I experienced my first fencing lesson at the house of the Corps Normannia, at Klaus-Groth-Straþe in Berlin Charlottenburg. In my foresight, I had brought my fencing jacket and fencing glove, both at that point comparatively new and freshly washed. When I entered the fencing attic, I found myself among raw brick and mortar and rafters, with a few bloodstained shirts and bandages hanging near the window.

A group of young men was attired in dirty, sweat-stained fencing aprons -- which look and feel like they're made from padded burlap -- with heavy helmets, heavy weapons, padded fencing cuffs over the elbows, massive gloves.⁶ And here I was, twiddling that pansy foil glove in my hand...

The process to learn the first cut, the Hochquart or high quarte, was arduous. In the Schläger system, a cut is executed from the combined rotational forces of shoulder, elbow, and wrist. No matter where you aim your cut... at the crown of your opponent's head, or at the angle of his jaw... when the tip of the cutting edge hits, your sword arm has to be straight, with your upper arm lying closely across your face, your fist pointing as high up to the left as you can get it.

Here's how you can experiece the underlying difficulty first hand: Take a mask and hang it from a wall at the same hight as your face. Take a saber, grasp the handle betweeb thumb and index finger, measure three feet between you and the wall, and place yourself squarely in front of the mask. Make sure your shoulders are parallel to the wall.

Now raise your right arm straight up, so that the point of your saber, your wrist and shoulder are perfectly aligned in one vertical line, with your upper arm firmly pressing against your right ear. This position corresponds to the steile Auslage, or Steep Ward.

From the steile Auslage, move your upper arm from your ear across your mouth without breaking the perfectly straight line between point and shoulder. The inside of your elbow joint should lie diagonally across your left eye, your fist should be at the utmost upper left position you can possible achieve... while your shoulders are still alined in a perfect parallel line to the wall.

From this awkward position, break the straight line between shoulder and point at your wrist as you try to hit the upper left of the mask with the first eight inches of the cutting edge. I repeat: The cutting edge. Not the flat. Not at an oblique angle. And don't move those shoulders!

As your blade makes contact with the mask, you have realized the most important aspect of the offensive-defensive sequence: the system's underlying concept of attacking from continuous cover.

Because in this position, you cannot be hit. Your blade provides a barrier against cuts from above, your arm, still pressed across your mouth, will block any cut directed at the left side of your face. (Your right side, or the katholische Seite, is relatively unprotected against the opponent's low tierce, also called a Spicker. Lucky for you, almost all local Mensur Comments outlaw hits aimed at this unprotectable area...)

But at this point, the Comment's other requirement kicks in, forcing you to leave this safe zone: During a bout, the point of the blade has to be kept in constant motion. This means you have to move on, back into a defensive position, without providing an opening.

Since you still are standing in front of your mask, shoulders parallel to the wall, back and legs straight, and head held up proud and agressively, with the saber balanced between thumb and index finger, execute a tight locking movement around the surface of the mask... as if you're turning a key to lock a door.

During this locking movement (Abdrehen, lit., "to turn off"), the cutting edge of your blade will turn from pointing downward to pointing upward. (To practice, try hitting the left side of the mask with the cutting edge, then execute the locking motion, culminating with a slight tap of the false edge against the right upper side of the mask. This last tap, of course, is only for practice purposes.)

In this process, your shoulders remain aligned with the wall, your arm remains straight, and your fist is firmly planted at the utmost left.

As your blade "turns off", you are creating an opening: The right-hand top of your scalp lies open to an attack in high tierce or Hacke. This means that as you turn your wrist, your upper arm needs to rapidly slide back, across your mouth to rest against your right ear. This time around, however, you do not go back into the steile Auslage. But as your biceps hits your ear, you drop the point of your blade further down the left hand side of the mask while pulling your elbow back and up.

This ward position, called verhängte Auslage or hanging guard, protects the right side of your face and head by your arm's vertical line between shoulder and elbow. Your forehead and crown are covered by your lower arm and guard, which points diagonally toward the enemy's right-hand side. Your blade, pointing downward and foreward diagonally to where the opponent's shoulders would be, protects the left side of your face. Again, if you're doing this process right, you cannot be hit.

From the verhängte Auslage, you have two options to keep going. (Hey, it's the rules!). If you're using a bell-guard or a basket-hilt Schläger, your next attempt at landing a high quarte involves the following:

1. Bell-guard Schläger: A push foreward into your guard that again aligns your arm in a straight diagonal that covers mouth, left eye, and brings the guard into the utmost left position as you drop your edge into the high quarte position.

But it requires perfect form. Any sloppiness, and you'll end up with a 7-inch gash across your scalp or face. Allow your arm to fall forward as you shift you biceps from your ear across your mouth, and you create an opening in your left cheek. Allow your lower arm to droop in the verhängte Auslage, and you create an opening in the back of your head. Or allow the point of your blade to drop to low as you go back into the Verhängte, and you remove the block that protects your left side...

All the while, you remain standing proud and straight. Because while the Schläger system lacks the athletic emphasis, there is a mental, a moral element to it. Your stance is static, you don't work with distance, and rather than avoiding a hit by a quick movement you actually stand and take it rather than break your pattern. The only body part you're allowed to move is your sword arm. Move your head, duck, twitch, attempt to dodge... and your own people will call the bout.

Because in this system, any superfluous movement is not only useless, but terminally dangerous to you. In the very fast, very rapid exchange of cuts, you need to get to viscerally understand the rhythm of the bout, consider your actions before you act and accept the consequences no matter what they may be.

You take control of yourself... develop an instinctive evaluation of a situation. Your vision is limited. You see the basket of your opponent's sword, but the best clues you can get are from his face and the rhythm of the steel. The only way to hit someone who is cutting and attacking from a flawless covered position is to break his time.

And then, of course, there's that most practical of the system's life applications: Don't attack unless you are covered.