Again, in honor of St. Patrick's Day, some links to sites on the Irish Martial Arts.
Comhraiceoir Bata - Ken Pfrenger's site... one of the first sites I recall devoted exclusively to the Irish Martial Arts. Loads of info on there about Irish Stick Play!
NEOHEMAS (Northeast Ohio Historical European Martial Arts Society) - Ken Pfrenger's blog. He regularly updates it with notes of his training sessions. He also puts up youtube clips demonstrating specific techniques much like the 'simple chokes using a shillelagh'.
Kirk Lawson should be no stranger to readers of this blog. Besides his work in faithfully transcribing out-of-print/antique fight manuals, he also practices/teaches Irish Stick Play. His site: Cumann Bhata Dayton Study Group. In addition to the Irish MA, he also studies/practices/teaches other forms of the Western Martial Arts.
Rince an Bhata Uisce Bheatha - Glen Doyle's family bata style ... Rince an Bhata Uisce Bheatha means Whiskey Stick Dancing. What distinguishes Glen Doyle's family style is the use of a 2-handed grip on the bata vs the traditional one-handed grip of other bata styles. Loads of info on this site too!
John Hurley's site - Hurley wrote at least 2 books on the Irish MA, one on the shillelagh, and one on faction fighting in the works of William Carleton... his site has a lot of background on Irish MA.
I'm sure there's more sites out there on the 'net. But you cannot go wrong with the 4 above if you are new to the Irish MA. Enjoy!
Interesting stuff. I've been finding myself more and more interested in traditional Western martial arts over the years. William Sanders has also gotten interested in the Irish stick-fighting recently, and has information on his Cimande website, too. Hopefully enough people are getting involved that these traditions will be saved.
ReplyDeleteHello Sun Bear:
ReplyDeleteI'm guessing that with MAists of the caliber of Ken Pfrenger and Kirk Lawson, in addition to Tony Wolf, Craig Gemeiner, Terry Brown, John Clements and many more, that the WMA are already saved.
There's a Sherlock Holmes movie in the works and some Bartitsu (Pierre Vigny stickwork) should be featured. That should help out too.
~sg