Connor Wood first started learning to sword fight when he was a child and that ultimately led him to join the Society for Creative Anachronism. In pursuing the historical sources, he soon crossed over in Historical European Martial Arts and saw a myriad of overlaps between the two movements. Today, Wood discusses the evolution of HEMA and the SCA, the cultural tensions that have developed between the two communities, and the ways tournament structures shape martial practice, along with mentorship, pedagogy, ranking systems, competitive incentives, and the ongoing debate between specialization and cross-training.
Martial Arts of Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow: Thank you for joining us today, Connor!
Connor Wood: Thank you for having me!
MAYTT: What first drew you into the Society for Creative Anachronism?
CW: So, in order to answer this question, I’m going to talk a little bit about my general background and where I’m at now, because they’re obviously related. I first became interested in swords at a very young age through my father, who was a stage fight choreographer. In addition to having a degree in history, he also has a degree in theater. The intersection of those two things and his interests very much resulted in the person that I am today. When I first started getting officially involved in sword fighting in any organized capacity, I was twelve years old. It was through a man named Chelo Lorino, who was a member of an offshoot of the SCA called the Empire of Adria [The Adrian Empire]. When I was twelve, I started working with him and doing the reenactment side of sword fighting, which I’m sure we’ll talk more about later. I was aware of the SCA at that age, but I wasn’t participating in it. When I turned 18, I started fighting in the SCA. It is possible to sword fight in the SCA as a minor, but it requires more paperwork and administrative hoops and things like that. I also had some other stuff going on at the time. But when I turned eighteen, that’s when I actually got involved with the SCA, and I’ve been consistently fighting in the SCA ever since.
MAYTT: Since eighteen till now, what is it about the SCA that has kept your interest this long?
CW: So, there’s a few things about the SCA in particular that are somewhat unique. In the United States, it is the largest cohesive organization that does sword fighting as an activity, at least in the ways that I’m interested in doing it. I’m sure there are other organizations, like Amtgard and things like that. I haven’t really looked into how they compare recently, but both in terms of the number of participants and how widespread it is, that’s something the SCA really has going for it. The SCA also has a huge breadth of activities. Not only does it have various forms of sword fighting, whether that’s with rattan or steel, but it also includes all sorts of historical pursuits that may or may not be directly related to combat. As somebody who is interested in historical material culture and some of the other living history elements, it’s a space where I get to explore how all of those things intersect in various ways.
I think that’s really the biggest thing that has kept me participating in the SCA as a whole: the fact that I can experience a kind of gestalt package. I can do it with people who are not necessarily all interested in the same thing. When I go to a HEMA event, many people there have interests outside of sword fighting, but they’re primarily there for that one main thing. At an SCA event, though, you’ll find people with wildly different interests all sharing the same space. Because of that, you get some really interesting collections of expertise, and that’s something I find really fascinating.
MAYTT: You mentioned that you started formally learning to sword fight with an SCA offshoot. What is reenactment sword fighting compared to the SCA and Historical European Martial Arts?
CW: I love this question. Once again, we’re going to talk a little bit about how I got started, because I think it’s very illustrative of the differences involved here. The way I got started with sword fighting in a formal context is very much what we would now recognize as modern HEMA. What happened was that the guy I started learning from had access to some of the earlier sources, as we call them – historical documents that contain instructions from hundreds of years ago on how to fight with swords and other weapons.
I think one of the first sources we had access to was an early copy of Hans Talhoffer. It’s not a very good source if you’re not already familiar with the material, but it’s what we had. So, we were looking at these period documents with pictures and cryptic instructions on how to fight with a sword, and then practicing them. Twice a week, after school, I would go over to this guy’s house, and a group of us would work through these old manuals and practice sword fighting from them. Then, on the weekends, we would go to historical reenactment events that had sword-fighting tournaments. The things we were practicing from these books turned out to be very effective in those tournaments, so because they worked and we kept succeeding with them, we kept studying them.
