Striking in unarmed Medieval/renaissance MA

[Mike Cartier]

Hey man, no offense taken or intended but that's incorrect. I've trained in one form of boxing or another for most of my life but for the past decade or more it's been the 19th century styles. Boxing started out bare knuckled, boxers had specific training methods they used to condition their hands for bare knuckled striking and while I don't currently do that I did it for years. Gloves, or mufflers as they were called, were introduced for the same reason foils, federschwerts, singlesticks and any other Western training weapon was introduced; to make practice safer. It's a matter of history and recorded in the manuals.

Sorry dude but Andrew maxwell is correct in what he said, I say this coming from a life of boxing and a family of boxers. You can condition the hands but modern boxing with the gloves and the wraps is all about protection of the hands not the opponent. The supposed safety of modern boxing is a false claim thats not supported by evidence. The body is made to be knocked out but not made to recieve hundreds of punches in a 3-5 minute round bouncing that brain around, then get an 8 count and get a few more hundred punches. There is a documentary out there that shows what happens to the brain under this sort of stress, I forget the name of it but its pretty graphic and shows a modern pro boxer before and after a pro career and its not pretty. There is in fact a movement in modern boxing to reduce the gloves and such and go back to the old style but its not getting much support. The hand is not made to do what modern boxing teaches which is why the old boxing styles used different sorts of fists and strikes even going back to old Ancient boxing. Even in modern MMA the use of modern boxing theory has led to alot of broken hands even with wrapsand mma gloves.

[Sean Karp]

I have to butt in on one thing. Modern boxing gloves give the punch a greater Impulse* when hitting their target than MMA gloves or bare fists thus they produce more long term damage (like Pugilista Dementia). See modern boxing gloves partly bypass the protection & armour of the brain. Namely: The Skull.

MMA gloves do the same but not to as great an extent. Bare fists even less so.

A bare fist may kill you or hurt you more now, but a boxing glove may give you more brain damage to enjoy later, like ten to twenty years later.

-Sean

BTW the picture of a Blacksmith using the ground, wall, or other hard object like an anvil while he pound's upon someone with his fist is a scene I have read more than once in Fiction. Glad to know it really is how a blacksmith thinks about a fight, it made my day.

(*Note:Impulse is defined as a force multiplied by the amount of time it acts over. In calculus terms, the impulse can be calculated as the integral of force with respect to time. Alternately, impulse can be calculated as the difference in momentum between two given instances.The SI units of impulse are N*s or kg*m/s.)

[Andrew Maxwell]

Hey man, no offense taken or intended but that's incorrect. I've trained in one form of boxing or another for most of my life but for the past decade or more it's been the 19th century styles. Boxing started out bare knuckled, boxers had specific training methods they used to condition their hands for bare knuckled striking and while I don't currently do that I did it for years. Gloves, or mufflers as they were called, were introduced for the same reason foils, federschwerts, singlesticks and any other Western training weapon was introduced; to make practice safer. It's a matter of history and recorded in the manuals.

None taken or intended here either and I could certainly be wrong. You may have read more accurate sources than me <shrug>, but as far as I am aware one of the major reasons to use gloves was to prevent the metacarpal fractures common amongst bare-knuckle boxers. I totally do agree with you that a fighter should have a grapple and a striking game (and a ground game, actually )

It's not the gloves that deprive boxers of their most effective techniques, it's the rules. The gloves do alter things quite a bit though, they change the way the strikes work and some even use them as shields.

You've got me curious as to what techniques you think are prevented by the rules which are the most effective for strikers...

[Mike Ruhala]

Hey Mike, lately I'd been reading here and there that you might be into boxing. I don't know what style you're into or what your approach to sparring is but one of these times when I'm down in South Florida I'd love to toe the scratch with you. I've been intending to get a program started up here in Tampa Bay, maybe get a LPR circuit going. If I see you in Jupiter this Thursday night we can talk about it.

Anyway I must reiterate what I said because it isn't a theory or a personal opinion but a matter of historical fact. Gloves, or mufflers as they were once called, are not inventions of modern boxing but have been in use for hundreds of years. Where things get confused is that modern boxing does not teach boxers how to strike with closed fists, it isn't a part of their game so they have to have something to protect their hands and the mufflers, originally there to protect your partner, also protect their hands purely by happy coincidence. This subject comes up way too much and I always like to point to Billy Edward's 1888 Art Of Boxing And Manual Of Training, an original of which once resided in my personal library.

Nothing is to be condemned so much as sparring open-handed, or with fingers only half shut. Serious accidents often result to the joints of the fingers from this stupid practice. How can you hit a clean, sharp blow straight out from the shoulder and land full on your adversary's person, without damaging your fingers, if open? If you think it too much like real fighting to close the fists when the gloves are on, you had better take the gloves off and shake "the bones" for exercise.

