Saturday 9:30 – 11:10 (Main Hall)
“Traversing terrain and ‘blind’ parades – Roworth’s sabre beyond the sports hall”
(Sabre/Broadsword/Spadroon)
Chloe Headdon of Smart HEMA & AHF

In ‘The Art of Defence on Foot’, Roworth instructs the reader on how to defend oneself in a variety of real-world situations, for example fighting on uneven ground or fending off an opponent in the dark. But what does this mean to the modern HEMAist who generally fights in various indistinguishable sports halls around the country, with flat floors and good lighting? In this workshop we’ll be exploring using Roworth’s traversing footwork to move around our opponent, find better ground, and create valuable opportunities for attack and defence. We’ll also don blindfolds to replicate recapturing the feel of an opponent’s blade in darkness using parades. Come along for some experimental fun and games, and find out how these skills can level up your (indoor) sparring too!
Participants will need a mask and gloves as a minimum. Full sparring kit is recommended to make the most of the exercises. This class is suitable for any steel or synthetic one-handed weapon such as sabre, broadsword, spadroon, sidesword or arming sword. There will be some swords available to borrow.
Chloe took up HEMA in 2015, spending 8 years training at the Academy of Historical Fencing in Bristol before recently moving to Smart HEMA in Swindon. She has taught British military sabre at a variety of clubs and events around the UK including Kings of the North and Stramash. Outside of HEMA she’s a medieval nerd and published writer, with a particular obsession with King Arthur.
Saturday 9:30 – 11:10 (Training Room)
“”On the Trail of the Kayo Kid – An introduction to pugilism a-la Jack Dempsey””
(Pugilism)
Mark Penman of the York School of Defence

Have you ever wanted to learn how to throw a punch? Have you ever wanted said punches to pack some serious explosive power? Have you ever wondered what would happen if a year-old baby fell from a fourth-floor window onto the head of a burly truck driver, standing on the sidewalk? Are you now wondering how this has any bearing on punching? Well lucky for you Jack Dempsey aka The Manassa Mauler covers all this in his excellent instructional book Championship Fighting!
This class is an introduction to the fistic arts through the lens of Dempsey’s teachings. We will cover some absolute basics in terms of footwork, stance and how to keep yourself safe whilst punching. We will then move on to the core of his teachings, the four principle methods he believes lead to punches that pack a serious… well you know. These four principles focus on using your whole body and mass to throw heavy HEAVY punches. We will look at a standard set of punches and see just what Dempsey’s advice is for transforming them into the type of blow that will earn you the nickname The Kayo Kid.
This session is for total beginners or boxing curious folks in general. Expect to be ducking and diving, dodging and weaving and making some terrific noises as you obliterate the training pads with your booming blows!
Please note that if you wish to take part in the Oz Challenge Cup Pugilism Tournament then you are required to attend this class. The Oz Challenge Cup is light contact but is bare knuckled and as such we shall not be using gloves during this class.
Kit requirements are-
Grit
Determination
Your own two paws
A smile
And a gum shield if you are feeling spicy
Oh and a groin guard. Always a groin guard.
Mark is a current assistant coach at the YSD and ex instructor at Manchester Historical Fencing. Mark has been punching things in some form or another for the past 20 years and enjoys sharing his love of The Sweet Science of Brusing with others.
Saturday 11:20 – 13:00 (Main Hall)
“Buckle Up, Buttercup”
(Sword/Messer & Buckler)
Ben Halbert of Academy of Steel

Do you love single-handed weapons like messers and arming swords? Do you dislike looking like a teapot with your off-hand on your hip? Bucklers are the solution!
Swashbuckling has been a staple of fiction for hundreds of years, yet the buckler is often neglected. We can’t possibly cover everything that can be done with a buckler but this workshop will look at a few fundamentals to easily and effectively incorporate one into your fencing. Once we’ve got the basics down we’ll explore a few plays that are fun, flashy and (sometimes) practical!
The context is primarily 14th-15th century (drawing inspiration from I.33/Fecht 1, Lignitzer, Kal and Talhoffer). However, bucklers continued being used in various forms for centuries beyond this period and many of the principles can be applied to dussack, sidesword, sabre, etc.
Requirements: You will need a mask, gloves, buckler and a single-handed sword. A limited number of spare swords and bucklers will be available.
Saturday 14:00 – 15:40 (Main Hall)
“Danger! High Volta!”
(Smallsword)
Kerri Tamplin (she/her) of London Historical Fencing Club and Cambridge Historical Fencing

