Dual wielding. So what is so unholy about it?

[Ironlion45]

In later periods, it was not uncommon practice to have both a dagger and sword;  the dagger used when an opportunity for a quick thrust presents itself; think more, rapier than longsword though.  so quite a bit later :p

[Merentha]

In later periods, it was not uncommon practice to have both a dagger and sword;  the dagger used when an opportunity for a quick thrust presents itself; think more, rapier than longsword though.  so quite a bit later :p

It wasn't uncommon, but sword/buckler, sword/cape, and sword/hand were all valid forms of dueling.  Civilian dueling.

[Eogan]

Most of the backlash against it comes from one of two things:
-Backlash against the kind of people who normally bring it up, who usually deserve a  at best.  These are usually the people who, when they first decide they want to try armoured combat, make up "unbeatable" strategies where if their opponent tries move A, they'll just do B, C, and D, and then win EVERY FIGHT!
-Backlash against anything done in the SCA, usually learned from John Clements.

While there have been a few notable practitioners of dual-wielding in the SCA, especially here in An Tir, and there are numerous experienced fighters who have used it at some point in their fighting careers, most choose sword & board in tourney fighting as it is simply the easiest and most effective style (when knees & shins aren't legal targets- just to forestall Mer's complaint).  Here are the steps in learning how to effectively dual-wield:

1. Learn to fight with one weapon.
2. Get good at it.
3. Learn to fight with one weapon in your bad hand.  This is about as hard as learning to pitch with your other hand, or learning caligraphy with your other hand.
4. Get good at it.
5. Learn to fight with two weapons.  You actually have to learn a completely different style of combat here, and using one-handed techniques with two weapons simultaneously won't cut it.

Not only is there 3 extra steps AFTER you've learnt how to fight sword & board, but those are the three HARDEST steps of the progression.  When fighting one-handed is a more effective style, you're basically tripling the amount of work you need to do so that you can be a WORSE fighter.  The only reason so many people learn to do it in the SCA is because learning how to fight in a style teaches you how to fight AGAINST that style.  This is also why we recommend that EVERYONE learns sword & board first, since a large majority of opponents you face will be fighting in that style.

Of course, this is "dual-wielding" in the true "two offensive weapons" sense.  Using an axe or pick held just below the head, an inverted spear, or an inverted longsword held by the ricasso as a defensive parrying tool with serious offensive possibilities is much more common, and arguable more useful.  If missiles aren't involved, I'd prefer a longsword in my off-hand to a shield, except that I've spent much more time with a shield, specifically a heater, so I'm currently more skilled with it.

By the way, here's a most excellent paragraph I found when I looked up "Florentine" in Google:

Florentine was first used as a term for a weapon style within the Society for Creative Anachronism circa A.S.2 (1970 AD) to describe a fighting style involving the use of two pounds of spinach and a pair of salad forks. Later the spinach was either discarded or eaten (feasts often started late in those days) and the term came to denote any two-weapon style, or, alternatively "what medieval knights would have called fighting in tournaments with two weapons at once if they had ever done such a thing, which they didn't". The style is sometimes referred to as “Too many swords.”

[Archonsod]

Sure, I can see issues with dexterity and coordination (it would be easy to slice your own arm by accidnet if you weren't paying attention), but I don't quite understand the sheer impractibility of it.

Try running at a shield wall with two swords and you'll quickly find about six swords plunged into your ribs...

[Destichado]

What Merentha and Eogan said.  These gents both know what they're about.   

That said and acknowledged, there are historical references for two weapon fighting, but they almost never support two SWORD fighting.  Which is, of course, what the fanboys looooove so dearly.  Swords are "soooo cool!" -but not particularly effective weapons on the high and late medieval battlefield -which is another reason for the vehemence of negative reaction when "n00bs" bring it up.  Maces and axes -especially those with crowsbeaks, were, and it is with these weapons we see instances of carrying two weapons and fighting.  Sword and mace or sword and axe, can't remember which (the knight in question was unhorsed with nothing but his sword, and "took up an axe" IIRC) or in the case of one etching I saw, a knight gesturing with a mace held a riding axe along with the reins in his left hand. 
But that doesn't mean that the unhorsed knight fought with a sword and axe -he could have put the sword away and fought with the axe, and the gesturing knight might have carried two different weapons but never planed on fighting with both at the same time.