They put the gloves on because they were worried about hurting their buddies in friendly sparring matches. It doesn't matter whether modern boxing is safe or not, it doesn't matter why modern boxers wear them, the gloves were not invented to protect your hands. The original gangsters didn't even wear gloves when doing bag work. From the same manual,

Do not put on the gloves for punching the bag, but use the bare knuckles. If at first they should get a little raw or rubbed, a few applications of weak tannic acid solution, or rosin, or good strong pickle out of the salt-pork barrel, will soon make the hands and knuckles tough.

FWIW I developed hornlike plates and the two knuckles I preferentially strike with are still physically larger than the other two... they'd been like that so long I thought it was natural but Keith once told me that was because of the conditioning and he's a doctor so....

Anyway, rebated weapons(gloved fists) allowed modern boxers to get sloppy and forget how to throw a real punch just like how rebated weapons and light bulbs allowed modern fencers to get sloppy and forget how to cut and thrust.

Sorry if I take this subject so seriously but this was my primary art for many years and it's one I used in earnest back in the bad old days.

[Mike Ruhala]

Hey Andrew, I see you're from New Zealand. I visited your country once, it was one of the most beautiful places I've ever been and populated with some of the finest people I've ever met. I gotta get out there again someday.

You've got me curious as to what techniques you think are prevented by the rules which are the most effective for strikers...

That would be a tough question to answer without going over every rule set but the simplest thing to say is look at what strikes are considered fouls in any given format. For me personally I think the biggest thing is they force you to wear gloves. Yeah yeah, the gloves protect your hands, they're more dangerous... whatever. I can do a tremendously larger amount of damage in much less time with my bared hammers. Other than that start counting down the list... spine, back of the head, trachea, temples, orbits, joints, knees on short ribs, headbutts and so on. I'll work with what I have though and my favorite, the uppercut, is generally legal.

Hopefully my reply to Mike Cartier helps with the other issues/questions. I'm still sitting on a ton of material from my old practice so it isn't anywhere close to practical for me to even try to post everything I have but I could field a specific question or something like that but I don't want to steer this thread too much further off course than it is already. I think most people here are focussed on grappling and the Med/Ren eras.

[Mike Ruhala]

BTW the picture of a Blacksmith using the ground, wall, or other hard object like an anvil while he pound's upon someone with his fist is a scene I have read more than once in Fiction. Glad to know it really is how a blacksmith thinks about a fight, it made my day.

Oddly enough I started out with the stock removal method of bladesmithing and only graduated to forging relatively recently. I have, however, referred to my fists as hammers since childhood.

[Jonathan Waller]

@Mike R.
I too like the idea of neutralising the opponent with whatever methods. I'm not focused on grappling just what works.

All my points were regarding the original thread point med/Rem MA. Obviously by the 18th century pugilism has made a shift. However thats outside of the orignal question.

Also when i saw control i mean preventing the opponent from moving/harming you while you damage them, not restraining them.
Best

[Andrew Maxwell]

They put the gloves on because they were worried about hurting their buddies in friendly sparring matches. It doesn't matter whether modern boxing is safe or not, it doesn't matter why modern boxers wear them, the gloves were not invented to protect your hands.

I stand corrected From what I've read, it seemed that they were invented primarily for protecting the hands, but hey, I'm willing to accept that it may be only some kinds of (modern) gloves which had hand protection foremost in mind. All gloves were not designed for the same purpose in any case- I'd classify the cestus as a type of boxing glove, and that hardly has your opponent's safety in mind!

FWIW I developed hornlike plates and the two knuckles I preferentially strike with are still physically larger than the other two... they'd been like that so long I thought it was natural but Keith once told me that was because of the conditioning and he's a doctor so....

I was aware that BK boxers conditioned their hands, but I'm also aware that it was common for them to injure their hands- enough so that a fifth metacarpal fracture is still sometimes known as a "boxer's fracture". I do believe that you know your stuff, but I'm not entirely sold that the hand protection offered by gloves is just a happy accident...

Anyway, rebated weapons(gloved fists) allowed modern boxers to get sloppy and forget how to throw a real punch just like how rebated weapons and light bulbs allowed modern fencers to get sloppy and forget how to cut and thrust.

Now THAT is something which would be interesting to discuss Modern boxers definitely use different actions to BK boxers, but it's an interesting call to say it's a "poor" or "sloppy" punch (not that I'm saying you're wrong mind you, I'm hardly an expert on boxing technique). Perhaps we should start a new thread about historic pugilism?

