M. Allyson Szabo is an amateur food historian and cookbook author. Her historical experience ranges from 10th century Norse to early 19th century American. She specializes in mid-14th century cooking, and is currently researching an 18th century American cookbook.
Brittany Saint Leafy (she/her) is the Head Instructor of Mordhau Historical Combat in Mesa, Arizona. She is a highly sought after international instructor having taught at esteemed HEMA events across the United States, Canada, and Europe. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Ancient and Medieval History, a minor in Art History, and has cross trained in armored combat and jujitsu. With over a decade of martial arts experience, Brittany has won a multitude of medals across several competitive categories including wrestling, longsword, and sharp cutting.
Bart Walczak
Bart Walczak (he/him) has been researching and practicing HEMA since 1999 (with several hiatuses). Aficionado of medieval culture, unaffiliated scholar, occasional author. Might have contributed a few ideas to the theory and practice of skill reconstruction.
Charles Murdock
Charles Murdock (he/him) began training in martial arts in 1980. Over the ensuing decades, he has trained in several styles of karate, aikido, taijitsu, jujitsu, and budo arts. He discovered Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) in 2008. He joined the Meyer Freifechter Guild (MFFG) in 2009 and founded the Grünberg Freifechter as a study group of the MFFG in early 2010. The group has been focusing on current translations of Joachim Meyer’s 1570 multi-weapon treatise entitled “The Art of Combat”. Charles has taught classes at the Meyer Symposium, Purple Heart Armory Open, Fechtschule New York, Fechtschule Frisbee, Longpoint, Iron Gate Exhibition (IGX), Montreal Sword Meisters, and Amici Armis. He has medaled in spear, dagger, wrestling, and longsword.
Christian Buettner (he/him) has been doing HEMA for 7 years now and has had the good fortune to be surrounded by supportive and curious instructors and students. He now teaches saber, longsword, montante and biomechanics at his club and others. His current interest is taking lessons from Dance, historical and modern, and applying these to fencing. There are only so many ways to move your body and dancing has a lot of detailed Pedagogy we can learn from.
Christian Trosclair
Christian Trosclair (he/him) has been studying Liechtenauer since the mid 00’s. An avid translator, his translations are featured on the Wilktenauer which he helps run. He has studied dance and martial arts most of his life and currently researches the context and content in and around late medieval and early modern central european martial arts.
Christopher Valli (any) began his training in martial arts at the Shaolin Wushu Center in South Windsor, Connecticut under Grandmasters Hu Jianqiang and Zhong Jianmei. He trained in kungu and taichi for 10 years where he also assisted in teaching children and beginner classes.
In 2004, Chris attended a seminar on the German rondel dagger by Christian Henry Tobler and the next day ordered a pair of wooden training daggers. It was love at first disarm. Within a few months, he was attending classes regularly. In 2015, Chris earned the rank of “Free Scholar” through the Selohaar Fechtschule. He then started Laurel City Historical Fencing in Winsted, CT to be able to pass on his love of the sword to new students.
In addition to historical fencing, Chris also enjoys archery, shooting, and really any sport that involves weaponry.
Collin Vredenburg (he/him) is an avid competitor and passionate scholar. He started fencing in 2018, diving into an intensive training program that included self-study and research, building a comprehensive HEMA library, and earning his first tournament medal at Purpleheart Open 2019 with just 8 months of experience.
Collin applies the same dedication he has as a student to his coaching and works with beginning and advanced students teaching the Bolognese tradition of one-handed sword, Sword & Buckler, and Two-handed Sword, Smallsword and Saber in the French Tradition, and specializes in Rapier. His primary source is Gerard Thibault d’Anvers’s Academie de l’Espée, making him one of very few in the United States working with this tradition. Collin is currently adapting and re-translating l’Academie into English from its original 17th century French. He currently has a TikTok and Youtube Channel @TheRealThibault where he shares videos of his drills and interpretations across Historical fencing disciplines, but with a focus on Thibault.