In many ways, that’s what HEMA is. You look at these sources, you practice what you think they mean, and then you go try them out. Sometimes they work and sometimes they don’t. Then you go back, refine your understanding, and try again. It’s a continual cycle of interpretation, testing, and refinement. This was before what you might call the HEMA movement really existed – before the HEMA Alliance and all of that – so we didn’t actually use the term HEMA at the time. Instead, we used the catch-all term Western Martial Arts, or WMA. Interestingly, that’s a term that’s starting to re-emerge as the HEMA community continues trying to define exactly what it is doing and, as tends to happen, diversify and split into different directions.
So, what I was doing at the time was both what we would now understand as HEMA and participation in the reenactment space. In many ways, the origins of HEMA come from people doing exactly that. A lot of practitioners found the reenactment experience dissatisfying for one reason or another – whether because of existing combat rules, the equipment available or required by different organizations, or simply because they wanted to approach things differently. Those people eventually branched off into the WMA space rather than remaining solely in the reenactment world.
MAYTT: What was the general timeframe for all of this?
CW: Yeah, so let’s see… I’m thirty-three now, and I was twelve then, so we’re talking about twenty-ish years ago. Roughly 2006, I think. I graduated high school in 2010, when I was eighteen or nineteen. By the time I was graduating high school, the term HEMA had really started to come into existence and gain traction. I was part of a HEMA club in Spokane, Washington, called Iron Crown around 2011 or something like that. But when I first started, when I was twelve, the term definitely wasn’t part of the zeitgeist yet. So somewhere during that period, things had kind of solidified, and the community had started to coalesce around the term HEMA, but that wasn’t really the case when I was first getting involved.
MAYTT: From what you are saying, the SCA do historical fencing, just with a different brand of paint on top of it.
CW: For my money, it really comes down to context. People pursue fighting from a variety of perspectives and for a variety of reasons. Many people who participate in sword fighting, as a very broad category, aren’t particularly interested in the historical basis of it. Whether they’re LARPing or doing reenactment fighting in a historical format, they may not necessarily be interested in the actual technical execution of the techniques. And those are all perfectly legitimate ways of pursuing sword fighting as an activity. Then you have people who approach it from a different perspective. They’re interested in understanding the technical application – either how these things were done historically or how understanding those historical methods can inform how we might do them in the quote-unquote best way possible today.
MAYTT: How does the SCA and HEMA approach teaching and learning historical fencing?
CW: Yeah, so this is kind of a difficult question to answer for a couple of reasons. For one, the SCA exists as an organization, for lack of a better term, but it is so widespread and has such cultural and bureaucratic momentum dispersed throughout its various regions that things are done pretty differently depending on where you are. That being said, there are definitely some common trends. In fact, there’s a big conversation happening right now about how SCA fight practices are typically run and whether that traditional cultural model is the most approachable and effective for everybody. There are sports science considerations involved in that discussion, but also cultural elements as well, which I can talk about in more detail if you want.
On one side, you have the SCA and its cultural approach to fight practice. On the other side, you have HEMA, which – barring the existence of the HEMA Alliance, largely for insurance-related reasons – isn’t really an organization at all. HEMA is an umbrella term for a wide variety of activities. Saying “I do HEMA” is no different than saying “I do Asian martial arts.” That could mean a huge variety of things. Furthermore, there isn’t a centralized governing body that determines how those things should be done. The SCA, at least, has governing documents that establish how combat is supposed to work for safety reasons and so on. That’s both good and bad for a variety of reasons. HEMA, by contrast, mostly operates through cultural agreements that have evolved over time and become the accepted standard.
For example, when you go to a HEMA tournament, you can generally expect certain equipment requirements, such as needing a 350N-rated gambeson. Those expectations have become culturally codified. However, they aren’t universally true. If you consider wrestling to be HEMA, then obviously you don’t need a 350N-rated gambeson to wrestle. So, things get a lot more complicated, with every club and every event doing things slightly differently based on what they think is important or what they want to accomplish. Because of that, directly comparing an individual HEMA club to an individual SCA chapter is pretty difficult.
