Sword vs. Spear

[Watchman]

I've never even seen kendo IRL. Though I did a little bit of training with late-medieval longswords (aka "bastard swords"), based on contemporary teachings, a while back. And I've been taught to do fancy things with a staff.

By what little that's worth, and based on everything I've read and heard on the topic, I'd say there's no hard and fast "which is better" division as far as weapons go; different weapons and different ways of using them suit different people and different situations, and when two people fight their choice of weapons is largely secondary to their ability to wield them (with the ever-present caveats regarding armor).

However, it would seem to me that a spear, or similar light and agile polearm (the difference between a more sophisticated fighting-spear and a light halberd/glaive/whatever is often rather fuzzy), wielded with comparatively equivalent skill, has to be among the more difficult weapons for a swordsman to face. Unless one goes to the huge greatswords of Renaissance, approaching two meters in lenght, the advantage in reach is almost certainly on the spearman. Regardless of the sword, a well-made spear or polearm is at least its equivalent in killing power, although many of them can't chop off limbs quite nearly as well.

And everything I've been told and taught, be it by a fencing instructor, a written tratise on such subjects, or an unarmed-combat teacher, tells me the control of distance is very very important in combat.

Quite simply, if the spearman knows his stuff the swordsman is going to have some difficulty even getting his weapon into effective range. As a tactical situation this isn't overly different from facing a sword with a dagger or a rapier with a shortsword, or a rather longer-armed fellow in the boxing ring - rather uncomfortable...

May I make a suggestion ? People truly interested in the issue should, instead of debating conjecturals with only laymen's knowledge on the topic (as we all have), go ask people who actually study this sort of thing in practice. I'd guess the folks at ARMA could be helpful.