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Deceiving:

A general word for all kinds of deceptive maneuvers, but especially for one in which the combatant makes the opponent believe the attack will come in one area, but brings it home in another.

The term might also cover the provoking tactics used here and there in Meyer [Meyer 37v].

Pulling:

Withdrawing the blade before or after contact by pulling away with the hilt. See Meyer Sequence 19r.2 Example of Pulling Cf. Meyer 28v, where it is contrasted with Failing, and 29r where it is contrasted with Running Off.

Running Off:

Withdrawing the blade, before or after contact, by rotating it around the hilt. By keeping the hilt in place, it keeps the opponent believing the attack is coming in, while in fact gathering for an attack elsewhere. The term does not appear to be used before 1500, and its meaning isn’t clear before Meyer.

Failing:

These terms describe a cut that deliberately misses its target. It is good against those who strike to the weapon rather than the body. In Meyer, this technique is generally executed by running off as one passes the target.

Flitting:

A term used by Meyer for a pulling that happens before blade contact.

Doubling:

In this technique a parried long-edge attack is followed with a secondary attack behind the opponent’s blade; in the fifteenth-century sources, the second attack can be done with the long or short edge, while Meyer specifies the short edge.

Doubling can be used against the opponent’s forte or against a hard bind.

Transmuting:

This apparently means to follow up a high attack with a low one by turning from the bind into a hanging thrust over the opponent’s blade. The term may have lost currency in the 16th-century texts, and Meyer may use it generically to mean any change of attack from one quarter to another.

This can be used against a weak bind.

To pull away after engagement for a cut in a different place, usually on the opposite side.

Snapping Around:

After a cut, to follow up with a flicking cut by rotating around the hilt.

Circle:

A term found in Meyer. It appears to be an attack in which the combatant rotates the sword more or less parallel to the line of encounter to rake the opponent’s side vertically with the short edge.

Changing; Changing Through; Going Through:

To change the line of attack from one target to another during an attack. This maneuver is called changing through or going through when executed under the opponent’s weapon. Changing through is a good technique against opponents who attack the weapon rather than the body. Meyer says it is especially good against maneuvers that shorten the reach. However, it is itself a shortened maneuver, and can be countered by a long thrust. Meyer mentions two other uses of the term: to change sides in the Onset, or to change guards in the Onset.

Rose:

A maneuver that changes from one quarter around to another, often as a disengage or evasion, sometimes by force. Each change of quarter describes one petal of a rose. The term is never actually explained in the sources, but its use seems fairly consistent.

Looping:

A term in Meyer for an action that brings the sword around in a circle overhead, apparently used to deceive or confuse the opponent. Meyer mentions two versions: the single describes a circle around on one side, the double does a circle on both sides.

 

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