Book Two: Tempo and Measure

Let's keep talking about Fabris' Book Two and dive right in!

In my last post, I described Book Two as "an advanced exercise in management of both tempo and measure while requiring a high degree of internalization of the practical applications of Fabris' theory as demonstrated in the various plays he describes." I still think that's a pretty decent concise summary, but what does it mean?

At heart, I don't think that there's anything in Book Two which directly contradicts the rest of Fabris' manual. He points out that "it is very important to know how to wait for a tempo and an opportunity to attack: from this proceeds the knowledge of measures, tempi, contratempi, as well as the understanding of all the deceptions and artifices that can come from the opponent." However, Fabris notes that "I rather think that when you have the advantage, it is much better to proceed without waiting for anything else, reassured by the fact that the opponent cannot harm you from his current position." Essentially, once you have gained the advantage over your opponent - which is to say in a general sense that you have found their blade - you should be safe to immediately proceed to wounding them. (Granted, this can itself an accomplishment which requires multiple steps, but we'll get to that later on in this process.)

Fabris describes a few common errors which we've all seen, and probably commit on a regular basis. There are fencers who wait for their opponent to move and give a tempo even if they have found their opponent's sword and there are fencers who don't attempt to find their opponent's sword at all but rely solely on feints and invitations. For the latter, Fabris points out that "If you think about this strategy, you can see that it involves making a tempo in order to provoke a tempo from the opponent. Therefore, the first tempo is also the first danger. No matter how small, it will at the very least provide the opponent with an opportunity to gain some advantage..."

These two points are key to seeing what Fabris is thinking with Book Two. If you have the advantage of the opponent, you should proceed to wounding them without waiting. You should not wait for them to hand you a tempo, as you have already found their blade. You should not ignore finding their blade and try to proceed by allowing them to give you a tempo that you can try to move inside of. So where does this bring us?

"What we are looking for here is a way to attack the opponent immediately after unsheathing the sword, without stopping and without regard to the opponent’s guards, postures, tempi, parries, attacks, advances or retreats. In short, the opponent should be utterly powerless to stop your attack under all circumstances." Again, how does proceeding with resolution accomplish this? "The advantage comes from your ability to put the opponent into obedience and force him to do as you wish, whether he tries to defend or counterattack. If you know how to do this, everything else will be easy, because you will be able to foresee your opponent’s actions."

Oh.

At heart, once you have found your opponent's sword, you have ideally placed them under some degree of obedience - there are only a finite number of reasonable actions for them to take, and ideally you are able to counter them with a more efficient and therefore faster response. What Fabris is suggesting is that if you do this while smoothly closing with your opponent, their potential array of reactions will grow more and more limited until none remain to them, and they are wounded.

This is different from stepping closer to one's opponent in a more conventional fashion because there is no pausing. There's no waiting, no drawing them out and seeing how they react. This means that as you close measure and your opponent reacts, you must be already moving to counter them. "Carry your sword so close to the opponent’s blade that when the opponent’s sword moves, it will seem to be tied to yours: in other words, one sword’s movement should be quickly followed by the other’s. If your opponent’s sword gets away from you, the tempo will be lost, and if you were to chase it while going forward you may be wounded."

If you are moving towards your opponent at a steady walking pace, ideally one of two things will be happening to the measure - it will be collapsing if they remain still or if they decide to approach you in turn, or it will remain the same if they retreat. As you initially enter an extremely wide measure, you move into position such that you have found the blade of your opponent. At that point, they react - and you will continue to move forward and continue to make yourself safe according to all the principles that Fabris has already outlined in the rest of his book. They will continue to react, and you will continue to keep yourself safe, until you are close enough to strike them in a single movement.

Because the measure will be collapsing and the available tempi will be shrinking - sometimes extremely rapidly, especially if your opponent decides to advance as well - you will need to have a very clear understanding of the relative positions of your blades and your bodies, as well as what the most efficient counter to the possible movements of your opponent are. While you can simply go back to the rest of Fabris' manual and piece together what the plates say about the various movements your opponents can make at various measures, Fabris does a lot of that work for us by assembling his Rules. Each Rule that he describes is structured in a really interesting way, and I'm going to start pulling one of them apart in my next post.