How were bucklers held, historically, and how should this inform their use today?

Grip is fundamental to proper use of a sword, buckler, or any hand weapon. To use the weapon right – and to have any hope of using it with faithfulness to the way it was used in its historical heyday – you have to hold it right. Sadly, Medieval fencing texts are notorious for not telling you how to grip a weapon, and this I think has been the source of misinterpretation in the case of how bucklers were gripped in medieval Europe.

I have seen many sword-and-buckler enthusiasts today gripping the buckler in such a way that their thumb is extended upward along the handgrip of the shield (as viewed from the grip held vertical with respect to the ground), in a manner that in fact resembles an Italian dueling-sabre grip, though it differs in that the index finger is held curled with the other digits. This creates a sort of “thumbs-up” grip à la Buddy-Christ from the movie Dogma.

I don’t think this grip is correct, historically. Even though we don’t have much in the way of explicit instruction on how to hold a buckler, we do have illustrations – both from the fencing books themselves as well as from contemporary iconography – to reconstruct grip. And from the earliest treatise, MS I.33 (dating from the early 1300’s), as well as contemporary iconography from other manuscripts, the Buddy-Christ grip is not used. Rather, we see this manner of holding the buckler in I.33 in the following image, and only this manner of holding it, whenever the grip is visible:

Contemporary sources show the same. This fabulous website compiles hordes of searchable images from contemporary illuminated manuscripts, and where we see buckler grips in these images they are the same as I.33. Here are two from a French codex dating between 1280 and 1300, so roughly contemporary with I.33:

In all images, the buckler is held with the thumb in opposition to the other digits, and the thumb runs across the handle, it is not extended along the length of it.

Does this grip change with time? Apparently not: all images showing buckler grip from Talhoffer and Paulus Hector Mair (as well as the latter’s source images) show the same manner of holding the shield. Marozzo also displays figures gripping the buckler like this in 1536. Much past these sources, and the buckler starts to go out of favor across much of Europe.

Now, a quick note on the reliability of medieval imagery for this kind of information. There is an often-raised critique among the historical fencing crowd that medieval images are not reliable for reconstruction, because they are so “stylized.” This is really a fancy way of saying “primitive” that doesn’t come across so judgmental. And it is true that many features of period fencing technique are difficult to extract from them. For example, it is extremely difficult to tell which leg is the forward leg as a rule in the I.33 images. But by and large, medieval imagery should really be viewed as imagery that predates the artistic techniques developed during the renaissance and later, such as the use of perspective, that were part of a push toward ever-increasing “realism” in art. We cannot say that medieval images of fencing were not made in earnest intent to accurately depict body positions, when clearly they were. They are not stylized the way that ancient Egyptian art is, with stock poses — the postures and actions depicted ARE in fact natural, just executed for the most part with less of an artistic toolkit available and a different set of conventions. That is what makes them look odd to the modern eye. So while it is difficult to discern some (perhaps many) details, it is not tenable to overlook details where they are included and are clear as day.

As an example of this, re-examine the image of the two men fighting above, from the French codex, where the fencer on the left is wearing blue. Examine his thumb position on the sword hand. It is very clearly drawn with careful attention to detail, extended onto the cross, past the grip, and aimed toward the point of the sword — very different from the grip shown in the I.33 image above. With this attention paid to thumb position on the sword, I am very comfortable arguing that the buckler grip is also accurately and realistically portrayed. Other pictures from the same codex provide similar levels of detail with regard to sword grip, showing multiple variations. But buckler grip remains the same in each image. And there is no reason to assume that this is is not also the case for I.33. And as if this weren’t enough, Talhoffer, Mair, and Marozzo are well within modern artistic realism, and their thumb positions are very very clear — NOT extended.

So overall, from the 1200’s through the 1500’s we have a very consistent depiction of buckler grip across Europe, from France, Germany, and Italy. Was the thumb-extended position never used? Well, of course we can’t say this, but if so it was clearly much more rare. If you’re inclined to stay as historically accurate as possible in your historical fencing, I would go with the style of holding the buckler depicted in EVERY image we have available.

The contents of this post reflect my own views and opinions, and do not necessarily represent those of my masters at Martinez Academy of Arms. Any errors are fully my own, as I am still in training and have been encouraged to research to further my studies.