That said, there are cultural norms that have developed, and you can generally expect a different type of experience in one environment versus the other. If you go to an SCA fight practice, you can usually expect a group of people to pair up and fight individually for a couple of hours, with sporadic individualized instruction if there is any formal instruction at all. The SCA operates on a somewhat historically inspired master-apprentice model, where people with a certain level of prestige or rank – knights, masters, and so on – serve as sources of advice. People will seek them out for guidance, or those individuals may feel comfortable offering unsolicited advice, which can be its own challenge. By contrast, if you go to a HEMA class, you can generally expect a more structured environment. There will usually be one or more designated instructors teaching a specific concept or skill that the students then practice. Exactly how that instruction is delivered varies widely from club to club, but there is generally a difference in the overall structure. Each of those structures has its own benefits and drawbacks, and different people respond better to different environments.
MAYTT: You mentioned that the SCA is more group-oriented rather than individual instruction. What are some of the positions on where to change that practice and where should it be going?
CW: Yeah, so to further clarify, the SCA is not culturally a monolith. Different practices happen in different ways in different places. There’s also a distinction between practices oriented toward individual combat – tournament-style fighting in the SCA context – and group combat, which the SCA refers to as melee or war combat. Those are two fairly different activities.
When we’re talking about the individual tournament format, there are practices that trend toward being entirely focused on pairing up and fighting, or rotating through different opponents. Different places have different names for these formats. One example I’m familiar with is called a bear pit. In a bear pit, two people fight while everyone else waits in line. The winner stays in and fights the next person, while the loser goes to the back of the line. The process continues until the winner eventually loses. You’re essentially trying to hold the field for as long as possible. Those kinds of practices disproportionately reward people who are already performing well because they get more opportunities to fight. They’re also not particularly well-oriented toward people who need actual instruction for whatever reason. It’s fighting, not training.
With the popularization of HEMA, in my opinion, more people have started to recognize the benefits of structured training for improving sword-fighting ability. It seems somewhat obvious from a sports science perspective that there are effective ways to teach physical skills. However, the SCA, because of both its cultural momentum and bureaucratic momentum, has been somewhat slow to adapt and catch up. Part of the reason I think that conversation is happening now is because there are very clear examples of alternative approaches being used in closely related communities. Furthermore, there’s now more competition for participants between these organizations. I do both HEMA and SCA, and what we call cross-playing – or cross-training, if you will – is becoming more common. However, many people only want to invest in one or the other, whether because of time, finances, or simply because they’re more interested in what one community offers. If people have the option to participate in something that is more directly aligned with their interests, then organizations have to either accept not having those people or adjust how they present what they’re doing in order to attract them. The generalized nature of the SCA has meant that people who specifically want what HEMA offers will often choose to go there instead. There was a time when the SCA was kind of the main game in town, and that’s just not the case anymore.
MAYTT: So, then it seems that the structure that HEMA provides is actually a positive.
CW: For a lot of people, yes. As somebody who runs a HEMA club, my view is that most people benefit more from a structured training environment and from being taught in, for lack of a better term, a classroom-style setting. The way SCA fight practices have evolved is still useful and valuable, but it tends to work best for a very particular type of person – someone who is already naturally successful within that environment. Whether that’s because of previous experience, natural physical ability, or some other factor that gives them an advantage, those individuals are disproportionately rewarded by the structure that the SCA has developed. In my view, that’s something of a through-line issue within the SCA as an organization. Leadership and prestige are often tied to performance in these skills, so this dynamic of rewarding people who are already succeeding tends to reinforce itself. The people who perform well receive more opportunities, more recognition, and more influence, and that pattern can continue all the way up the chain.