Beyond that, the armor one faces must be sufficiently lacking to allow a one-handed weapon to defeat it.  So in essence, no armor.  And you must either have armor enough to keep yourself from being injured from multiple directions, or you must be facing a single opponent.  So you're fighting peasants, or you're a in a non-military duel.  OR -and this is another STRONG objection to two-weapon fighting by reenactors- you're playing in a game which has rules such that swords are assumed to defeat plate armor with a single hit, and parries -no matter how weak!- are assumed to void any attack, no matter how strongly it contacts.

[Llew]

Not to be OT, but, where did your sig get to, Destichado? I liked my Friendly Neighborhood Knight in Shining Armor. 

[magnemoe]

Generally speaking, dual wielding works, it's just not as efficient as sword&shield or two-hander. The shield is a very valuable protection, especially against missiles, while you don't gain that much added offence with the off-hand. If your armour is heavy enough you might consider yourself safe without a shield, but then the problem is your opponents will probably be equally heavily armoured and you'll want the added power of a two-hander to kill them--and no, two one-handers do not equal one two-hander. The latter deals much more damage when you're counting in terms of real-world lethality rather than fictional "hit points".

So basically, it's not impossible, or useless or anything. It's just less efficient, especially in massed battles.

Yes, during the renaissance it was not uncommon to fight fights and duels with a light rapier and a dagger. You were carrying both so why not use them, the dagger could be used to block and hit targets of opportunity.
The reason for this setup was, you were carrying a sword for defense and a dagger as a tool, you did not carry a shield because it is too big to carry around as an civilian and firearms has reduced its use on the battlefield, a shield would have been a better idea but you did not have it. Also the enemy would not have armor; I doubt the usefulness of a left hand dagger against an enemy in chain or plate armor. Would you be able to hit hard enough to do damage, you have to penetrate or hit so hard that you do blunt damage.

[Aqtai]

Even in the ast (i.e. China and Japan) when it came to battles all the fancy weapons and moves were ditched in favour of more practical and functional weapons such as bows, crossbows and various polearms. A man "duel-wielding" on a battlefield is going to a) get killed, b) put his own side at risk and/or c) cut his horse's head off if he's mounted.

It's worth noting that one of the few European dual-weapon styles, fighting with rapier and parrying dagger, was exclusively used in civilian situations, NOT battelfields.

[Darian]

Also worth noting is that the left arm would be significantly weaker (well, if you're right-handed that is). Fighting men had a "sword arm"; the other would hold a shield or spear or reins or whatever, but it was the right arm that did all the action and so would be the strongest. Taking this disadvantage into account, using a sword with this weaker arm would probably not give much of an advantage, or would even leave the user at a greater disadvantage than if they had used a shield or had wielded the sword with two hands (which puts much more power behind each blow).

Whenever dual-wielding has been done in real life (and that means outside of movie sets ) the left-handed weapon has generally been much shorter and lighter than whatever the right-handed weapon, with the length of the average short sword being about the maximum. An off-handed weapon could be very useful for getting the unfair advantage against a lightly-armoured foe, but against mail and better the wielder might not even be able to successfully penetrate the armour, especially if the foe has a shield.

[Archonsod]

Whenever dual-wielding has been done in real life (and that means outside of movie sets ) the left-handed weapon has generally been much shorter and lighter than whatever the right-handed weapon, with the length of the average short sword being about the maximum.

