There’s nothing quite as cool as a sword, at least to a certain segment of the population. Just ask a Jedi—who needs a blaster when you can have a blade of light at your command? The origin of all that double-edged coolness is a tough one to pin down, since swords were the weapon of choice for an enormous swath of human history. This week, the Renaissance Center at the University of Massachusetts and the Association for Renaissance and Medieval Swordsmanship get together for their fourth conference on historical swordsmanship to further knowledge of the art in Europe. The conference includes discussions, lectures and demonstrations of what’s been dubbed “European martial arts.” That martial arts aspect is currently the subject of reconstructive efforts based on period treatises on fighting techniques. The Renaissance Center hosts the Raymond J. Lord collection, a digital archive of such treatises.
April 18, UMass-Amherst, Renaissance Center, 650 East Pleasant St., Amherst, (413) 577-3600.
