Fictional account, but with key references made by the novelist R. D. Blackmore that drew upon real events, and real wrestlers of the period: Volume 2, Chapter 5: CHAPTER V. That same evening, as I was sitting in my lonely room, yet not quite alone,–for little Sally, who always did as I bade her, was […]
(pp148) SINGLE-STICK, a slender, round stick of ash about 34 in. long and thicker at one end than the other, used as a weapon of attack and defence, the thicker end being thrust through a cup-shaped hilt of basket-work to protect the hand. The original form of the single-stick was the ‘‘waster”, which appeared in […]
(pp167)…Joe beckoned me in, and I went round to the back of the table and looked on. As the men came up from the group round the door, when their names were called out, the umpires said a few words to each of them and then gave them their prizes, and most of them made […]
Single-stick and Cudgels. [To Mr. Hone.] I do not observe that you notice the yearly village sports of Single-stick playing and Cudgelling, in your Year-Book. — You may know, perhaps, that the inhabitants of many of the villages in the vrestern counties, not having a fair or other merry-making to collect a fun-seeking money – […]
(pp99) Among the places in which preaching was regularly established were the villages of Landkey and Swymbridge. In these parishes, the presentation to which is vested in the Dean and Chapter of Exeter, the tithes had fallen into the hands of a lay impropriator, and “ duty ” of both churches was at that time […]
Higgs, Robert J., 1932- (1995). God in the stadium : sports and religion in America. University Press of Kentucky.
(pp355) Every bit as savage as bare-knuckle boxing was the ancient sport of Devon Wrestling, One of the last champions was Abraham Cann, who was nicknamed the Devon Hercules. In this painting by Henry Caunter (c. 1846), Cann is evoked as the last great exponent of the dying art of wrestling according to the brutal […]
(pp385) On the night appointed, I hid behind a tree at the arranged spot, ready to spring to the rescue and help the old lion ; my loafers lurked in the shade of a wall. He came in the starlight — a grand figure of an old warlock, just merry enough to feel the blood […]
(pp35) Prize-fighting was then the order of the day ; and a set-to between two professionals of celebrity would bring together men of all ranks, patricians and proletarians, from the most remote parts of England, to witness what it would have been heresy then to call a barbarous exhibition. The vale of Bicester, being […]
Swetnam was a prominent Fencing Master from Bristol, who was The Master of Defence in Plymouth for many years. This is core material within the DWS. Full modernised version by the DWS, currently being prepared. THE SCHOOLE OF THE NOBLE And Worthy Science of Defence. Being the first of any English-mans invention, which professed the […]
A copy of the 1727 edition is currently in the collection of thhe Cornish Wrestling Association (CWA). This is core material for the DWS. We have an authoritative edition of Cornish Wrestling manual known as “Progymnastmata: In-play or the Cornish hug wrestler”, published in 4 editions of Sir Thomas Parkyns’ original work (1713, 1714, 1727, […]
A personal account of a combat between Richard Peeke (Tavistock, Devon), and three Spanish rapiermen. The event happened on 15th November 1625. Peeke documented his account in July 1626. Three-to-One: Being an English-Spanish combat performed by a Western Gentleman of Tavistock in Devonshire, with an English quarterstaff, against three Spaniards [ at once ] with […]
THE WRESTLERS : ——————-a mutual yoke of hands, Dragging with arms and elbow – joints in intertwisted bands; And in their clasp reciprocal they lifted from the ground Each other’s body, snatched in air, descending round and round; A double pleasure thus employ’d th’ Olympian dweller’s mind, Lifting and lifted thus by turns upon the […]
Chapter XIII Wrestling Wrestling had become one of the least practised of our old English sports, till the recent revival of the art as a music-hall “turn” — a use for which it was particularly well adapted, inasmuch as a Wrestling Match never fails to hold the interest of the spectator from first to last […]
“The Cornish are masters of the art of wrestling, so that, if the Olympic games were now in fashion, they would come away with the victory. Their hug is a cunning close with their combatants, the fruit whereof is his fair fall or foil at the least.” Fuller, T (1662). History of the Worthies of […]
THE MYTH OF BRUTUS THE TROJAN. By the late R. N. Worth, F.G.S., etc. rutus, son of Sylvius, grandson of Æneas the Trojan, killed his father while hunting, was expelled from Italy, and settled in Greece. Here the scattered Trojans, to the number of seven thousand, besides women and children, placed themselves under his command, […]