 With a few exceptions, whenever it was done in real life the off-hand weapon tended towards not being a weapon so much as a supplement. The dagger used alongside the Rapier was generally intended for defence, the offensive use being limited to specific situations. The only time two offensive weapons were carried they tended to have seperate uses, for example the sword and pistol combination, or various thrown projectiles and hand weapons.
 It's probably fair to say that the only time dual wielding was really used was when one weapon was either of such specific use, or else restricted utility, that a more 'general use' second weapon was necessary to keep the wielder in the fight.

[Kuzgun]

Whenever dual-wielding has been done in real life (and that means outside of movie sets ) the left-handed weapon has generally been much shorter and lighter than whatever the right-handed weapon, with the length of the average short sword being about the maximum.

of course in practical use you cannot wield two weapons of same size efficiently. it must be either both short or one short, one long, just as in rapier and poignard, or japanese swords katana and wakizashi,which are called daisho ( means long and short, even though they are not designed for dual wielding).

Some slight points:  medieval swords were not typically piercing weapons until the late 14th century.  Before then, they were slashing weapons.  Having a curve merely strengthens the power of a draw-cut, which is why a longsword will typically out-range a katana of the same length:  the katana is using a shorter-ranged, slightly deeper cutting slice, as opposed to a more linear hack. 

One problem I have with many eastern martial arts is that they've become very stylized in many cases.  Rather than trying to be about being the best fighter available, they've instead focused on trying to create a specific school.  For this reason, they may not be as efficient in a free-for-all fight.  For instance, a school focused on dueling is not going to be able to deal anywhere near as effectively on the battlefield as someone who's been trained in group fighting.   Similarly, many of the fighting styles and weapons (kama, tonfa) come from peasant weapons and arts designed to be surreptitious.  Had I a choice between being skilled in a tonfa and skilled in a spear, I'd pick the spear.  That said, if I was a peasant trying to revolt, the tonfa's my only choice.  I'm not particularly familiar with ichi niten ryu or kali, but I simply cannot imagine a time on the battlefield when dual-wielding would be superior to a two-handed spear, two-handed sword, or sword/board (depending on armor).

pointy  but as a practitioner i must say that most of the people get wrong idea that eastern stylized martial arts focus on just one thing and become useless in free for all (thanks to hollywood for that(!)). as for niten ichi ryu it emphasizes the improvement of the off hand as eogan mentioned before in order to become a better swordsman.it takes time and hell of a lot practice. it does not dictates "use only two weapons, you should be ashamed and commit seppuku if you use only one". it just teaches the way you can use an off hand weapon ( which is wakizashi -short sword- at this point), when the situation calls for it or gain advantage , locking the opponents weapon, swaying the opponent and/or confusing opponent by creating a constant movement with offhand weapon.

it is also known that musashi miyamoto has won most of his duels by using dual wield but in battles he only used dual wield if he's overwhelmed by the amount of strikes or got cornered. he also implies thet one must use both of his hands in order to become a better swordsman

[Cirdan]

That said and acknowledged, there are historical references for two weapon fighting, but they almost never support two SWORD fighting.  Which is, of course, what the fanboys looooove so dearly.  Swords are "soooo cool!" -but not particularly effective weapons on the high and late medieval battlefield -which is another reason for the vehemence of negative reaction when "n00bs" bring it up.  Maces and axes -especially those with crowsbeaks, were, and it is with these weapons we see instances of carrying two weapons and fighting.  Sword and mace or sword and axe, can't remember which (the knight in question was unhorsed with nothing but his sword, and "took up an axe" IIRC) or in the case of one etching I saw, a knight gesturing with a mace held a riding axe along with the reins in his left hand. 
But that doesn't mean that the unhorsed knight fought with a sword and axe -he could have put the sword away and fought with the axe, and the gesturing knight might have carried two different weapons but never planed on fighting with both at the same time.

In any case, two swords would be rather stupid--if you're using two long weapons, you won't use the off-hand very often, so you might as well take something very different from the leading weapon. E.g. sword and axe; lead with the sword, use it to thrust and create openings, and if you can get away with it you delvier a heavy blow with the axe.