Krumphau and Why It Really Isn’t the Right Blow to Use With A Baseball Bat

A knight will always defend the weak regardless of the cost to himself.

This is the essence of chivalry.

                                                  -Master Raske

But maybe he shouldn’t use a krumphau.

You see, I was trying to do the right thing.  And what’s the point of learning the coolest martial art in the world—aka German Longsword—if you don’t also learn how to behave with chivalry. So when Jack slams Caleb against a tree and starts swinging a baseball bat towards his terrified face I feel I have no choice but to interfere.

‘Hey, Jack.’ I say – hoping I don’t sound as scared as I feel.

‘What?’ Jack turns round and Caleb scrambles to his feet.

‘You shouldn’t do that.’ I add.

Yeah?’  The bat’s swinging slowly in front of my gut.  ‘Says who?’

A fight between us Squires and Master Raske. Much more chivalrous than this one.

‘Says me.’

‘Oh yeah?’ The rhythm of the bat increases and I wait for my fear to catch up. ‘An you’re going to stop me?’

‘Well yes.’ Instead of rising my fear seems to have vanished. And I realise that I’ve spent hours dodging swords—for my upcoming squires test—and that Master Raske says I have excellent measure (which is knowing your range). And that the weapon in Jack’s hands is six inches shorter than the one’s I’m used to and only made of wood not steel. ‘I am.’

‘You?’ He gives me a contemptuous once over. ‘You couldn’t stop a baby,’ he says, laughing.  ‘I could take you with one hand tied behind my back.’

I’ve got no problems with a handicap.

‘Now get out of my way.’

‘No.’

‘I said, get out of my f-ing way.’ Caleb has moved behind me instead of running off, which is a pity because if he had scarpered Jack might have calmed down rather than starting to swing his bat again. ‘And let me get that bastards who messed with my sister.’

‘Look he didn’t mess with Dianne and—‘

Which is as far as I get before he swings the bat towards my head and the time for conversation—even stupid conversation like ‘yes’, ‘no’ and ‘oh yeah’—is now over.

Then he swings the bat once, twice, three times and Caleb gasps and then runs (too late unfortunately) and I let my last year of training take over.

Mittlehau (middle strike), I think, range out by at least three inches so no need to triangle back before moving forward. He’ll be finishing his strike so I can catch him in the after (which does work as well as my fencing master said it would). Now I’ve got my arms around his elbows and my hands on the bat and holy shit, even off balance he’s stronger than me. But then I remember the noble sheep grip and is he wearing a belt? Yes he is and I just need to grab the belt and twist my hip and—

Jack’s on the ground and I’ve got his baseball bat in my right hand.

What I felt like at this point. But the girl is a lot prettier than Caleb. And probably much smarter.

‘Don’t get up.’ I do an unterhau (understrike) up past his head; deliberately missing his shocked face by at least six inches (because anything less would be dangerous and anything more wouldn’t be threatening).

‘What the f—‘

Another unterhau has Jack shifting backwards.

Vom Tag. Definately the best option for a weapon without a point.

‘—are you doing with that thing?’

‘Kunst des Fechtens,’ I say, moving the bat back into vom tag (as it seems the best guard for a weapon lacking a point). ‘Which is the art of the long sword.’

‘You’re crazy.’

 ‘Maybe.’  Considering I’m holding you of with nothing but a lump of wood we could make that a probably.

‘F—ing crazy,’ he repeats and I can hear real fear in his voice. Like he’s scared I have gone nuts and am about to do a number on his face. And though I’m not planning to do anything more than make him back off—because no matter what everyone seems to think I’m not a very violent person—there’s a moment when it feels good to be the one with the power.

‘Get out,’ I say.

‘Yeah man, I’m going,’ he puts a hand out towards me. ‘Just give me my bat back and …Holy f—’

The last expletive is when I bring the wood across his arm. I know Master Raske says we should never use our training aggressively and I do agree. But I also don’t think I should give Jack his weapon back.

