{"id":28021,"date":"2014-09-29T14:13:37","date_gmt":"2014-09-29T18:13:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=28021"},"modified":"2014-09-29T14:15:08","modified_gmt":"2014-09-29T18:15:08","slug":"when-i-started-fencing-i-was-told-there-was-no-math","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2014\/09\/29\/when-i-started-fencing-i-was-told-there-was-no-math\/","title":{"rendered":"When I started fencing, I was told there was no math&#8230;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>John Turner sent me a link to this short article in <em>Slate<\/em>&#8216;s &#8220;The Vault&#8221; column, discussing the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.slate.com\/blogs\/the_vault\/2014\/09\/25\/history_of_fencing_geometrical_images_of_sword_fighting_by_gerard_thibault.html?wpisrc=obnetwork\" target=\"_blank\">mathematical side of fencing<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Girard Thibault\u2019s <em>Acad\u00e9mie de l\u2019Esp\u00e9e<\/em> (1628) puts the art of wielding the sword on mathematical foundations. For Thibault, a Dutch fencing master from the early seventeenth century, geometrical rules determined each and every aspect of fencing. For example, the length of your rapier&#8217;s blade should never exceed the distance between your feet and the navel, and your movements in a fight should always be along the lines of a circle whose diameter is equal to your height.<\/p>\n<p>The rest of his manual, geared towards gentlemanly readers who took up fencing as a noble sport, is filled with similar geometrical arguments about the choreography of swordsmanship. Thibault\u2019s work belongs to the same tradition that produced Leonardo\u2019s renowned Vitruvian Man.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_28022\" style=\"width: 863px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.slate.com\/content\/dam\/slate\/blogs\/the_vault\/2014\/09\/25\/1LgThibault.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-28022\" src=\"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Thibault-mathematics-of-fencing-illustration.jpg\" alt=\"&quot;Human proportions and their relationship to swordsmanship.&quot; Engraving by J. Gelle. By Girard Thibault. (Click to see full-sized image.)\" width=\"853\" height=\"598\" class=\"size-full wp-image-28022\" srcset=\"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Thibault-mathematics-of-fencing-illustration.jpg 853w, https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Thibault-mathematics-of-fencing-illustration-150x105.jpg 150w, https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Thibault-mathematics-of-fencing-illustration-480x336.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 853px) 100vw, 853px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-28022\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">&#8220;Human proportions and their relationship to swordsmanship.&#8221; Engraving by J. Gelle. By Girard Thibault. (Click to see full-sized image.)<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>John Turner sent me a link to this short article in Slate&#8216;s &#8220;The Vault&#8221; column, discussing the mathematical side of fencing: Girard Thibault\u2019s Acad\u00e9mie de l\u2019Esp\u00e9e (1628) puts the art of wielding the sword on mathematical foundations. For Thibault, a Dutch fencing master from the early seventeenth century, geometrical rules determined each and every aspect [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[569,778],"class_list":["post-28021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","tag-fencing","tag-mathematics"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-7hX","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28021"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28021\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28023,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28021\/revisions\/28023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}