I recently bought a reproduction of the gladius, the short sword used by the Roman armies to conquer a large chunk of the world surrounding them.
I have taken to working with it (cough, cough, playing with it), and that has helped with a tendinitis issue I've had in my dominant arm this year, but it still hurts to extend my arm for a full thrust (the purpose of the sword, and thus this post). g!d help me, I am a child playing with this dangerous toy, but I still love hearing it sing as it clears the scabbard.
Maybe there will be a post from me in the future explaining how to live with only one hand LOL
A little training would go a long way for me ;>
I took a semester in fencing way back when in college, but in no way is a gladius a foil or saber. It would come closest to an epee in use, but even that is stretching it. I also trained with the knife in the Corps; yet this blade is far longer and heavier. So I went looking for some kind of training material on the net. Needless to say, the local YMCA does not teach a gladius course.
There is some material regarding the training of the gladius, but it is all from the Classic period and deals with the use of the sword en masse by the Roman army. The Roman soldier fought as a unit with the sword, and their use of the weapon required both acting with other men in unison, and the use of the shield.
I suppose I could get a riot shield, or use a buckler. Looking at the buckler, I think I would need to be much faster in my reflexes to use it correctly, and I have noticed that when I work with (play with) my new toy, I am assuming the use of a shield in my stance. Too many viewings of HBO's Rome, I assume.
In any case, let me emphasize that while the gladius can cut very nicely, the purpose of the weapon is a killing blow by stabbing the vitals, which is what the Romans taught their soldiers.
The Roman Army, the gladius and the spatha, the stabbing blow versus the cutting blow
Livy relates the story of Titus Manlius Torquatus accepting a challenge to a single combat by a large Gallic soldier at a bridge over the Anio river, where the Gauls and the Romans were encamped on opposite sides of the river. Manlius strapped on the Hispanic sword (Gladius Hispanus).During the combat he thrust twice with it under the shield of the Gaul, dealing fatal blows to the abdomen.
/Gladius on Wiki
Up until Pullo goes charging headlong into the Gauls, HBO's Rome still has the best entertainment depiction of the Roman Army in action.
Grossman, in On Killing notes that Vegetius had to emphasize the utility of the stab when attempting to revitalize the Army in the later Empire. By this time, however, the Romans were using the spatha, a longer sword designed to inflict cutting blows...from horseback.
Gladius VS Spatha - Why Did The Empire Abandon The Gladius?
However, the consenus is that it was the gladius that carved out the limits of the Empire.
