“My Many swords”

By the Honorable Mizfy Allen

Though I have never actually owned a real sword, throughout my life I have managed to make do with several different types of facsimile.

Christmas time was always a good time for swords. The center roll of the wrapping paper made for an excellent light saber. In the days and nights leading up to that most anticipated of holidays, I waged many an imaginary battle. Sometimes, a Dark Lord of the Sith would be faced down and destroyed. On other occasions, I would be the Sith Lord, dispatching Jedis to wherever it is they go upon their dramatic disappearances.

At other times of the year a common yardstick would be employed. Though designed for measurement, these wooden instruments can be substituted for a knight’s broadsword, a samurai katana or a swashbuckler’s cutlass. It would also work for a dervish’s scimitar or a gentleman’s foil, but I hardly ever played Muslim warrior or Victorian duelist. While I suppose a ruler could be a dagger, I found rulers more useful as helicopter props, when utilized with a pencil, or as a catapult, for the launching of small green plastic army men. None of my pitched battles involved daggers. I never played Italian Renaissance aristocrat.

Later, in my teenage years there were wooden practice katana for kendo. They were balanced in the same way a real katana was, but were dull. Still, many a fierce ninja battle or high catwalk Force-penetrated showdown ensued. After these the wooden swords would be chipped or nicked badly. Since then, throughout college and beyond, I have found that wooden dowels often work best.

Three quarter inch PVC pipe has an excellent weight and feel as well as an ability to produce a rich and satisfying sound when parried. PVC pipes, unfortunately, have a tendency to break. Broomsticks have similar properties as dowels, but a length that can make them unwieldy in amateur hands.

A problem endemic to the faux-rapier is the issue of hand-guard, more approaprieately, the lack thereof is the real issue. While actual sword-smiths have produced weapons with all variety of hand-guards, people such as myself have often had entire battles, fierce though they may be, interrupted by the pain of a well placed, sometimes purposeful, whack to the fingers.

Now, I have played around with many real swords and several foils, but the truth of the matter is that people who collect, or even have real swords, tend ot be of the sketchy variety, excluding of course historians, archeologists and serious collectors of martial antiques. I am none of these, I will, for now, refrain from a sword purchase. A yardstick, or meterstick (for the metric-world) will do fine.