German Dueling Scars!

hold my beer, said students in germany and austria in the late 19th century right before they hacked each others freakin faces off. Mensur dueling was a major thing in universities at the time, and what they would do is cover their whole bodies with protection, except of course, where you want the scars to be. they had to stand at a set distance, or a mensur, coming from the latin word for dimension, and duel with blunt tipped sabers sharpened about 8 inches on the primary side and 5 inches on the secondary side. First to leave a scar wins, and the loser has to drink a pint of beer as they ripped the wound open and packed a horse hair in there so the scar would grow deeper, they wore these becoming a man scars proudly, some who wanted the fit in but didnt want the danger associated, would see doctors and pay them to scar up their face. crazy. right? this persisted in germany resulting in lots of scary nazi officers. people often misconceive that it was a nazi practice but in truth, officers were most commonly made from educated gentlemen of hiher prestige, for instance who went to school, hitler himself actually banned the tradition, only to be reinstated after his death in 1945

[@HistoryinaHurry_Xx]

College Traditions Right? Any dumb ‘hold my beer’ moments you’d like to share? More shorts: kzbin.info/aero/PLwwlQw7_kk0_SiwTCSMkWhOX_5SS2Bi-g

[@G7I2N]

The thing with the hair is only half right. As sanitary procedures were scarce, hair was put into the wound so that puss could exit the wound. Also the thing with the beer afterwards was not true. They both drank one, since fencing was often times mutuale agreed on or was part of satisfaction for wrongful acts. And after fencing the offending argument put aside.

[@HistoryinaHurry_Xx]

Maybe they just got their story straight that it sounded cooler for the hair to deepen the scar. Also, it makes perfect sense that they’d both drink, I do however think that that while I’m sure some disagreements were surely settled this way, it was also done just for fun. Thanks for sharing 🙂

[@louizifer8922]

Aha.und wo auf Wikipedia hast du den Schwachsinn gelesen.?bitte keinen mist verbreiten und zu viel rein interpretieren.denkt daran die Geschichte schreiben die Gewinner.nicht alles was die Amerikaner erzählen ist gezwungen wahr

[@Fichtelslynkahoudn]

So while, yes, mensur fights can be a so called Personal Contrahage, a fight agreed upon by two members of fencing fraternities themselves (officially that may not be done to resolve injuries of honor/ insults for legal reason, because that would be considered an actual duel and those are now illegal, but who's to Control for what reason two agree to fence so it might happen. However, most Fights today are so called bestimmungsmensuren, roughly Translated "Determination Mensur" where the fencing official of fraternities that partake in mensur (called Fechtwart or Consenior) will determine good pairings in terms of skill with the others in their waffenring (lit. Weapon Ring, an Association for mensur fencing within one or more universities, though sometimes there are even multiple in one uni, the rule Sets (Paukcomment) for mensur are defined by them, and organizing the fencing days (Mensurtage) is also their job) mostly for the mandatory mensurs many of the fraternities require from their members. Many of those are actually fought to the end with no Hits Being made. In General, there is no nominal winner in mensur. Fights go on for a set amount of bouts that consist of a set amount of strikes by each fencer, after which the seconds (Sekundanten) of each fighter (Paukant) fall inbetween the fight with a dull sword and full armor to end the bout. They also do this if a hit is Taken, they see issues with their fighters protective gear, rule violations by the opposing side and various other reasons. There is a neutral man (unparteiischer) from a third fraternity but he's not a referee but just a third final opinion if the seconds disagree. The paukanten may only whisper to their sekundant and not talk to anyone else, and keeping stonefaced and following the rules is way more important. One way to end a mensur early is the so called Abfuhr. A fraternity may declare Abfuhr if their paukant is injured to a point where the Doctor who is present advises the fencing is to stop, if their own paukant is violating rules or there are so called moralic weaknesses (showing emotion, dodging away (which increases actual danger and is forbidden), not keeping on striking) or in some comments for protest if the other side Showed behavior that should Result in Abfuhr but they had not declared it. If the mensur is fought through, something like three members of your fraternity that are there as witnesses decide if the mensur is valid. That's usually the case. In case of Abfuhr, there is a certain minimum of bouts that have to have been fenced. If you or your contra get Abfuhred for being injured, that's not a Problem for Validity of the mensur for both of you. If you've for example Taken a hit in the 14th out of 40 bouts of 4 strikes, doc says it's okay and your opponent breaks a rule the next bout, he'll get Abfuhr by his frat, your frat will probably declare your mensur valid and the opposing fraternity will probably deny their fencer that, plus put him into "Cleansing" or "Reinigung" where you will be half kicked out, Losing your right to wear the colours of your frat until you fought a valid cleansing fight, usually takes some months nowadays as mensur days are quite a bit rarer than back in The day. If you chronically mess up, at some point you could actually be dismissed from your fraternity permanently. I'll finally start studying at 25 in October, and I have to say, i'll probably join one of those fraternities, i'm really intrigued by the fencing and the so called Kneipen.

[@michaelbraun9999]

It is still practiced to this day. Training for one of these mqtches is, surprisingly, quite a lot of fun

[@HistoryinaHurry_Xx]

Have you done it?

[@michaelbraun9999]

@@HistoryinaHurry_Xx Indeed, I have and I intend to continue ;}

[@rogaldorn605]

​@@michaelbraun9999 But is it like hema with protections, or do you have some scars from it?

[@michaelbraun9999]

@@rogaldorn605 During training you are fully protected. During a Mensur - Not so much. Your eyes, ears, nose and sometimes cheeks are protected, as well as essentially anything below your chin. Your vitals are especially covered in several layers (on my Mensur I wore chain mail as well as Kevlar). The rest of the head is free game.

[@rogaldorn605]

@@michaelbraun9999 so today still you Mansur duelists have sword scars? That's fucking cool