Ready for some fancy footwork?
There is something beautiful about the volta. Maybe its the lightness on your feet? Or maybe its
the satisfaction of a damn good stab. Either way, it looks pretty cool. In this class we will get you moving around your opponent and put a stop to them running in (or at least look good doing it). This will be aimed at smallsword. Based on Girard and Angelo, we shall explain what the volta is and how we go about this. You will require a smallsword, mask, gorget, gloves and covered arms. Ideally chest protectors and jackets for full effect.
Kerri started HEMA in Edinburgh in 2015 where she quickly found her love for sabre and smallsword. After moving south of the border, she helped set up Cambridge Historical Fencing in 2018 and began teaching soon after. It was then that London Historical Fencing Club invited her to teach sabre which she happily accepted. She has continued to be a member and instructor of both clubs ever since. Kerri primarily focuses on sabre (British, French and American sources) and smallsword (Girard and Angelo).
Saturday 14:00 – 15:40 (Training Room)
“Behind Enemy Lines: The SOE Fighting Method of WW2”
(WW2 Combatives)
Chris May of Battalion Martial Arts & Exiles York

The Special Operations Executive (SOE) deployed over 400 agents into occupied Europe during World War II, serving as spies, saboteurs, and radio operators. These brave men and women underwent close-combat training that typically consisted of a maximum of six 45-minute sessions—often fewer.
In this lesson, you’ll learn the essentials needed to survive and thrive behind enemy lines, including how to fight effectively with only your hands, use a knife with confidence, dispatch a sentry swiftly and silently, and resist capture in hostile conditions.
Drawing from the works of Fairbairn and Sykes, this is martial arts distilled to its bare essentials—techniques designed to be taught quickly, remembered easily, and applied under extreme pressure by individuals with little or no prior combat experience. By the end of this session, you’ll gain insight into the brutal effectiveness of their methods and leave with practical skills rooted in the SOE’s wartime legacy.
You may want MMA gloves if you have them, if you have your own focus mitts or/and plastic knife bring them. There will be kit available to borrow!
Saturday 15:50 – 17:30 (Main Hall)
“Keep Stirring – Don’t let the source stick!”
(Longsword)
Anna Clisham of the Manchester School of Arms

Sources are the sauce to our HEMA spaghetti. Lichtenauer is your value 1kg bag of penne, Fiore is the Italian branded linguine, and English longsword is the boil-in-the-bag twirly pasta. They’re all good, but need sauce to be at their best, and you need to keep an eye on that sauce, else you’ll forget it entirely!
Diving into sources is a great way to understand the wider context around what you’re doing and to better understand the system(s) you are learning. Interpretation of the source material is a fantastic part of HEMA, which gives it a lot more flavour than martial arts with a clearer lineage. Let’s make the most of it!
Mustard your courage and journey back to a long time ago, when dinosaurs roamed the earth, Matt Easton: Schola Gladiatoria was just known as Matt Easton and our lovely instructors were interpreting the sources themselves. In this class, you’ll be reading through some (hopefully) lesser known Longsword sources in small groups and trying to work out what they mean!
Requirements:
A longsword-like object
Light gloves
Mask (Optional)
A friend to help you read (clever person may around on request).
The ability to portion pasta not required.
Less knowledge is desirable! Don’t be scared if you’re new – your interpretation is just as valuable!
Anna started her journey with stage fighting and re-enactment as a teenager, before joining a local HEMA club in 2015. Nearly 10 years later, she has not looked back. In that time, Anna has competed at numerous tournaments and toured Europe extensively, visiting many HEMA clubs along the way. This experience opened Anna’s eyes to the huge variety of interpretations and approaches to HEMA – particularly in her favoured weapon, Longsword. This has informed Anna’s teaching practices, where she favours principle-based classes and student lead-learning.
Saturday 15:50 – 17:30 (Training Room)
“Feats of Strength to Amaze your Friends at Parties”
(Muscles and Leopard Print)
Jennifer Garside

