on YouTube.

Most people are pretty ignorant about how advanced Europeans became in unarmed and armed combat before firearms. Not many people even know that the term "Martial Art" is a European term literally translating to 'the arts of Mars'. This is probably because historical movies are pretty terrible when it comes to fight choreography or they just ape Asian martial arts and haphazardly throw them into a historical European setting.

There actually is a movie with fairly accurate middle-age swordplay: Ironclad (2011). I go really excited when the main character pulled out his greatsword and actually began using it in a realistic manner; half-swording, using the cross-guard as a hook, etc.

Reclaiming the Blade is a pretty good documentary about swords throughout the ages. There is some good info about historical sword fighting and features John Clement, one of the leading authorities on historical European martial arts.

@rdclip: uhm, we all know about wrestling, fencing to name a few.

@superguy1591: Fencing now is very very different from historical fencing. The word fencing come from "defensing", it was created as a self defense and dueling martial art. Usually the sword was accompainied by a dagger, small shield or even a cloak.

I suppose my point is that Eastern martial arts are celebrated an practiced commonly while European martial arts have either been forgotten or so dramatically changed that they are more sport than combat.

Boxing and wrestling are ancient European arts, so are archery, stick fighting & fencing.

Most of them fell out of favour and devolved to mere sports & past times from serious martial arts due to widespread

use of gunpowder weapons and mass armies, thus diminishing the skill of an individual infantry man into near non-consequential.

Similar development was seen in Asia around 1800's when Europeans arrived to India, China & Japan en mass and brought more advanced warfare with them.

Ironically what "saved" the once glorious & chivalrous war arts were entertainment business and criminals & cut-throats... Those "industries" have always been in high demand for people with great skill in such arts.