MARTIAL ARTS… for the uninitiated

Fencing is one of those sports that practically everyone has heard of, though it probably wouldn’t immediately be thought of as a martial art. That said, this stalwart of European armed combat, with its roots in real-life warfare, is very much deserving of its place in the pantheon of great fighting forms.

Fencing is a broad term – in the strictest of senses, it covers any form of armed combat in which you attempt to stab, bash or slash your opponent with a hand-held weapon. That said, it is usually understood today to refer to the competition sport which sees competitors (often from the upper echelons of society) don white body suits with fly-eye masks and attempt to poke each other with improbably slim, flexible swords.

Fencing of one form or another has been knocking around for quite awhile. Images from ancient Egyptian artefacts show a version of competitive swordfighting, replete with body padding, which looks similar to that which is practised today. Learning to fight with a sword was the bread and butter of warriors in Europe and beyond, right up until humans mastered the use of gunpowder, and with each passing year the skill set was refined.

By the 15th century, clubs dedicated to developing swordfighting with light, manoeuvrable weapons between two individuals began to spring up across Europe, with Germany, Italy, England and France acting as the main bases for the emerging sport.

 In 1471 a fencing manual was published by the Spanish enthusiast Sierge de Valera, although the purpose of learning to fence at the time was to fight in frequently lethal duels over matters of honour.

Different styles continued to develop in different countries over the following centuries, although winning practice bouts was becoming an end in itself, and practitioners were finding themselves in a situation in which they could be described as a good fencer without ever having been in a duel.

Stylistic differences continued across the continent, but there were enough similarities to see fencing become a part of the first Olympics of the modern era in 1896 under a unified set of rules of engagement.

Modern fencing has three styles, involving three different types of weapon and different associated rules. The épée is a comparatively heavy sword used for thrusting and competitors score points by striking anywhere on the opponent’s body. The sabre is a lighter weapon designed for both thrusting and cutting with the upper body (excluding the back of the head and the hands) as the target area. Finally there’s the most popular – the foil, which is a light sword used exclusively for thrusting, with the valid target area restricted to the torso.

Fencing hasn’t been immune from the divisions found in other combat sports. Some practitioners have dismissed the Olympic version of the form and moved instead towards different goals.

Some, for instance, practice moves exclusively against imaginary opponents – probably because it’s easier. This is strikingly reminiscent of kata, the simulated fighting practiced in a number of East Asian martial arts such as taekwondo, kung fu and karate.

At the other end of the scale are the realists, who practice a form of fencing which is geared towards killing the opponent rather than just scoring points in a competition. There are also attempts to resurrect fencing in the more diverse understanding of the word, with many seeking to rediscover the skill set behind a broader range of hand-to-hand fighting weapons. These ‘historical fencers’ are particularly keen to eschew the wire-like foil (with which you would struggle to inflict an injury on someone, unless you poked them in the eye) for heavier weapons in the belief that the competitive nature of Olympic-style fencing has drawn it too far from the purpose for which it was originally designed – that is, actually fighting.

Fencing for the purposes of duelling has existed in Ireland for centuries, but its Olympic variant arrived in Ireland in 1906 with the establishment of the first Irish Fencing Club in Dublin. It struggled to gain a foothold in its early years but by the 1930s most Irish universities had established fencing clubs, the Irish Amateur Fencing Federation (IAFF) was established and the future of the sport was secured.

Fencing in Ireland, like elsewhere, has something of a reputation as being the preserve of the wealthy elite – which isn’t helped by the fact that it is so strongly geared towards student-only university clubs, rather than those open to the general public.

However, with this being the 21st century, I felt sure it would be far more open to the average Joe than it was in the past, so I contacted a few university clubs in the hope of getting into a class. Sadly, they all ignored my requests for an hour in the white jump suit. Undeterred, I contacted the IAFF in the hope that they could sort me out with a club, but alas, they too gave me the ‘talk to the hand’ treatment.

It might be a bit of a stretch to come to the conclusion that people involved in the Irish fencing scene are happy to see opportunities to publicise their sport slip away because they want it to remain exclusive, but I think I’ll do it anyway.

Yet while it appears that our current crop of fencing superstars might not want to let everyone else play, there is a lot to be said for the sport as a whole. One particularly attractive aspect of it is the willingness of the fencing hierarchy to open up and alter the rules and training methods, in an attempt to improve the art. One good example of this was the introduction of deciding on the validity of strikes by electronic scoring apparatus in competition.

Martial arts need to be open to new ideas if they are to thrive, and in most countries fencing certainly seems to have adopted this attitude. However, if my interaction with the fencing clique is anything to go by, then insular, upper-crust exclusivity is still an issue in the Irish branch of this fascinating fight form.