Constance Burns (they/them) is an avid fencer and life long martial artist. First donning a gi at age 4, Connie has competed and won at a national and local level in both eastern martial arts, and HEMA. Currently Connie is treading the long and interesting path to literacy in rapier, specifically focussing on Michael Hundt and Marcelli. To this effect, Connie has entered rapier competitions in both HEMA and the SCA, and even medaled using Michael Hundt’s rapier at Blades Against Harm. To this end, Connie wants to teach techniques from this oft overlooked manual in order to show how entertaining, funny, and functional the German tradition of rapier fencing is. Fabris be damned, let’s get weird!!
Ian Carmichael (he/him) holds a bachelor of arts in Anthropology with a minor in Classics Material Culture. After learning Spanish while living in the Peruvian Andes with the United States Peace Corps, he extended these language skills to the translation of historical texts. He has translated Philippo Vadi’s De Arte Gladiatoria Dimicandi, Francesco Alfieri’s Lo Spadone, the Anonimo Riccardiano, and selected sections of Pedro Monte’s Collectanea. These sections relating to wrestling and fencing were compiled in a small volume titled “The Practical Monte”.
He began studying martial arts with Tae Kwon Do. In middle school, he studied wrestling and kickboxing. Throughout high school and college, he studied a mixed system of Inosanto and Doce Pares Kali, Jeet Kune Do, judo, Japanese jiu-jitsu, and Wing Chun. Since moving to Boston in 2017, he has studied and trained at Boston Armizare, a historical European martial arts (HEMA) club focused on 15th to 19th century Italian traditions, where he has benefitted from the tutelage and expertise of many excellent colleagues. To better understand the historical combat systems he studies, he has taken coursework with a number of modern combatives instructors, namely Craig Douglas and Brian Frias of Shivworks, Aaron Janetti of Knife Control Concepts, and Joel Levan of the PTK-SMF system. He has won medals in longsword, dagger, and wrestling, fought two prize fights in armor, and periodically participates in full contact, low protective gear stick fights with members of the Dog Brothers tribe. All of these experiences influence and inform his more academic work
Jess Rozek (she/her) is the president, chief cat herder, and beginner’s class instructor at Maryland KdF. She grew up loving Highlander and all sorts of sword and shield fantasy and finding HEMA was a dream come true. She has been doing HEMA since 2011 when she accidentally helped found the Grunberg Freifechters in Burlington, VT while in college. From there, her first competition was the Boston Sword Gathering in the summer of 2011 followed shortly after by Longpoint 2012.
She moved to Maryland in 2013 and was thrust into running Maryland KdF as its primary instructor. After several years of hard work and the assistance of many wonderful people, she managed to grow the club into one of the largest on the East Coast.
She has been a teacher/instructor since the age of 15. First, with skiing in Massachusetts, then sailing and watersurfing, then HEMA, and lastly, archery. Throughout all of this, she has maintained technical teaching certifications across the various sports. Her goal with HEMA is to make it accessible and fun for all by helping a fighter’s body work for and with them.
Jordan Mock
Jordan Mock (he/him) runs one of the largest HEMA schools in Britain and has taught in some of the biggest HEMA events in Europe including Fightcamp and HEMAC Dijon. His passion is the study and interpretation of Fiore dei Liberi and its function in free sparring. He has participated in a number of tournaments in Britain and Europe and has brought home a several awards and medals.
Kimberleigh Roseblade (they/them) is a “Fiorist with a flair” who discovered HEMA in the Spring of 2010 while living in Vancouver, BC. Kimberleigh has since moved to Toronto, Ontario and has been teaching Armizare internationally at various HEMA events and symposiums since 2014. In 2016 Kimberleigh participated in their first tournament winning bronze in Women’s Longsword at Swordsquatch in Seattle, Washington. Kimberleigh works as fitness instructor and coach who specializes in the fitness needs of HEMA practitioners. They also focus on making fitness as accessible as possible and they specialize in working with clients who are disabled, living with a chronic condition, or athletes recovering from surgery and injury. Kimberleigh is passionate about movement and activity. When Kimberleigh isn’t swinging a sword or lifting weights, they can be found swimming, cycling, or dancing.
