Spear & Shield (rotella) Fight

Sparring with spear and shield. Here we are trying out two different spear shafts lengths/widths to see what we want to use in future. They are 7’ and 8’ long, we swap them mid fight. In this particular video we are using small double strap round shields. Spears were of course used with all sorts of different size of shields, but these are a good match to the renaissance rotella as well as earlier light infantry/skirmisher shields. No two handed use of the spear is allowed with these as they are not suited to taking heavy edge impacts. And no we do not have backup weapons either, because this is a test of the spear shafts to see if they are useable long term. You will see we use a mix of overhand and underhand grips, of which both were used in the bolognese tradition.