The Armoury Roundtable

Single-edged medieval swords are a long-underrepresented weapon category in the history of combat and warfare. This may be due to aesthetic preferences, to the availability of extant examples, or even to the complexity of their categorization. The winds, however, are changing, and with the rise of HEMA and a new interest in niche aspects of medieval life, falchions and messers are returning to som...

Keith Seeley researches the weapons and martial arts of early modern China. His master's degree in history informs his approach to contextualizing and deciphering military treatises and manuals from the late Ming to mid Qing dynasties. His primary weapon of study is the yaodao or single-handed saber, which served as the mainstay military sidearm and civilian self-defense tool throughout this h...

Roland Warzecha is a world-renowned expert in historical swordsmanship, with 25 years of martial arts practice under his belt. He has also been a devoted re-enactor since the 1990s. His primary focus of research is medieval sword and buckler combat as outlined in MS I.33, for which he and his fellow instructor/researcher Cornelius Berthold have developed dedicated online courses which you can find...

Having trained with swords and other medieval arms in a stage combat context since the age of fifteen while performing in fight shows throughout the New England Renaissance Festival circuit, James Hester encountered early pioneers of Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) and began studying the works of medieval and Renaissance masters. His path then led him to academia and education, working at...

Maxime started training HEMA and kenjutsu in 2002, and has been teaching since 2009. He now teaches sabre and Irish stick at BAHFF, in Ottawa, Canada. He has taught workshops and seminars in Canada, USA, Ireland, Mexico, France, and Norway, mainly in Antrim Bata and sabre fencing. He also publishes regular articles on his blog Hema misfits on the history and practice of martial arts and antique sw...

Fererico Malagutti is an Italian HEMA fencer, instructor, and martial artist. With over a decade of experience in swordsmanship, with a special interest in late medieval fencing, Federico is one of the preeminent voices in modern HEMA, sharing his skills and thoughts on YouTube. In this stream, Federico discusses HEMA and history, the commonalities and differences between sword training in the pas...

Dequitem is an armoured fighter who focuses on showcasing non-choreographed fights in his videos. His goal is to display historical fighting techniques in the context that most closely resembles how they would have been practiced in historical times. This leads to clashes fought at full speed and power in an effort to survive rather than score points. This approach leads to a better understanding...

Giovanni Sartori is a bladesmith and swordmaker from Bassano del Grappa, in Italy. His work centers around recreating weapons that are authentic not only in terms of measurements and proportions but also in terms of materials and processes. This holistic approach to swordmaking has led to his work being displayed in several museums, including the Deutsches Klingenmuseum in Solingen. In today's...

Eric Estlund is a custom bike maker turned swordsmith. He focuses on crafting high-end swords (and knives), basing his work on extant examples of antique swords while ensuring he also imbues his work with his own creative vision. With an educational background in art and an interest in fencing, that comes as no surprise. In today's episode of The Armoury Roundtable, Eric talks about his philos...

Some sword lovers handle antiques, other handle reproductions, others use them in HEMA training and sparring. But how many have handled authentic antiques and can tell the differences between them and modern reproductions? This group of lucky people is not huge, but if we narrow our focus down to medieval and renaissance swords, the cohort shrinks further, and there are not many who can claim to h...

In the second episode of sword-related conversations on this channel, host Gabriele Culot talks to Andy from Dlatrex Swords. Andy is a well-respected figure in the sword community and is involved in many of its aspects, from researching historical accounts of sword use to measuring sword metrics and charting them. Make sure to follow him at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkgmqo6KbzdA4jAuQlSuF3w...

Niccolò M. Menozzi is the founder and coordinator of the Spadone Project. This research endeavor aims to better understand one of the most iconic weapons of the 16th Century: The Spadone (or Montante, or Zweihander). In the past years, Niccolò and his team have been busy researching and stuying documents, iconography, and extant examples of these iconic swords, of which much is still not well know...