In 1899 Barton-Wright, the complier of Bartitsu, wrote an article entitled ‘How to pose as a Strong Man’.
Using this article, and some other mysterious sources (my grandad) this will be a very lighthearted look at some tricks and tips, hopefully encouraging people to think about how body mechanics can be used to achieve the seemingly impossible.
There will be prizes for the best leopard print/strong person outfit, best moustache twirling* and other totally arbitrary achievements.
*some moustaches will be provided for those not naturally endowed in that department.
Sunday 09:30 – 11:10 (Main Hall)
“A Good Day To (Not Have Anyone) Die”
(Steel Swords)
Ross Bailey of the Medieval Combat Group

Low protection sparring is a lot of fun, targets slightly different aspects of sparring than fully kitted up sparring, and is well worth getting to grips with how to do it safely.
This workshop for anyone who’d like to spar with low protection without killing, maiming, or otherwise injuring their sparring partner (or themselves). We’ll work through drills and sparring exercises looking at safety, control, fluidity, control, safety, movement, safety, control, biomechanics, and control, and some safety.
Required kit: Mask, light gloves, weapon (preferably steel but synthetic will do fine)
Attendance at this class is mandatory if you wish to sign up for the fencing tournament in the afternoon (unless previously discussed beforehand with Chris) as it uses the same format, just under tournament conditions.
Sunday 09:30 – 11:10 (Training Room)
“Jo‘s House of Flying (with) Daggers”
(Dagger)
Jo York of the Hotspur School of Defence

Let’s continue our foray into dynamic movement and shenanigans with the dagger. We’ll be making full use of the matted flow to move effortlessly from place to place, and force our opponents to go where we need them to be.
We’ll aim to make your stabbings and shankings as succesful as possible using a combination of dagger sources as well as sound application of good body mechanics.
No knowledge of any of my previous sessions is required, this lesson is open to everyone.
You will need a dagger simulator and a fencing mask, along with a willingness to explore rolling around on the ground a bit with your training partners. Dagger simulators and a limited number of masks will be available to loan.
Sunday 11:20 – 13:00 (Training Room)
“Bodies still don’t bend that way…”
(Catch Wrestling)
Ella Banken of the York School of Defence

Holds, locks, picks and cranks will be looked at in this catch wrestling workshop to explore how we can use the limitations of our opponents’ anatomy to our advantage.
Beginners and more experienced wrestlers alike welcome to inflict (gentle, consensual) discomfort.
Sensible clothing and clean socks (can be worn under wrestling boots) are required.
Please remove all jewelry and make sure nails are trimmed.
Sunday 14:00 – 15:40 (Main Hall)
“HEMA Sticker Book”
(German Longsword)
Matthew Malcolm of the Medieval Combat Group