‘I’m keeping the bat.’

‘You’ve broken my bloody arm, you crazy nutter.’

‘No I haven’t.’ I’d thrown a krumphau (crooked strike) using the short edge rather than a mittelhau because it’s a more controlled strike and I didn’t want to damage him. There’s no way he could have worse than a bruise. So why is he looking so shocked?  ‘‘You should go now.’

This guy has just had his sword beaten down with a Krumphau, and is being hit in the ear. This is clearly worse than what I did to Jack, so I don’t see what Jack’s problem was.

‘I’m going, I’m going.’ He scrambles around the tree. ‘Just keep that bloody thing away from me.’

No problems. I don’t like its balance anyway. But Jack’s clutching his arm and running away as if I’m someone to be scared of and even when he bumps into Caleb (who seems to have a real gift of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and I think he should avoid travelling overseas because he’d be bound to get caught up in a terrorist attack) he just shoves him aside and keeps going.

I’m in trouble now.

And though Master Raske’s says we should never behave like vigilantes I don’t see what else I could have done.

But maybe I shouldn’t have used the Krumphau.

What do you think? I don’t know anymore.

Lesson 6: Krumphau, The Crooked Cut

That’s a picture of the Krumphau (Crooked Cut) from Talhoffer. If you get it right, it’s pretty sweet – you beat the opponent’s blade down to the ground or hit them in the hands.

Master Raske has some simple rules for striking a Krumphau. Begin striking an oberhau, and then part way through you push your pommel through underneath your arm, out to your right hand side. This causes your blade to flick out to your left, beating down your opponent’s blow.

If we look back at the picture above, the guy on the left is doing a Krumphau. You can see how his pommel sticks out towards us – just like we described above. This time he’s striking his opponent’s blade, though he could have hit him in the hands instead.

The end position of the Krumphau.

You also want to make a good jump to the side away from your opponent as you perform the strike. This helps you strike at the right angle, and you’re not safe behind your sword unless you do.

If you’re doing the Krumphau to parry someone else striking at you, you should be aiming to strike the flat of their sword with your edge. (NOT the flat-of-their-strong mind you, just the middle of their blade). I like to put my thumb on the blade as I perform it, to align my edge against their flat better.

That’s the version that I did. It isn’t exactly like you read in the treatises, but then I was improvising with a baseball bat, not a sword. I used the Krumphau action to strike Jack’s arm with the short (or back) edge. Well, where short edge would be if the bat had had an edge. It is the same as what the SCA would call a “wrap” shot.

There’s lots of controversy in HEMA about what a Krumphau is, and how you do it. We were going do a proper video, but there is a HEMA group from Europe that has already done a fantastic one. Check out the video from Bratislavský šermiarsky spolok below. Some of the first strikes they do are Krumphau.

See it works! Really well!  Master Raske says you can all get back to training it now! :p

The Fearful Learn to Fence

Christmas is awesome. Not only does it contain a welcome six week break from school—because even nerds have better things to do than learn about algebra and Australian history—and the possibility of scoring enough money from grandparents to finally buy a sword but it also has the Christmas tourney.

And I’m going to do okay (provided I can get out of the police station in time to practise). Maybe better than okay because I’ve been working at this all year and not only has my technique improved but—more importantly—so has my courage.

You need courage to fight. Even when you know there are rules and you’ve got a fencing mask on—which I want to paint so it looks like Ironman but Master Raske says not till I buy my own—and gauntlets and a gambeson and a box—which I am not painting to look like Superman no matter what my friend Jason says and anyway I told him you wear it under your clothes—and you’re pretty well protected.  But longswords are fast and they hit hard and even if HEMA does have a better safety record than football Sam cracked Malcolm’s rib last month (which Master Raske was not pleased about) and swords are not designed to be safe.

I am designed to be safe.

Or, at least, I used to be.

