Our first article was about the small sword so we figured we should provide an adequate article about a complimentary weapon. The main-gauche, meaning left hand in French, is the perfect partner to the small sword. It is a light weight dagger used to parry attacks from opponent sword fighters. These parrying daggers are held in the off-hand and can attack just as well as they defend.
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There are a few different types of parrying daggers and each of them has a unique quality that makes it useful in some situations. All of them, when paired with the skilled hand of an expert fencer, will give an aggressor some reason to pause.
The Trident Dagger
The trident dagger is similar to the Sai. The effectiveness of the parrying dagger is judged by how well it can block an attack and the trident dagger scores highly. The short dagger has a three prong design and sometimes even incorporates a spring technology to flip the blades out into a fan.
The center blade is the longest of the three and would be most useful for stabbing. The other two jut outward at thirty degree angles and are used to catch an opponents sword as it slides down the center blade. They can also be used for stabbing.
When you can easily trap an opponent’s weapon in the prongs of your trident dagger, he will be at your mercy. However, one of the trident daggers main features is also its drawback. If the wielder should fail to catch the opponent’s sword just right with the three prongs of his trident dagger, the blade could glance off in the wrong direction and slice fingers, wrist, or worse.
Sword Breakers
These are similar to the trident dagger in purpose only. The sword breaker is an incredibly strong dagger with multiple divots and deep sharp angled slots in the blade. Used to parry strikes the sword breaker will catch the opponent’s weapon between one of these sharpened teeth and stop the blow.
Unlike the trident, it was almost impossible to glance off the sword breaker. Its entire purpose was to catch and hold the opponent’s sword so that the fighter could strike with his primary weapon of choice. The only problem with these sturdy daggers was that they were kind of a one trick pony. If you weren’t using it to block an attack you could barely use it for anything else.
The name sword breaker is also a bit of a misrepresentation. Even though these swords were able to withstand much force and were designed to stop much larger weapons, it is doubtful that they were actually able to snap the blades off of opponent’s hilts. Perhaps with a nice twist of the wrist it would be possible to disarm your opponent using a sword breaker but for the most part they would just catch and hold.
The off-hand weapon today is a rarity. As sports fencing gained popularity and general sword play lost out on the battlefield to more ranged weapons it became unbecoming to wield a parrying dagger. In fiction and in video games however, the use of two-swords or dual wielding is one of the more popular fighting stances a hero can take.
They may be out of fashion because they aren’t exactly practical anymore but the parrying dagger and all of its manifestations is by far one of the most exciting sword play styles to watch.
The off hand weapon, particularly the parrying dagger, is a form of true martial arts weapons mastery. Rather than pick up a shield and protect yourself from oncoming blows with a blunt piece of wood or metal, go on the aggressive and do some damage doubly-so. The best defense is a good offense, after all.
