Medieval and Renaissance Dagger Combat

What constitutes a program of practical knife defense is something today that few of the so-called experts can agree upon. But the new stuff these experts push is almost always made up in the school and never subjected to the acid test of combat, which winnows the true from the false, the real from the fake. So, what are people who need a simple and practical self defense method against a knife attack to do?Fortunately, the answer is simple, and can be found in the martial arts manuals of European fighters from centuries ago. In their old books, these masters, for whom knife combat was an ever present reality, shared their tried and tested methods for knife defense and knife combat.These methods are simple and practical. With a little study and practice, anyone can learn them sufficiently to be able to use them on the street — just as the students of these old masters learned to do.Drawing from sources written from 1409-1600 (including the works of Hans Talhoffer, Fiore dei Liberi, Filippo Vadi, Joachim Meyer and more), this book uses step-by-step photos and historic illustrations to demonstrate the deadly and effective techniques of European knife defense and fighting. Talhoffer and the others were men with real fighting experience, not self-promoted "grand masters" or denizens of the training hall, and they wrote the manuals that form the basis for Medieval and Renaissance Dagger Combat. The dynamics of the knife fight have not changed over the centuries, and the masters' lessons are as useful against an attacker with today's tactical folder as they were against the first dagger.