So my first tourney went something like this.

I, Oliver, lift my sword into Ochs and prepare to use the cool technique I found in one of Master Raske’s books.

My best friend, Eliot (who is five inches shorter than me and should be easy to beat) brings her sword into Vom Tag and we wait for the call of …

“Fence.”

Bam, bang, pow and I feel like an extra in a marvel comic as blows explode around me. The cool technique goes out of mind as I swing my sword wildly and Eliot gets a clear shot to my mask.

The next time she gets me across the gut.

The third time I retreat so fast I fall over the ropes and she gets me on both my head and my gut—which considering I’ve just lost a point for  going into the ropes would seem unnecessary—before the cry of ‘Hold.’

And my misery doesn’t end there because it’s a timed bout of 2 minutes and we’ve only used up 26 seconds, which leaves another 94 seconds for me to backpedal around the arena like a robot stuck in reverse. And instead of the glorious conflict I’d been imagining—because these are swords not normal sport and you learn about them from books and surely that makes them a geek thing—there’s just me, Oliver, falling over my own feet. Completely failing to fight, think or, in one memorable exchange, even keep my eyes open.

And while I don’t mind losing at football, or cricket, or basketball or just about any sport to be honest I do mind losing at swords. Because I was getting the hang of reading the texts and Master Raske had praised my form last week and I’d really thought I’d discovered something I could do.

“If you are fearful, do not learn to fence”

But clearly I was wrong.

‘I can’t do this,’ I tell Eliot. ‘I’m a loser.’

‘No you’re not,’ she answers with commendable loyalty but a fine disregard for the facts.

‘I just lost,’ I point out.

‘Yeah, but anyone can lose,’ she says. ‘That’s what Master Raske says. He says it’s not whether you lose or not it’s how you fight that matters.’

I think about how I just failed to fight. ‘Then I’m stuffed,’ I say.

‘Not necessarily,’ Master Raske’s voice joins Eliot’s. ‘Only if you give up, now.’

‘But I can’t do it. I’m hopeless and I just run away.’ I pull out the book he leant me and open it to the beginning. ‘And it says here, if you get scared you can’t fence.’

‘Ah, but that’s just one source and it says here,’ he flips the pages over to an article on Saviolo. ‘That courage can be learned.’

‘Seriously?’ I tilt my head to look at what’s written down. ‘I’m not stuck with being a loser?’

‘Seriously, Oliver.’  He leans down and gives me a hand up. ‘No one is stuck being a loser.’

Lesson 5: Be not afraid …

“Confronted with bravery and power, every opponent will hesitate.” – Doebringer

So it turns out I’m not the only person that has had troubles running away. And apparently the Masters don’t agree about courage. Some say if you’re fearful, give up now. Don’t even bother to try. But Master Raske read me this quote …

“Many that being fearful by nature,
through daily practise have become courageous.”
– Vincentio Saviolo

Well, that’s a lot more encouraging! Master Raske says that it proves that even though the Kunst des Fechtens is awesome the German masters didn’t know everything. And that I could change the way I responded to a fight. To not be a loser.

It turns out that Courage isn’t just something you have, or you don’t have. It’s a skill that can be trained. I’d never thought of it like that. I just thought people were just brave or they weren’t. Fiore (the Italian master) called it audatia. That’s audacity, or boldness. And you can train it every time you pick up a sword. Every time you hit a pell. Every time you do a drill.

Drilling can be good place to practise courage. Getting whacked over and over, while your partner perfects their technique, can be pretty hard. But every little thing you learn to do better helps. Stepping up and attacking, without hesitation, being decisive – that’s courage too – and if you’ve done it once then you can do it again. And it makes the next step easier to take.

Just keep taking the next step. That’s all you need to do, and that’s all it takes. So this year, I reckon I can make it.

So that’s proof that you can learn courage. I only win one of these fights but I don’t run away in any of them. By my book that’s definitely a victory