In part 2, you saw that, for the fencer who has gained a stringer on the inside, they are expecting their opponent to disengage. If you don't know what this is, go back to part 2. As a brief reminder, fencer A has stringered fencer B on the inside. If fencer B disengages to the outside, fencer A must counter this else be killed.
There are really four counters that fencer A can perform, although some of these have more advanced variations. Guy Windsor calls this the 'hierarchy of actions' and explains it with a nice video. If you watch this, you don't need to bother reading this post. Still here? Good.
If fencer B disengages from the inside line to the outside line, while they are disengaging, fencer A can do any of the following:
Parry and riposte in one tempo (counter-attack)
Parry and riposte in two tempos (essentially a parry or beat followed by a thrust)
Void attack
Counter-disengage
If we put this in a flow chart, it looks like this:
We will look at each of these in turn.
Counter-attack in one tempo
As Fencer B is disengaging, Fencer A turns their hand from quarta to seconda and thrusts. This can be done with a lunge, but is it also possible that, if fencer B is disengaging and lunging to attack, fencer A simply needs to extend and fencer B will skewer themself on fencer A's point. The parry and the thrust happen at the same time, as a single action, and so this is a single-tempo counter.
Advanced variations
There are two variations of this same play, both of which involve fencer A making a passing step forwards with their left foot instead of a lunge, and performing an action with the left hand:
Fencer A uses their left hand to grab the hand/hilt/wrist of fencer B while they thrust in seconda. Video here: https://swordschool.com/wiki/index.php/Plate_9
Fencer A grabs the strong of their own blade and half-swords to gain leverage on fencer B's sword, and they stab fencer B in the throat.
Video here:
Parry and riposte in two tempos
As Fencer B is disengaging, Fencer A turns their hand from quarta to seconda and simply parries fencer B's thrust. Then fencer A lunges and thrusts. Whereas the counter-attack took one tempo, the parry-riposte takes two tempos, as the parry and the thrust are separate actions.
The parry can also be made as a beat of the blade. The beat is a fendente (in this case a riverso) directed down the blade towards the hilt. It will take some practice, but you know it has worked when their blade gets knocked well off to the side.
Capo Ferro says that, during the tempo of the parry, Fencer A should draw their left foot forwards so that it sits just behind their right foot. This gives them extra reach when they make their attack, by extending their lunge.
Here are a couple of videos about parrying in rapier:
Void attack
This is called 'attacking under the enemy's sword'. Interestingly, in England in the early 1700's, Zack Wylde refers to this as a 'sacoon', which is a clear reference to the attack under the sword being made in seconda.
The sequence is this:
Fencer B is stringered on the inside. They disengage under.
While Fencer B is disengaging under, fencer A drops their point and thrusts with a passing step to the left, with hand turned to seconda underneath the sword into Fencer B's flank. They bend their waist low and tilt their head to the left as they do, being careful to avoid the enemy's point.
It should be noted that this is a risky move and can be made safer if Fencer A first parries or beats aside fencer B's sword after the disengage. Video here: https://swordschool.com/wiki/index.php/Plate_11
Counter-disengage
This is fairly straight forwards: as fencer B disengages from the inside to the outside, fencer A disengages in the exact same way, following fencer B's sword. This puts fencer A's sword back on the inside, in the exact same position. In practice, it is a circular motion (and will come to be known as a circular or round parry in smallsword fencing in later centuries). The counter-disengage should be followed with a thrust in quarta.
Conclusion
What I like about the hierarchy of actions is that it quickly conveys the core techniques in Capo Ferro's rapier system. Hats off to Dr. Guy Windsor!
In the next post, we will look at how Fencer B can counter Fencer A's counters.
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