Early Combat Manuals

This listing is not exhaustive. It does not deal with manuals published after1600, or 16th.c. manuals that deal solely with the developing rapier style. Nor does it attempt to list all the works that exist only in manuscript. It does attempt to list the works that will be most accessible to the interested reader. Many of these are available from Patri Pugliese in photocopy form, and these are noted below.

Anon. Notandum quod generaliter omnes dimicatores sive omnes homines habentes gladium in manibus etiam ignorantes artem dimicatorium utuntur hiis septem custodiis. Tower of London I-33; MS. membr. I 115. A German sword-and-buckler manual, probably from the early 14th c.. 65 pages of illustrations, with commentary in Latin. A well developed system with seven wards.

Premariacco, Fiore dei Liberi da. Flos Duellatorum in armis, sine armis, equester, pedester. il fior di battaglia di maestro Fiore dei Liberi da Premariacco. Testo inedito del 1310, ed. Franchesco Novati Bergamo, 1902. Flos Duellatorum, or "Flower of Battle" is an Italian manual of 1410. Primarily illustrations with short rhyming captions in Italian. Sections on wrestling, dagger, sword, spear, two handed sword, armored combat, pollaxe, and mounted combat. Considerable discussion of disarming techniques. Two-handed sword (spadone) has the greatest emphasis. An extract is published on the Web.

Talhoffer, Hans. Talhoffers Fechtbuch aus dem Jahre 1467, Prague 1887. Talhoffer exists in a number of manuscripts, and the 1443 and 1459 manuscripts have also been published in the 19th c.. Like Flos Duellatorum, the work consists primarily of illustrations with short descriptions (German, in Talhoffer) and concentrates on the long sword, or two-handed sword, as well as pollaxe, sword, dagger, wrestling, and mounted combat. Talhoffer also covers sword and buckler, as well as some specialized forms for the judicial duel: double-ended dueling pavises used with sword or club, and man in a pit with a club vs. woman with a rock in a sock.

Anon. The Use of the Two Handed Sword. Brit. Mus. MS. Harleian 3542, ff. 82-85. Also known as 'The Man that Wol'. Reproduced in Hutton, Alfred. The Sword and the Centuries; 500 Years of European Swords and the Duels That Have Been Fought with Them. New York, Barnes & Noble, 1995 ISBN 1-55619-690-6. Perhaps the earliest combat manual written in English, this text uses a complex terminology that is unfortunately not very accessible to the modern reader. However, the system clearly puts great emphasis on movement, controlling distance, and making "thy hand and thy feet accord" so that blows are struck with maximum effect.

Achille Marozzo. Opera nova, Mutinae, 1536. Italian, with some illustrations. Sword with dagger,buckler, or targe, two-handed sword, and various pole-arms, as well as wrestling and dagger play.

Marozzo seems to have been the primary 16th c. source for Hutton, Alfred. Old sword-play : the systems of fence in vogue during the XVIth, XVIIth, and XVIIIth centuries with lessons arranged from the works of various ancient masters / London : H. Grevel ; New York : B. Westermann, 1892. this work has been republished on the Web.

Grassi, Giacomo di. Giacomi di Grassi, his true arte of defence, plainlie teaching ... how a man ... may safelie handle all sortes of weapons ... with a treatise of disceit or falsinge. London, Printed for I.I[aggard] 1594. Italian text translated into English in 16th c.. Two-handed sword, poll-arm, and pike, as well as rapier, and rapier with dagger, cloak , buckler, and targe.

Silver, George, fl. 1599. Paradoxes of defence. Amsterdam, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum; New York, Da Capo Press, 1968. 72 p. illus. In his Paradoxes of defence and Brief Instructions Silver spends a fair amount of time frothing at the mouth about the folly of the newfangled Italianate rapier play, as opposed to the honest English sword. He also has some interesting discussion on the proper use of sword and buckler, two-handed sword, dagger, various pole-arms, and pike. Both di Grassi and Silver are reprinted in:

Jackson, James Louis, 1916- comp. Three Elizabethan fencing manuals. Delmar, N.Y., Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints, 1972.

Thimm, Carl Albert. A complete bibliography of fencing and duelling, London and New York, John Lane, 1896. xvi, 537, [1] p., 1 l. front., illus., plates, ports. (part col.) facsims. Thimm is good starting point for those who wish to do more research on manuscripts on early combat manuals.

Go back to Saint Michael's home page