Thoughts on Paulus Hector Mair

[Roger N]

That is intriguing indeed. However, the order of the images in the book might not portray the work process. So, the sword & buckler and sickle images may have been created before the dagger and dussack images even if they appear at the end.

And to make it more complicated the dagger, dussack, sword & buckler and sickle images may even have been the very first images made and then pasted in at a later stage.

Somewhere along the line in this process they may have considered engraving plates, at least for the images. It is of course hard to judge fully and even harder to know if it was an early or late idea during the sketching phase.

[Roger N]

And to broaden the picture a bit, Joachim Meyer actually depicts lefties in his 1570 manual; three longsworders, 1 rapier fencer and possibly 2 halberd fencers.

Back, right fencer


Back left, right fencer.


Front, left fencer.


It is of course possible to build a thesis that this is for illustrative purposes, but given the context it doesn't seem to fit, since there would have been better and simpler solutions. Therefore I believe these are really lefties.

[Michael Chidester]

The problem with demonstrating a connection between dagger treatises is that dagger looks the same in every tradition. The problem with demonstrating a connection between longsword treatises is that almost every longsword play looks the same in a single treatise. (Every longsword treatise seems to have at least five images of two guys facing each other in an equal bind at the middle.) This specifically relates to demonstrating provenance of Mair's dagger and longsword plays, which are drawn from at least four different sources and mixed together indiscriminately, and generally bear different text than the sources. When he shows an equal bind at the middle, is he copying Codex Wallerstein, Jorg Wilhalm Hutter, or something else entirely?

(I also ran into the issue with a dagger manuscript that really seems like it's part of the Nuremberg group, something that I can't seem to prove.)

[Keith P. Myers]

Very cool thread!

Just one thought I had on whether PHM made up the additional material found in the text for the illustrations. I don't think so. He clearly copies Fabian von Auerswald's book, but then provides many more follow ons than in von Auerswald. And they make perfect sense. They obviously didn't come from someone just thinking about it and writing it down. Jorge Breu obviously used a whole series of models for his illustrations. Who were they? Breu paid such close attention to detail that in one illustration from the half-swording section he shows a fencer wearing a leather apron with a wooden shoe form and a cut- out of a shoe laying on the floor in the background. This man was obviously a cobbler. I think its a fair assumption that these men were members of a local fencing guild. Any guild would have a "master" that was in charge of instruction. I don't think it would be too much of a stretch to assume that PHM knew this man and that this man provided at least some of the input for the text. This is just a guess, but I don't think it is too "out there."

So my thoughts go like this:
---The men that posed for the illustrations obviously knew something about swordsmanship.
---A group of men that knew how to wield weapons likely came from a local fencing guild.
---PHM likely knew members of this guild if he wasn't a member himself.
---This men may have had input into what ended up in PHM's text.

At this point in history I doubt that the fencing guilds were into armoured fighting. Most guild members were commoners and not noblemen. Suits of armour were expensive. This might explain why the text for the harnissfechten section is not as good as the rest. It very may well have been based on speculation rather than application, since in a time when local martial arts are on the wane, armoured fighting was likely the first thing to disappear.

Enough rambling.

[Michael Chidester]

Yes, that's a very plausible line of reasoning, but there's just no way to be sure at the moment. I'm withholding judgement about his additions to these treatises until I see a translation and can actually formulate an informed opinion. If his interpretations prove to be correct it would be a huge boon to all of us, breathing life into many manuals that are essentially worthless to us at the moment.

On a different note, yesterday I was chatting with Steven Reich and the fact came up that Mair's texts cannot be said to constitute a "system" of fencing. Mair presents us with an extensive library of manuals, but they're bits and pieces of many different systems, including Liechtenauer, Nuremberg, I.33, and others. Thus, while his texts serve as valuable points of reference for the study of many--if not most--of the manuals in the German language, you can't "do Mair" the way some groups specialize in Fiore delli Liberi or Sigmund ain Ringeck or some other master. (Well, unless you were willing to make a pan-European, or at least pan-Germanic, claim.)

[Keith P. Myers]

On a different note, yesterday I was chatting with Steven Reich and the fact came up that Mair's texts cannot be said to constitute a "system" of fencing. Mair presents us with an extensive library of manuals, but they're bits and pieces of many different systems, including Liechtenauer, Nuremberg, I.33, and others. Thus, while his texts serve as valuable points of reference for the study of many--if not most--of the manuals in the German language, you can't "do Mair" the way some groups specialize in Fiore delli Liberi or Sigmund ain Ringeck or some other master. (Well, unless you were willing to make a pan-European, or at least pan-Germanic, claim.)

I agree. At the Houston event a couple of years ago my plan was to present a class on Dussack based on PHM. But I soon discovered it was much easier to use Joachim Meyer because PHM does not lay things out systematically. As you said, his manual is essentially just a collection of set-plays. With some work one can derive or extrapolate a system for some of the weapons....like the shortstaff. But as a whole his manual is not very user friendly.

[Michael Chidester]

Keith Myer's translation of the Sword and Buckler content we were discussing is now online.

http://www.wiktenauer.com/wiki/Clerus_Lutegerus