Part 16: The island was then called Albion, and inhabited by none but a few giants. Notwithstanding this, the pleasant situation of the places, the plenty of rivers abounding with fish, and the engaging prospect of its woods, made Brutus and his company very desirous to fix their habitation in it. They therefore passed through all the provinces, […]
The men of dSurrey, Cheeky Blew and gold, (Which for braue Warren their first Earle they wore, In many a Field that honour’d was of olde:) And Hamshere next in the same Colours bore, Three Lions Passant, th’ Armes of Beuis bould, Who through the World so famous was of yore; A siluere Tower, Dorsets Red […]
Book 1, Page 1: Cornwall, the fartheſt Shire of England Weſtwards, hath her name by diuers Authors diverſly deriued. Some (as our owne Chroniclers) draw it from Corineus, couſin to Brute, the first Conqueror of this Iland : who wrastling at Plymmouth (as they say) with a mightie Giant, called Gogmagog, threw him ouer Cliffe, […]
We have read of his Cornish father’s prowess in “the art of fisticuffery,” and might certainly have looked for a spirited account of the affair at Bodmin Bridge when the terror of all Plymouth and Devonport was vanquished, and another of the fracas at Menheniot Fair. But we should probably also have had an essay […]
Baring-Gould, S. (Sabine), 1834-1924 DEVONSHIRE WRESTLERS WRESTLING was the favourite sport in former days in Devonshire and Cornwall. Evelyn, in his Diary, speaks of Westcountrymen in London contesting in London against men of the North, and in all cases the former were the victors. And Ben Jonson, in his Bartholomew Fair, 1614, introduces a Western […]
DEVONSHIRE WRESTLING. For the Table Book. Abraham Cann, the Devonshire champion, and his brother wrestlers of that county, are objected to for their play with the foot, called “showing a toe” in Devonshire; or, to speak plainly, “kicking.” Perhaps neither the objectors, nor Abraham and his fellow-countrymen, are aware, that the Devonshire custom was also […]
WE must not close this department of our subject, without saying a word or two on wrestling. This exercise, which at one time was almost universal, is now, like many others, fallen into general disuse; and is confined almost entirely to Cornwall and Devon in the west, and the counties of Chester, Lancaster, Cumberland, and […]
THE COMMITTEE of the CORNWALL and DEVONSHIRE WRESTLING SOCIETY beg to announce that they will celebrate their usual ANNUAL SPORT in the Pleasure Garden attached to Mr Baum’s, the White Lion, Victoria Park Station, Hackney Wick, on Whit- Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, when a number of handsome money prizes will be given to be wrestled […]
FENCING BY WALTER H. POLLOCK, F. C. GROVE, AND CAMILLE PREVOST, MAITRE D’ARMES WITH A COMPLETE BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE ART BY EGERTON CASTLE, M.A., F.S.A. BOXING BY E. B. MICHELL WRESTLING BY WALTER ARMSTRONG WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM INSTANTANEOUS PHOTOGRAPHS Second Edition LONDON LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. 1890 All rights reserved (Page 184) ….was unable to […]
WRESTLING. (Page 166) IT is very difficult to give directions for wrestling in intelligible language. If you had hold of me, I could say, “Now put your foot so, and turn your hip so—that’s it;” and how a sudden heave like this,” and so forth. But so in attempting the task on pencil, or by […]
Reference ORIGINAL MODERNISED The praise of Plymouth (p6, First Song) The christning of that Bay, which beares her nobler name. Vpon the British coast, what ship yet euer came That not of Plymouth heares, where those braue Nauies lie, From Canons thundring throats, that all the world defie? Which, to inualue spoile, when th’English […]
John Prowse, who had now taken me under his protection, was a good specimen of the North Devon peasant; lively and intelligent, stout and muscular, nearly six feet high, and with shoulders that would not have disgraced Hercules. Besides this, he was upright as a dart, a grace he had acquired by having been some […]
pp.622, A minor reference to a Devonshire Wrestling in a fictional work. Reference to good breeding. “Upon my word, madam,” the General protested, “you use the doctor badly. He is blamed if he kills people, and he is blamed if he keeps them alive. What is he to do?” “Do? He can’t help saving the […]
The only amusement generally indulged in, the mode of which is almost peculiar to the county, is that of wrestling. It differs much from the sport so called and practiced in Cornwall and the North of England, inasmuch as the cruelty of kicking the shin is permitted; a custom which is very prolific of obstinate […]