MAYTT: From what you are saying, HEMA is influencing the SCA to change to make their activities more palatable for the average person.
CW: Yeah, in my opinion, that is what is happening. And it’s happening for a huge variety of reasons – not just because people want to teach sword fighting more effectively, but also because organizations want to be more marketable to the current audience. I will make a note, though, that the way the SCA does things has had a demonstrable effect on the way HEMA does things as well, even if it’s often in a reverse sense. As I alluded to earlier, the modern HEMA movement largely grew out of people who were dissatisfied with how the SCA and similar organizations approached things. They essentially took their ball and went somewhere else to play with it. As a result, HEMA developed, in some ways, as a kind of counterculture movement. The structure, priorities, and culture of HEMA were often shaped in reaction to existing reenactment and historical combat organizations. Because of that, the two communities are intrinsically related in a variety of ways, even when they’re defining themselves in opposition to one another.
MAYTT: Is there any drawback from that hyper-structured approach that the SCA’s approach would be more useful?
CW: Absolutely. The generalized approach – the common model where you have a group class and everybody is learning the same material – is not always the most useful or efficient use of time for people who are already performing at a high level. For those individuals, more individualized training or sparring practice is often more beneficial. A lot of HEMA clubs address this by offering different classes on different days that provide more targeted experiences. Using my own club as an example, we have a beginner class one day a week, a novice-to-intermediate class another day, and an advanced class on a third day. All three are designed for people at different stages of their training. You can imagine how a very advanced practitioner might not get as much out of a beginner class as they would from individualized instruction with a coach for the same amount of time. That is actually something the SCA offers, particularly if you’ve entered into a master-apprentice relationship. In SCA terms, if you’re involved in rattan combat and are squired to a knight, you can generally expect that kind of individualized attention. Whether that’s happening during regular practice or outside of it – meeting at someone’s house for an extra training session during the week, for example – that sort of one-on-one instruction is somewhat baked into SCA culture. You’ll sometimes find that in HEMA clubs as well, but not always. I offer private lessons to my students, especially if they have a specific area they want to work on or if they’re preparing for an upcoming tournament, but not every instructor does that, and not every student wants that kind of experience. So, while HEMA is often seen as having a more structured training environment, the way it is generally organized is still fairly broad and generalized. Like anything else, that comes with its own drawbacks.
MAYTT: Since you do run a HEMA school, how many of the students that you have are there specifically for HEMA and how many are those students are there for the SCA?
CW: Yeah, that’s an amazing question. There are a handful of members in my club who cross-play and participate in both the SCA and HEMA. I’m one of them, and the fact that I do both definitely has an effect on the culture of my club. One of the interesting things about how HEMA works is that anybody can start a HEMA club. There isn’t really any oversight over who can or can’t do that. Because of that, the people who create these clubs have a direct impact on the club culture and what that culture ultimately looks like. For me, as someone who participates in the SCA, it naturally encourages people in my club to be more willing to check it out. By contrast, if you have a HEMA instructor who strongly dislikes the SCA for some reason, their preferences will inevitably be reflected in their club culture as well, whether they intend that or not.
One of my main assistant instructors is heavily involved in the SCA. He and I have a close relationship in HEMA, in the SCA, and outside of both. Because of that, there are now several other people in the club who are also actively involved in the SCA. That said, many people who come to my HEMA club are there instead of going to the SCA, and they’re making that choice deliberately for one reason or another. Most of the people who join my club simply find us through the internet. The popularization of HEMA online over the last several years has been significant. People come across HEMA videos on YouTube and think, “Oh, that’s a thing I can do that I didn’t know existed.” Then they search for HEMA, discover there’s a club in their town, and decide to check it out. That pipeline has really evolved. Ten years ago, that wasn’t how most people found these activities. Usually, you learned about them because you knew someone who was already involved, or maybe you attended something like a Renaissance Faire – which, as you mentioned earlier, I also do – and saw a demonstration that introduced you to it.
