#franco-belgian

Astérix & Obélix contre César

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Series: The Airtight Garage

"But, though many examples of fighters with excellent self‐control can be mentioned here, still many people see their opposite, and these fighters regard it as glorious when they can drink endlessly and when they can roll themselves in every filthy pleasure. In the fighting school there are many Chironomi and Acrochirstae, this means, who make a presentation of movements and gestures. They do their best to show off their art and their body with a certain school‐like appearance of wrestling. They are only willing to boast, while they take care not to use any methodology during their performances. Even more, they themselves are neither instructed in certain rules nor bound by them, but when the hands must be brought together, then they want this to be a clear example of their art: that when they bring forth blows they do so without any notion of technique and sanity, with closed eyes in the way of fools, in the same way as is mentioned about the Andabatae. And because they mostly fight in public spectacles with weapons which are not sharp, but use blunt weapons, they only try to hit the heads of their opponents. They themselves only protect this part of their body, neglecting the other parts. And with their arms, though sometimes not without any danger, as it were a wall, they protect themselves. Meanwhile they don’t care whether their opponent hits with thrusts or with cuts to the other parts of their body. Because of this it seems that this kind of art is of minimal use in a real fight, and so it happens that many spectators are persuaded that knowledge of this art can’t bring any practical utility. And this is true about fighters who fight like this; they cannot be considered artful. They judge it deprived of a foundations and have the opinion that only agility of the body and strength are the most important matters. In this matter they make no small mistake. For this art has not less than another very certain and very perfect fundamentals (though very few people know about this). I have decided to bring something about these foundations in our midst, indeed in brief and in this order that I don’t entirely omit the Greek and Roman antiquities, the inventors of the art of wrestling." Interesting excerpt recently posted on Facebook concerning 16th century sport fencing according to historical Franco-Belgian rules.