Swords in South Africa, with David Wagenfeld

David Wagenfeld

David Wagenfeld is a fencing coach, creator of the En Garde model for teaching fencing in schools, and the co-founder of Table Mountain Fencing and Historical European Martial Arts. He lives in Cape Town, South Africa and has been instrumental in creating the HEMA scene in the country. We talk about how he got into […]

Big Blue Flags, with Marli Vlok

Marli Vlok

Marli Vlok is a virologist, historical martial arts instructor and historical flag waver. And she was also a competitive target shooter who represented South Africa for a decade. Now based in Ottawa, Canada, Marli tells us about her work finding viruses in the oceans and working on diseases, including Covid, of course. Marli got into […]

Bringing Italo-Hungarian Sabre to Taiwan, with Huang Chun-Yi

Huang Chun-Yi

Huang Chun-Yi is an instructor of classical and military sabre at Lionheart Historical European Swordsmanship in Taipei, Taiwan. She also blogs in Chinese at travelingswordslady.wordpress.com. Chun-Yi’s club is the only one in Taiwan that practises classical sabre, and we talk about what drew Chun-Yi to the Italo-Hungarian sabre, over the longsword or rapier. This is […]

Forged in fire, quenched in oil. With Stephanie Aiuto

Stephanie Aiuto lives in New York and began her career with blades as a sport fencer, competing at a national level in sabre, until she had to stop because she wore away all the cartilage in her toes. To fill the void the lack of sabre left in her life she took up knife making, […]

Hope and Black Powder with Dr. Milo Thurston

Milo Thurston is the founder of the Linacre School of Defence in Oxford, UK. He’s an absolute bastard with a single stick and a leading expert in the work of Sir William Hope. In our conversation we talk about the essence of Hope’s New Method of Fencing and what is so good about it. We […]