To answer your question directly, there are definitely people who have joined my club and then gone on to become active in the SCA. There are also people I originally knew through the SCA who decided to check out my HEMA club because they wanted to improve their fighting ability or develop their skills in a different way. So, it’s definitely happening in both directions.
MAYTT: How deep are you into the SCA and HEMA communities?
CW: In no particular order, as I mentioned earlier, I’ve been involved in sword fighting in an organized capacity for more than twenty years now. I run a HEMA club in Spokane, Washington, called the Inland Northwest Longsword Academy. We’re a Kunst des Fechtens club – what people sometimes refer to as German longsword. That’s a much more complicated topic than that simple label suggests, but it’s a useful and searchable term for people who are unfamiliar with it. I’m also a member of the SCA, where I hold the rank of Master of Arms. Many people familiar with the SCA will recognize the title of Knight, which is a rank acknowledging prestige and skill in rattan combat. There is a roughly equivalent rank, though much less common and less well known, called Master of Arms. I can explain the differences if anyone is interested, but for the purposes of this conversation, they’re functionally similar. There is also a separate but theoretically equal rank for practitioners of steel combat disciplines such as rapier and cut-and-thrust fencing, known as Master of Defense.
One of the differences between the SCA and HEMA is that the SCA has a somewhat codified ranking structure designed to recognize people who are considered skilled in their particular discipline. HEMA, on the other hand, historically lacked any formal ranking system. Until relatively recently, with the emergence of HEMA Ratings, there wasn’t really a formal way of establishing a pecking order beyond community recognition and reputation. Historically, if people thought you knew what you were talking about and were worth listening to, then you naturally occupied a position of influence. That’s changing somewhat now, but that was largely how things worked for a long time.
So those are, broadly speaking, my credentials on both sides of the house. Speaking of HEMA Ratings, and for people who care about those sorts of metrics, I believe my highest ranking was somewhere around the low 200s worldwide in longsword. That’s pretty good, though certainly not exceptional. There are people in this region who rank much higher than that. Still, being around 200th in the world isn’t bad.
MAYTT: You bring up rattan fighting. As I understand it, every combatant is dressed as a knight in shining armor.
CW: So, yes and no. It’s a little more complicated than that. I refer to it as rattan combat. The official term the organization uses is armored combat, and many people also call it heavy combat, which is a term I actively discourage for a variety of reasons. I also don’t particularly like the term armored combat because it’s somewhat misleading, especially with the growing popularity, both in HEMA and now in the SCA, of what is usually called harnischfechten, which literally means armored fighting. Having both of those terms in circulation can create confusion, particularly because harnischfechten generally involves a visibly higher level of armor than what most people associate with SCA rattan combat.
That’s one reason I prefer the term rattan combat. It uses rattan weapons, and that’s a very straightforward and easy thing for people to understand. That said, there is a required amount of protective equipment – armor, essentially – that must be worn to participate. One of the most recognizable pieces is the helmet. So you have people wearing metal helmets and fighting with rattan weapons, along with various other forms of required protective gear.
Many people – arguably most – also wear equipment that is intended to look at least somewhat historical. The protective gear may be disguised as period clothing or incorporated into a historical aesthetic. Personally, when I’m doing rattan combat, I mostly wear modern protective equipment underneath historically inspired clothing. Aside from the helmet, which is a metal helmet based on historical designs, most of my protection consists of plastic sports armor or HEMA gear hidden beneath clothing styled after the sixteenth century. A lot of rattan fighters use what is commonly called hidden armor in this way. They’ll wear plastic, leather, lightweight aluminum, titanium, or other modern protective materials concealed beneath their clothing. That setup provides the necessary protection without necessarily creating the visual appearance of armor. So, you get the protective value while maintaining a particular aesthetic, if that makes sense.
I don’t actually remember what the original question was now. Sorry; I keep wandering off on tangents.
Part two coming soon!
