Manciolino/Egerton Castle

[Charles Blair]

Tom Leoni has just published his translation of Manciolino's Opera Nova (1531) into English. He, too, has something to say about Castle.

"Much more egregiously, Manciolino's writings have been mischaracterized and misunderstood by fencing historians from the Victorian era. British historian Egerton Castle, for instance, dismisses Manciolino's work as being long on dueling jurisprudence, short on fencing, and of containing four guards, only one of which is useful. A mere skimming of the work of the Bolognese master proves this to be false: Manciolino talks about fencing in all but the short introductions to each of his six books, in the fifth one of which he unmistakably makes a point as to why he will not include any dissertations on dueling law. Manciolino also counts and names ten main guards, while using a handful more." (p. 12)

My only quibble with Tom's assessment is to refer to Castle as a historian. A historian is an academic professional, or else someone with academic credentials who operates outside of the academy, like the American Tom Wolfe. Castle was not one of these. I post this here partly to say that you are not alone in your feelings about Castle, given his characterization of "the pompous science of Narvaez" (p. 121), and partly because, if any of you are interested in the Bolognese tradition, and do not read Italian, but do read English, Tom's translation is worth a look, since he brings to bear an understanding of Manciolino based on broad reading not only of the Bolognese authors, but also of all the Italian fencing authors from Fiore on down, as well as Italian literature in general, from the thirteenth century onwards. It makes for interesting reading, and helps bridge the gap between two very different cultures and two very different time-periods.

[Luis Miguel Palacio]

Well, mr. Castle seems to have been more a classical, victorian fencer with historical interests and less a proper historical scholar. I cannot help but to compare him with Don Enrique de Leguina, or to compare his "Libros de esgrima españoles y portugueses" with Castle's "Schools and masters of fence".

But it's not only Destreza or Maciolino: it can be said that the farther fencing was from the classical fencing that mr. Castle knew, the less he really understood it.

[Celebdol]

Thanks for the post, the translation seems to be very interesting.