The Classical Arms Academy defines the classical period of fencing in terms of three main factors: (1) how the sword is used, (2) the social context of the sword in sport, and (3) the distinctive weapons of the period. The Academy believes that when these factors are applied, the result is a consistent approach to sword use, with a standard set of weapons, in a definable social context.
Swords have been used in at least 5 different ways: as a military weapon, as a weapon for civilian personal defense, in court trials by combat, as a method of solving honor matters, and for sport.
The sword enters the period after the American Civil War (1861-65) and the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71) greatly diminished as a battlefield weapon. These wars demonstrated that replication of firearms, the development of the first machine guns, and longer-range artillery had made the main use of the sword on the battlefield, the mass cavalry charge, extraordinarily expensive. Despite several attempts to restore the sword to its traditional stature, and its continued inclusion in military training, the early 20th century was an anachronism.
Swords for daily civil self defense had already disappeared from use with the end of the Napoleonic wars. Men in the city no longer wore a sword as a fashion accessory.
The last recorded attempt to use the sword in a court trial by combat occurred in England in 1818. The result was a swift, and somewhat embarrassing, legislative reversal of the trial by combat in 1819.
The arrangement of honor affairs by the sword had suffered a recession with the development of dueling pistols in the 1700s. However, in the years after the Franco-Prussian War, the use of swords in duels was became a nationalist cause, and in the 1880s this resurgence fueled a revival of interest in dueling with the sword and saber dueling. However, the carnage of World War I generally quenched society’s thirst for blood, and by World War II dueling was a rare event.
That leaves the use of the sword for sport. The renaissance of Victorian sport included fencing, leading to the organization of competitions, the development of government organizations, the establishment of common rules, and the inclusion of fencing in the first Olympic Games, all in the period 1880-1910. Civil sport and dueling technique clearly diverged from the military use of the sword. Fencing was a sport of the white social elite, with the roles of women strictly prohibited and of a firmly amateur nature. During the period from the 1880s to the early 1950s, three weapons evolved to their modern form (foil, epee, and saber), with two eventually being discarded (the bayonet and the single stick).
Thus, during the period from about 1880 to WWII, the combination of various trends clearly defines a period of change and rebirth in fencing. The period saw the end of the military use of the sword for anything other than a ceremonial purpose and the slow demise of dueling, leaving the sword only as a weapon for sport. At the same time, fencing texts evolved to focus on civil and later sporting use of fencing weapons. The birth of organized sports in general in the Victorian sporting renaissance included fencing, which made its practice more international in scope. And as fencing became international competition, the growing nationalism in Europe embraced fencing as an element of national power.
This period clearly ends with World War II. International fencing not only stopped during the period 1939-1945, but after the war fencing underwent significant changes. The introduction of electric scoring to foil and eventually saber completed the transition in scoring and technique began with the electric sword in the 1930s. The adoption of fencing and all international sports as an element of a Wider national security strategy on the part of the Soviet bloc led to revolutionary changes. The use of the sports factory model and the search for medals as a measure of international prestige fundamentally reformulated the way in which fencing was financed and administered at the national level. The development of sports science led to significant changes in the development of athletes. Social changes paved the way for women to participate fully at all levels of sport, changed the character of athletes from members of the wealthy elite to a much broader population, including all races, and led to the eventual abandonment of the ideal. amateur.
Based on these changes in how the sword was used, the context of fencing as a sport, and the distinctive weapons in use, the Academy believes that a reasonable definition of the classical period is a transitional period during the years between approximately 1880 and the beginning. . of World War II in 1939.