Marcus Bernier has been involved in archery at some level for 40 years. He has shot nearly every type of bow although he does not claim to be an expert in all styles. He has made all wood (self) bows, wood laminate, and composite laminate bows in both traditional longbow and hybrid recurve forms. He has been making arrows for about 20 years and informally instructing and coaching intuitive/instinctive archery, string making, and fletching for about as long with a focus on primitive and traditional archery. He has a bachelor’s degree in Exercise Physiology and a Master’s Degree in Education and has been an Anatomy instructor for 25+ years, and adjunct professor for Great Bay Community College in Anatomy for 10 years.
Marcus got involved in HEMA during its infancy at Higgin’s Armory in Worcester and that involvement bloomed into a company called Hickory Arms which supplied wooden wasters locally and world-wide. Through this company he became involved in the HEMA, SCA, LARP and Ren Faire communities for over 25 years. Now he hopes to spread his love of archery to people in all of these and the adjacent communities for years to come.
Nathan Weston (he/him) is a Senior Instructor at Athena School of Arms in Boston. He studied a variety of martial arts, as well as Olympic sport fencing, before taking up HEMA in 2012. He has made an in-depth study of Lichtenauer’s longsword, and also practices rapier and occasionally saber.
Recently he has been focused on developing more effective teaching methods for HEMA. He runs the HEMA Alliance instructor certification program, has taught numerous instructor training workshops, and writes articles about coaching for GD4H.org
John “Pax” Crum (he/him) has been in martial arts for 35 years, having studied competition, form and combatives systems, and has been practicing HEMA since 2012. He was a founding member of the MKDF curriculum council, and remains a member of the club. John has taught self-defense, has done kinesthetic and competition coaching, and does special coaching for those having trouble with body mechanics. On top of his martial training, John is a medically retired police officer of 12 years, having specialized in deescalation and crisis intervention. His experience across multiple martial contexts and in coaching people from diverse physical disciplines and backgrounds has given him an array of communication tools when it comes to coaching movement, tactics and technique, as well as interpretation in the context of HEMA.
Rebecca Glass (she/her) has been involved with HEMA since 2014 and active on the competitive circuit since 2015. Besides being a frequent competitor, she is an experienced judge, director, and tournament organizer.
Roux Nelson (they/he) is a Longsword instructor with Moose Historical Fencing, and a researcher of the RDLN lineage of the Kunst des Fechtens. Their focus is primarily on building a cohensive understanding of the Haupstucke, and defining the biomechanical and spacial positions needed to achieve success in an exchange. Roux also runs a HEMA-Specific personal training program called Zettel Performance.
Shane Scallin (he/him) has been practicing HEMA for 9 years. He began learning Fiore’s longsword in early highschool, and now works as the co-founder and head coach of Black Cat Historical Fencing, Rhode Island’s first and only nonprofit HEMA club. He practices and instructs Fiore’s longsword, i33 sword and buckler, and ringen. His wider historical interests include medieval peasant lifestyles and cultures, historical sportsmanship, and the historical wrestling practices of cultures worldwide.
Scott Loescher (he/him) began studying HEMA at WSTR in Connecticut in 2017. He has always been interested in naval combat of the Napoleonic wars of the late 18th and early 19th century and wanted to learn to fight like Captain Jack Aubrey. To this aim, Scott has mostly focused his studies on military saber with forays into spadroon and smallsword. He is also studying cutlass, pistol, spear, musket and bayonet to round out his knowledge of all weapons used aboard ships.
Ties Kool (he/him) started HEMA back in 2003. He is known for teaching no-nonsense workshops and his tournament accomplishments. Ties has been part of many HEMA events in either the role of organiser, tournament manager or instructor. His main weapons are Longsword, Sabre and wrestling/dagger. He works in a high-end gym in Helsinki at the moment as Coach and manager. Here he is responsible for the in house education of coaches.
Krzyslaw “Kythe” Szubielka (He/Him) is a 30 year veteran of the Society for Creative Anachronism. He got his Culinary Degree in 1988 and went on to professionally cook for 20 years. He has been brewing for 41 years and is a Laurel and Guild Master of the East Kingdom Brewers Guild.