Double knife is broken down into five categories depending on the practitioner’s knife grips relative to the grips of the opponent. Generally, double knife resembles either the Solo Daga curriculum or the Espada Y Daga curriculum, with adjustments made because of the second knife hand.
Doble Daga Level One:
This is where the practitioner has both knives in sak-sak grips and so does the opponent. This section closely resembles Knife Level One but with some minute details dealing with clipping and zoning. There are also some techniques that are influenced by the European “Main Gauche” (a long parrying dagger). Because of the possible long-range aspect afforded by the sak-sak grip, parts of this section resembles the long range jabs as seen in boxing.
Doble Daga Level Two:
The practitioner now has a mixed grip–one knife in pakal and the other held in sak-sak–while the opponent is in double sak-sak. This section most closely resembles Espada Y Daga Level One, consisting of attacks, contradas and recontras.
Doble Daga Level Three:
In this section, both the practitioner and the opponent have mixed grips–pakal and sak-sak. The techniques in this set are extrapolated from different parts of the system, and contains a contradas set.
Doble Daga Level Four:
The practitioner has a double pakal grip while the opponent has a double sak-sak grip. The game plan of the practioner is to close the distance while the opponent’s tries to maintain distance. This is is similar to Espada Y Daga Level Two, containing attack, disarms, contradas and recontras.
Doble Daga Level Five:
Both practitioner and opponent have double pakal grips. Because of the hooking involved, neither participant wants to be inside the other’s guard. Think of two praying mantis fighting one another, using their sharp appendages to hook and rip at one another. Due to this concern, there are many techniques which look like the practitioner is slipping to the outside of the opponent’s guard, like one might see in boxing. This section most resembles the techniques found in Espada Y Daga Level Three, containing contradas and recontras.