Holmgang ???

[Inigo]

I did some fighting on the weekend and we decided to do something a bit different. We had seven fighters and split them into groups of 2, 2 and 3. The groups fought each other in turn, so it was always one group against another and not three groups having a free for all.

Each group had one person with a dane axe and the others with only shields.

Only the person with the axe could kill people, and the shieldmen would try to cover them. There was a lot of pushing and shoving, and it seemed that the best strategy was to give the biggest guy the axe

I thought at the time that the Norse had something similar called a holmgang, but I believe now that may have just been the name for a normal duel.

If anyone knows of any historical basis for two pairs fighting like this, I'd love to know of it. Thanks.

[Snorri the Mad]

i can't remember what book it was but similar fighting was used,

when someone was challenged they would fight in the middle of a circle, the circle had a line down the middle that the participants couldn't cross there was the two people on each side one just had a shield and could only block the other had the weapon (he was the one who was doing the challenge) the two guys would take turns performing a strike, they could not target the shieldbearer, they had to target the other weapon weilding guy, the shieldbearer had to try and and protect his mate. they continued trading blows until first blood or whatever the conditions of the fight were met.


when next we met ill be able to describe it a lot better with diagrams

[Stuart]

Holmgamger:

Four warriors with staffs form a square about ten to twenty paces apart.
Two fighters enter the square. Then it`s a fight to the death. I seem to recall, that under old norse law, the match could also be decided if one fighter caused the other to flee the square ?
Running a holmganger is a good display feature and really gets the public imagination.
-Think of it as a gladiator match for vikings..

[Víkarr]

http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/holmgang.shtml

Here is a writeup on the Hólmgang and Einvigi. It might have something useful in there if you havent already seen it.

V.