Medieval Swordfighting
Ages 7+ (younger groups by special arrangement)

Many people don’t know that masters of medieval European combat left behind detailed manuscripts describing their fighting systems. The above image is from the longsword section of Talhoffer’s 1467 manuscript. Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) is the practice of recreating these systems according to historical sources, including scholarly translations and interpolation using martial arts experts from a variety of cultures. The HEMA Alliance (of which the instructor of this class is one of the founders) is a national federation for HEMA that hosts regional, national, and international tournaments, and supports over a hundred HEMA schools.

Instructors Jonathan Mayshar and Robin Price have been teaching HEMA to adults and children for over 12 years. Here Jonathan and members of the Kron HEMA club are demonstrating at the Getty Center:

Here Jonathan and Robin are demonstrating Scottish broadsword based on McBane’s manuscript at one of dozens of Scottish Festivals we have taught at:

Since we started teaching the available equipment available for HEMA has gotten much better. The rubber medieval daggers in the picture below didn’t exist when we started. The boys in the bottom of the picture are looking at a facsimile of the Talhoffer manuscript — the same as the source of the image at the top of this page.

A typical introduction to medieval swordfighting will focus on longsword technique, but we will also introduce several other medieval and renaissance weapons. Parents are encouraged to take the classes alongside their children!