In this session we will take part in some freeplay; examining what are the common occurrences in your own exchanges and for the class as a whole. Building a picture of likely inputs from our fencing partners, we will work through and record our findings through the friendly medium of a sticker book.*
After this period of adhesive based research, we will begin an experimentation period. We will consider what tools the German Longsword sources provide us with to stack the odds in our favor and once again record the findings of your experimentation within our adherent manuscripts.
As session leader, I have a hypothesis of what will occur in this class and have tested this a non-zero number of times. However, this is an interactive and dynamic class; while there is a high likelihood that certain things ‘should’ happen… we all know that what should happen rarely does. Prepare yourself for thinly veiled chaos. Therefore, consider attending only if you like chaos and uncertain outcomes. Or stickers. The choice is yours.
Equipment requirements: Longsword, mask, gloves. Jacket required unless you are familiar with minimal kit safe sparring
*sticker book design to be finalized, some stickers will be available during the session, you can bring your own stickers, you are encouraged to share stickers with other fencers, responsibility cannot be taken for unexpected use of stickers, please do not apply stickers to eyes, also please refrain from excess sticker application to mask mesh near eyes, avoid excess ingestion of stickers, please do not lick stickers, please do not simultaneously cover mouth and nose with stickers, please do not apply and remove stickers forcibly for hair removal, please only apply stickers with an open hand, do not apply so many stickers to an individual that they will sink or become a fire hazard, do not set stickers on fire, do not cover electrical sockets or bare electrical wires with stickers, do not apply stickers with super glue, caution stickers will be hot when heated, do not use large or numerous stickers to forcibly restrain other fencers without their consent, do not use stickers to construct artificially intelligent androids that may threaten humanity.
Sunday 14:00 – 15:40 (Training Room)
“Chop Chop- the Bowie knife back cut“
(Bowie Knife)
Phil Crawley of Black Boar Swordsmanship School

The back cut is the signature move of the Bowie knife. We’ll explore the basic back cutting pattern, how and when to apply these cuts and how these actions can be applied to other weapons such as the pocket knife, straight razor and pruning knife.
Participants will need a knife shaped trainer (there will be some available to borrow), and a fencing mask.
Phil is President and Instructor of the Black Boar Swordsmanship School, based in Edinburgh. He has played with swords from an early age but discovered Historical Fencing in 1996, training with several salles and weapons before focussing on those taught in French schools of the Long C18th in 2006. When not fencing he works in mental health as a practitioner and manager, focussing on addiction recovery, and is butler to the sighthounds that occupy his furniture.
Sunday 15:50 – 17:30 (Main Hall)
“Don’t worry, he’s ‘Armless.”
(Broadsword)
Ben Hamilton of Saorsa

Disabling the sword arm in broadsword.
Arm hits. Alas, often overlooked in HEMA. Sometimes from a points perspective in tournaments and sometimes due to a lack of bragging rights in the pub.
However, we attest to the fact that the humble arm snipe is one of the most important tools in our toolbox. It’s favoured historically, it has loads of martial relevance and the skills we learn in order to do it safely can completely level up our fencing.
Looking at the techniques and tactics from multiple broadsword sources we aim to give you a solid framework for understanding the ways in which your opponent’s arm is vulnerable and the sequences we can use to create these openings safely.
We will also be showing a couple of extra one off tricks to (politely) infuriate your opponent.
No matter your size or experience you’ll be sure to pick up a few “handy” things during the session.
You will need a mask, a wrist protector and a sword with hand protection for the session.
Sunday 15:50 – 17:30 (Training Room)
“No, LET’S Argue Semantics!”
(Lecture)
Lauren Stokeld of the York School of Defence

Life on Mars, Vikings drinking from skulls, murder convictions: misinterpreting and mistranslating words can have significant impacts on history and perception. HEMA is no exception. Most of our sources for medieval martial arts are written texts. Sometimes, we take leaps with translations, and sometimes we can be tempted to believe that we’re following the instructions to, as it were, the letter. But vocabulary can be fickle, nebulous and hard to pin down. So, how can we, as HEMA scholars, approach tricky terminology with a critical eye? That’s what we’ll try to work out in this session. We’ll go on a journey to understand how words work generally and think about a few words from HEMA sources that can get a bit… sticky. Will we come out of this with all the answers? No. But hopefully, you’ll leave with some helpful questions. And you’ll get to drink tea. No prior knowledge of, well, anything required. Feel free to come along with any of the
following:
– Your favourite word
– The word that most annoys you when people use it wrong
– Any burning questions you have about vocabulary from medieval HEMA texts (and we can try to unpick them…)
Lauren joined the York School of Defence in 2017 and worked her way up to Scholar before abandoning York for the South. While her bladework could be said to leave much to desire, she is a bona fide word-nerd with a PhD in historical linguistics. She’s no stranger to obsessing over semantics, having spent four years studying the meaning of one word. Yes, you read that right.