If I ask you to imagine Elizabethan England, I'm quite certain that somewhere in your mental image will be a sword.

It may well be hanging from the girdle around a gentleman's waist, sheathed and has scabbard.

Perhaps the gentleman you imagine is in the court of Queen Elizabeth I, perhaps he engages in a duel with another man, in some friendly or not so friendly sporting combat.

Your imagination would not be wrong, such swordplay was indeed one of the martial arts that gentlemen enjoyed in the Elizabethan period.

But let's get into some of the details. What would the swords have looked like? How long, how heavy would they have been?

What sort of fighting did Ben engage in? Were the rules? How were they taught? And given that swordplay could lead to serious injury and death, was it regulated by the government in any way?

And did ordinary people participate in such pastimes, or was it just the elites?

To learn all about the intricacies of Elizabethan's swordplay, I'm delighted to welcome Jacob H. Deacon, a doctoral student at the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds.

He's currently researching the transmission of martial knowledge in England, between 1400 and 1600.

In addition to his doctoral studies, Jacob has worked with the Deutsche Klingin Museum, exploring a collection of sabers.

He undertook a fellowship at the University of Traera, and he recently became the assistant editor for Actor, Piliodico-Jula Torum, a journal for historical martial arts.

And before that wasn't enough, he's also been busy assisting with an Arts and Humanities Research Council funded project exploring the just as performance.

And he's also been busy delivering talks on fencing, tournaments, arms and armour for organisations including the Royal Arminous Museum in Leeds.

Jacob, welcome to not just the tutors. Thank you so much for coming on.

The fact you've handed me Susanna, it's an absolute pleasure.

Now, we're going to be talking about swords, and I think kind of the first thing we need to say is what a sword was. It might seem strange, but if you go to the Royal Arminous Museum in Leeds, for example, you'll see a wide range of weapons that we might think of as swords, that come in a range of shapes and sizes.

Can you clarify for us what a sword was in Elizabethan England and what it was not?

Of course, well, a sword can be one of many things. When we think of a sword in Elizabethan or Tudor England today, we probably most thinking of Arabia, this longed double edged sword with a complex hilt that is primarily used for these thrusting attacks in the lunch, but is equally capable of being used for cutting.

I think the reason we so primarily associate the Arabia with Elizabethan and Tudor England isn't just because it wasn't incredibly popular weapon then, but today when we look at Shakespeare, it's always the rapier that's been used even if that's perhaps a little anachronistic for the play, but there are many other types of swords being used at the time, particularly popular in England as well as something called a back sword.

Now, this is a single edged sword. Like the rapier it has a guard for the knuckles, that's the term back sword, because it only really has one edge and the way in which it's constructed means it's sort of a triangular blade.

Other swords include two handed swords. These are a continuation from the medieval two handed sword or long sword, some people call it.

And all three swords are used in different contexts in England, the rapier, most famously used in the duel, but also for self defense and back swords also a civilian weapon, but also used in the military.

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