The Weekly Warfare   Musings martial from across the SCA

Giganti introduces his defensive secondaries (buckler, targa, and rotella) by saying there’s no difference between them and dagger.  “Anything you have learned with the sword and dagger can be accomplished with the sword and rotella/targa/buckler.”  Which means if you’re using them differently, you’re doing something wrong.  Probably, you’re thinking you can offend with the dagger when it really is just a narrow, highly mobile shield until you’re standing face-to-face.  And at that range, you can also offend with a buckler rather effectively if striking the face or hands.

So take all of this (http://www.weeklywarfare.net/?p=2652) and this (http://www.weeklywarfare.net/?p=1030) and replace dagger with targa/buckler/rotella.  Like those, your defense with the off-hand weapon is performed in the same tempo as your extension with the primary weapon.

Starting with the rotella, the large, circular, strapped-to-the-arm shield.  Two guards are illustrated.  The first, high guard, is with the sword in prima protecting the face and the rotella defending the torso.  The second, low guard, is with the sword held withdrawn and the head and upper torso behind the rotella.

As you’d expect, it protects the inside line best, deflecting or blocking damn near anything so long as it’s held extended in front of you to close the lines.  To summarize his instructions: Anything coming from the left you block or deflect with the flat of the rotella; anything froom the right you block with the edge of the rotella, or the sword.  The more it drifts back towards your body, the more exposed you are.  Though Giganti does take care to instruct to hold it with your fist upward so that your arm doesn’t tire as quickly and so you can carry it where it doesn’t block your vision, which does limit the range of your extension.

Also, he likes it for night melees, which should really be a thing for the SCA, because I have health insurance.

For the targa, the wavy rectangular-ish shield, the instructions are largely the same: Keep it extended but angled so it doesn’t block your vision, anything from the inside is blocked or deflected with the flat, and anything from the outside (he also includes thrust to the inside, though I suspect he means between your sword and your targa in this case) is deflected with the edge.  He points out that the rectangular shape, and the folds in the metal, catch blades very well.  Other than that, use it as you would a dagger.

At this point you can surmise his instructions for the buckler.