Sorry if I take this subject so seriously but this was my primary art for many years and it's one I used in earnest back in the bad old days.

No harm no foul. I'd rather talk to people who take the subject very seriously, than ones who take it too lightly.

Hey Andrew, I see you're from New Zealand. I visited your country once, it was one of the most beautiful places I've ever been and populated with some of the finest people I've ever met. I gotta get out there again someday.

Well, if you (or any of the guys on here) are ever over here, look me up, we'd be glad to have you. Although... probably not for a year or two, until we've cleaned up the aftermath of our recent earthquakes (I live in Christchurch, which is a mess at the moment )

[Jay Vail]

Now i'm not saying that striking is ineffective. But we have to come back to the fact that it plays a very small part in the majority of sources.

The main reason in my opinion is that if 1 - you can strike then strike them with a weapon. 2 - If you don't have a weapon smash them in to the ground control them and get or draw a weapon and strkike them with it. 3 - they have a weapon and you don't. Then control them smash in to the ground and take their weapon or go to 2 and repeat if necessary.

Explaining why there is so little striking with the hand is of course the problem. They didn't do it. There has to be a reason. They were the ones who fought in armor, not us, so we must assume that they had a good reason. It does not get us near the answer or any degree of understanding to say that punches are great and effective and whatever. The old masters did not seem to think this was the case.

One thing is clear, that wrestling/grappling has two benefits. First, it nullifies the enemy's ability to strike with a hand weapon, or even his hand. Second, it provides solutions for what to do in the clinch, after you've tied up the guy's hands.

The throw is intended to put the man on the ground in, hopefully, a position in which he is in a disadvantage, a position where you can finish him. Landing on on the head, or otherwise incapacitating the throwee is, in fact, rare. In most throws/takedowns, the guy does not land on his head, contrary to popular modern belief. He has fight left while on the ground. But it is more likely in the old days that the fight would have been concluded with daggers than with strikes or submissions.
Here is an account of a judicial duel that occurred in France in 1386.

A dagger thrust decided the last formal judicial duel fought in France in 1386. Jean de Carrouges accused Jacques le Gris of raping his wife, Marguerite. He demanded and ultimately received permission for trial by combat. The fight began with a joust, but without any fence separating the combatants. They made two passed without breaking a lance, but on the third pass, both lances shattered. The fight continued on horseback with axes. During the wheeling melee, le Gris struck a great, two-handed blow at Carrouges. Carrouges raised his shield in time to protect himself, but the axe-head deflected from the shield and struck Carrouges’ horse in the neck, killing it. Carrouges leaped clear as the horse collapsed. Le Gris charged, trying to impale Carrouges on the top spike of his axe. Carrouges leaped out of the way and thrust his own axe spike into le Gris’ horse just behind the girth. Carrouges’ axe head sank deeply and stuck fast in the wound, and the horse’s momentum tore it from his grasp. Le Gris’ horse then crumpled, and the fight continued on foot with swords, “thrusting and striking and slashing.” At last, the two men nearly spent, le Gris stabbed Carrouges in the thigh. Le Gris drew his sword from the wound and stepped back as if expecting Carrouges to fall. But Carrouges grasped le Gris by the top of his helmet, and pulling sharply forward, threw le Gris to the ground. Carrouges stood over le Gris and tried to stab through the fallen man’s armor with his sword, but was unable to do so. Finally, when le Gris tried to strike from his fallen position, Carrouges knocked the sword from his hands and fell upon him. Kneeling on le Gris’ chest, Carrouges continued to thrust with the point of his sword, but with no more success than he had had before. Reversing the blade and pounding le Gris about the head with the pommel of his sword, Carrouges succeeded in breaking the latch securing le Gris’ helmet visor. Carrouges flipped up the visor, and cast his sword aside because he could not hold le Gris’ helmet and wield the sword at the same time. Carrouges drew his dagger. He demanded le Gris confess the rape. Le Gris cried that he was innocent. “Then be you damned,” shouted Carrouges, and drove the point of his dagger under le Gris’ jaw and into his brain.

The answer thus seems to be that men in the middle ages and renaissance thought that punching was less effective in combat than relying on the dagger.

[Jonathan Waller]

And in medieval Japan which serves as a useful comparrison.
Can we find the answer why it was not more fearured? And does it really matter, not that much. IMO if we train in as much of what they did it will give insights to the why and if it does't at least we've been training the skills they show.

However From comparrison to Japan the idea is that on a battlefield or in a sudden deadly assualt that strikes are less likely to be effective and therefore in these situations where a conservative attitudes will be found people will choose things that are more consistently effective.

Best