One of the ‘double edged’ swords of having only studied one art as I have is that some things appear to be unquestionably common sense to me - a given. Some other ideas in martial arts, incredibly common and widespread, are almost anathema to my thinking.
In swordsmanship the concept of binding definitely falls into this category. Over the last few years I have had more exposure to how different people use swords, HEMA in particular. My other experiences outside of SV are mainly with Rapid Arnis and Maul Mornie’s SSBD through training with Kam Dhiman and others. In these two it’s not so much binding in the HEMA sense, but more so dealing with stick on stick, blade on blade scenarios and drills which I will make reference to.
To define the term Kam was able to contact Claudia Kofler (SSBD and HEMA group leader Germany). Claudia kindly shared the following,
“In German HEMA we say Anbinden, this means to contact the opponents sword or blade and stay in contact for a moment, depending on your plan. It can be a soft or a strong contact.”
For the purpose of the article I want to binding to refer to a strategy or technique which refers to one using a weapon purposefully to make contact with an opponent's weapon.
So first let me begin with what I have been taught and now feels ‘common’ sense for me. If we take a typical sword used in SV, a tulwar, a lot of emphasis is placed on protecting the blade (edge) of the weapon. This is mainly because a typical combination is tulwar in one hand and small shield/buckler (krot) in the other. One of the aims of this krot is to break the sword or sword-hand of the opponent. Hence in our bird style (garuda) we have a ‘flapping’ motion which ‘swats’ the sword and also ‘pecks’ at the hand or blade.
Therefore when two SV opponents face each other with this combination the one who leaves his sword ‘out’ can be effectively disarmed at a safe distance.
With reference to stick work, for comparison with FIllipine/Silat etc., in SV a stick is a training tool for other weapons the first of which are clubs and axes. Even with such weapons if one were to protrude these weapons or bind with them they could be suppressed in many ways, both with an unarmed hand and with other auxiliary weapons (daggers etc, again common place in SV - we tool up and assume others do to).
However, there is a more subtle issue with letting your weapon bind or protrude which is that it effectively draws a line to the body giving away all the entry angles. This may well require a whole separate blog post, however in short there is a tangible way to ‘measure’ your way in from the point of contact or point of the weapon.
So, what about binding? My impression, and I am prepared to accept corrections to this, outside SV weapon work, particularly sword use, is that binding either occurs often in ‘sparring’ or in some instances is even intentionally sought as an opening tactic. Perhaps due to this I notice that some arts put quite a bit of time and work into this scenario in their drills and techniques, which betrays the fact that is clearly a situation that is seen to be common place whether it is sought or not.
As it is fairly common I need to ask myself why am I not taking it as being so? So I begin by listing the key virtues (gun) of binding in my estimation:
defensive measure, effectively you put a point or blade between the two of you. It can act as a shield or an object which deflects and parries.
You can track your opponent with the weapon (like a jab of a boxer)
You can ‘feel-out what’ the other is doing or about to do (like crossing hands)
You can measure distance/angles between you
The first seems to me the main reason. Understandably, and rightly, fighters in intense combat situations (particularly with live blades) need to make sure they don’t get hurt first and foremost (Incidentally, the uses of deflection and parrying are also found in SV too but without leaving your weapon out). Generally, and this can be seen in sports like football, the greater the emphasis on a defensive strategy the greater the cost to an offensive one. As well as the downsides mentioned above your attacking ability is compromised in the following way. If your weapon is already ‘out’ or in a bind then to deliver a proper (shudh) blow requires a setup movement of some sort which itself can be countered (or worse still leave a gap for a killer blow to you).
This last point becomes increasingly salient to swordsmanship when live blades are used as opposed to sticks or training (non-edged) weapons. This is because non-live blades lead to an exchange of blows similar to unarmed fighting where punch/counterpunch is more pervasive. Therefore, this issue or cost of being hit whilst maneuvering from a setup strike to a proper strike is reduced in significance as in the melee you see one of the two deliver a good strike eventually and that is seen as success.
In SV though we progress to using live blades relatively quickly which means the point of the sword ‘punching’ in as a stop gap is more effective at filling the gaps between strikes and therefore increases the requirement to be able to deliver strikes with little or no setup movements. There are an array of principles and methods employed to do this which I can elaborate on in later posts. For now I’ll name some: principle of staying inside one’s own centre or mass and keeping weapon edges/shafts inside this, using the inside shoulder to wield and having the ability to hit inside steps rather than at the end of them.
My concluding thoughts are that again like sports one aspect of your technique or stratagem has to marry together with all others. Therefore I can see why binding is useful in a wider context and understanding of body mechanics. In Shastar Vidiya though as maneuvering and footwork is the key attribute we base our strategies and techniques on the downsides outweigh the virtues of binding or tracking/pointing.
All this is not to say that I don’t appreciate that in actual combat blades cross, just as hands do, and one cannot hope to achieve a level of martial ‘perfection’ which means they will always get the clean killer blow. However, I'm yet to be convinced that binding should be sought or readily accepted as an inevitability. In my view engagement should only be sought when enough advantages are present, before that point simply stay disengaged - which includes running away!
Credits:
Many thanks to Kam Dhiman, Claudia Kofler and Sukhdeep Sembi for their input and help.
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