Steampunk Saturday – Bartitsu and the Violence of Victorian era fighting

It’s not often that I get to write about two favourite past times of mine and apply a skeptical eye to both.  If you are lucky enough to have seen the new Sherlock Holmes starring Robert Downey Jnr. then you will have seen the fight seen below.

So what do you think?  Was the fight scene believable? Do you think that’s how Holmes, a Victorian gentleman would have fought, or is it hammed up for the camera? Is it a bit too modern for a hero in a neo-victorian/steampunk setting.

Perhaps the video below, titled “How we used to fight” taken from  the 1980’s Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, fits more in line with your view of Victorian violence.

There is a misconception, several, perhaps when it comes to the martial arts, the Victorian era and violence.  I have observed a general trend within my own martial arts training toward the oriental arts as being somewhat more vicious, effective or powerful.  Born no doubt out of the fight films of the 70’s and 80s when Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris were in their prime (it’s interesting to note at this point that Bruce was not a traditionalist) and out of the secrecy employed by many early exporters of the arts to western shores.

The case my dear Watson is not so simple.

You see out of the two movie representations above, I believe the first to be the more accurate, both technically and historically ( at least within the confines of a work of fiction).  The character Holmes was a practitioner of Bartitsu, a sythesis of juijitsu, judo, boxing, savate, swiss wrestling and cane fighting.  The art(or regimen) is real, developed by Edward Barton-Wright and has, as part of reality based renaissance in Martial Arts been experiencing a resurgence since the turn of this century(ie 2000).

Like Bruce Lee, Barton-Wright innovated(Barton developed mixed martial arts contests a century before the UFC) and used what worked, he didn’t rely on secret knowledge and magical woo to rope in students (which is perhaps why his school floundered). Several students of the style went on to develop close combat courses for the military.

Still not convinced that the Victorian age wasn’t  a little namby pamby when it came to fighting? Consider the video here of an Australian instructor of Savate and French street fighting from the same time period.

Fighting, real fighting is and has always been brutal.  The backyard  bare-knuckle  fights of the Victorian age were vicious affairs, which often resulted in gouged eyes and bitten off ears and noses.

So whether you are role playing in a Steampunk setting or writing a Steampunk novel and you feel you could juice it up with some action, don’t feel you have to stray to far from history if you want your character to open a can of whoop-ass.

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