Michael Chidester
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mchidester.bsky.social
Michael Chidester
@mchidester.bsky.social
Editor-in-Chief of Wiktenauer, owner of HEMA Bookshelf, amateur codicologist, manuscript nerd, and meme enjoyer.
So much Thibault...
November 8, 2025 at 4:14 AM
One original 1620s painted Thibault print has arrived, and nine more are on the way.
November 3, 2025 at 10:22 PM
Thibault is large
October 26, 2025 at 4:25 PM
Preparing for a new project
October 26, 2025 at 12:40 AM
I spent April-June working on an English translation of Liechtenauer's Zettel written in verse like the original. You can read the results on Wiktenauer, along with a mountain of footnotes explaining choices:
wiktenauer.com/wiki/Johanne...

(My introduction to the project is in the discussion tab.)
July 18, 2025 at 3:32 PM
More revisions to the Lignitzer article: new translations by Christian Trosclair and Per Magnus Haaland, more dagger thanks to Bart Walczak and Bartosz Starko, a timeline of contemporary research, and this provisional stemma. Enjoy!
wiktenauer.com/wiki/Andre_L...
April 29, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Today in updates no one asked for: Andre Lignitzer!

wiktenauer.com/wiki/Andre_L...

This page has received several new transcriptions and also the modular column upgrade for easier comparison between manuscripts.

Pictured: Short sword fencing from the Cluny, which has nothing to do with Lignitzer.
April 21, 2025 at 8:23 PM
While I know people always judge books by their covers, I didn't consider that in-person, when they can't see a plaintext title, people would glance at the cover, see a word they don't recognize, and move on. So I'm working on an alternative for in-person sales to leverage the name Ringeck properly.
March 22, 2025 at 3:49 PM
Now on Wiktenauer: BnF ms. Arabe 2824 is an Egyptian fencing treatise written in 1470 in Arabic, containing teachings of the Mamluks, the elite--but indentured or enslaved--warrior class of many Islamic nations in the medieval and modern periods. It was written by Pseudo-Ibn Akḥī Ḥizām.
March 11, 2025 at 2:34 AM
Prepping for the next facsimile campaign. I guess now we find out the extent to which paper prices have gone insane.

What's coming up next? Here's a *tiny* hint...
March 6, 2025 at 11:10 PM
A while ago, I created this visualization page to show the relative sizes of various fencing manuscripts.

wiktenauer.com/wiki/Wiktena...

I was tinkering with this page recently, and to make it more useful, I also created a few subsections that only cover related manuscripts for easier comparison.
February 17, 2025 at 4:07 PM
So where does this fit into the Getty manuscript's structure of nine masters? Is it a play of the 7th master, but now defending a rising thrust instead of descending? Is it a play of the 8th master, but now crossed rather than uncrossed?
January 28, 2025 at 4:24 PM
Paris text (character count limit means no translation, but it was translated from something like that Italian text):

Praevalet iste motus cruce dagam nempe tenentj.
Supra nanque potuit operarj & subter in armis.
Vadit ad extremam nexuram hic ludus aperte
Inferior. Mediana iacet sub forte supermo.
January 28, 2025 at 4:22 PM
In arme aquesto e un fortissimo incrosar
Che desopra e desota se'po ligar
Aquesto va ala ligadura sotana
E quello de'sopra va ala meçana

In armor, this is a very strong crossing
Because it can bind from above and below:
This goes to the low bind,
And the one from above goes to the middle.
January 28, 2025 at 4:19 PM
In the 3rd position on c. 12a of the Novati Facsimile and the lower register of f. 37r of the Paris manuscript--right before the plays of the final master of dagger, there's an interesting play.
January 28, 2025 at 4:19 PM
Together at last.
January 25, 2025 at 5:47 PM
Christmas came late this year, but the first copies of _Pieces of Ringeck_ are here!
January 10, 2025 at 8:28 PM