Fencing book
Fencing books are medieval manuscripts and printed books about sword fencing and fighting with melee weapons . In Europe they have been widespread since the late Middle Ages, and during the Renaissance they were printed in large numbers.
development
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The oldest known fencing book is the German manuscript I.33 (formerly LB Gotha, Ms. membr. I, 115) kept in the Tower Museum in London , which was probably written in Latin by a monk around 1300 with interspersed German technical terms. Johannes Liechtenauer's “Art of the Long Sword”, which initiated numerous follow-up works, is fundamental to German-language fencing literature . Sigmund Ringeck , Peter von Danzig , Jud Lew , Hans von Speyer and Johannes Lecküchner passed the teaching on exclusively in literary form, whereas in the late Middle Ages this was only done iconographically by Hans Talhoffer and Paulus Kal . The works of Peter Falkner , Jörg Wilhalms and Paulus Hector Mairs also belong to the late medieval German-language fencing literature . The Upper German manuscript Gladiatoria , created in 1467, was extensive in terms of content, consisted of 59 parchment leaves and 116 colored pen drawings, but was lost in World War II. The Cologne fencing book has come down to us from the 16th century .
A fundamental work of the Italian fencing school is Fiore dei Liberi's “ Flos duellatorum ” written in 1410 . During the Renaissance, “Opera Nova” (1536) by Achille Marozzo, “Trattato die Scienza d'Arme con vn dialogo di filosofia” (1553) by Camillo Agrippa and “Ragione di adoprar sicuramente l'Arme si da offesa, come da difesa ”(1570) by Giacomo di Grassi.
The Italian fencing school fundamentally influenced the Spanish one, which found its expression in the work "Filosofia de las armas" (1569) by Jeronimo Sanches da Carranza. The Spanish fencing school again proved to be fundamental to the French and English fencing literature.
The medieval tradition of long sword fencing came to an end before the middle of the 17th century.
content
Fencing books describe fighting with edged weapons , with and without shield and armor , as well as wrestling . In addition to basic principles and tactics, the reader is taught positions, guards, blows and complex technical sequences. Some of the early fencing books were in part intended as mnemonic aids rather than didactic works. In addition, pictures of the positions and techniques in these early books are often very rudimentary, so that some representations can only be interpreted very vaguely. An understanding is only possible with the help of the accompanying text.
Modern representations
In the course of a revival of the medieval fencing tradition, more and more new fencing books are coming onto the market that are based on historical models and reproduce them. Modern fencing books are partly tailored to the needs of re-enactment and exhibition combat.
- Christian Henry Tobler : Modern training with the long sword according to Liechtenauer . From d. Engl. Transl. by Jan H. Sachers. G & S-Verlag, Zirndorf 2007. ISBN 978-3-925698-05-7 .
- Konrad Kessler: Fight with the long sword: from medieval combat to modern sport . Weinmann, Berlin 2007. ISBN 978-3-87892-091-5 .
- Herbert Schmidt: Sword fight: the fight with the long sword according to the German school . (Photos: Stefan Grdic.) Wieland Verlag , Bad Aibling 2007. ISBN 978-3-938711-19-4 .
literature
- Fencing, fencing . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages (LexMA). Volume 4, Artemis & Winkler, Munich / Zurich 1989, ISBN 3-7608-8904-2 , Sp. 324–328 (especially Sections III. Fencing literature in Germany and Italy (H.-P. Hils, Sp. 326–327) and IV. French area (Ph. Contamine, Sp. 327-328)).
- Heidemarie Bodemer: Das Fechtbuch: Investigations on the history of the development of the visual artistic representation of the art of fencing in the fencing books of the Mediterranean and Western European area from the Middle Ages to the end of the 18th century Diss. Stuttgart 2008 ( download option from the OPUS server )
- Daniel Jaquet, Karin Verelst, Timothy Dawson (Eds.): Late Medieval and Early Modern Fight Books. Transmission and Tradition of Martial Arts in Europe (14th – 17th Centuries) (= History of Warfare. Volume 112). Brill, Leiden / Boston 2016, ISBN 978-90-04-31241-8 .
- Jan-Dirk Müller : image - verse - prose commentary using the example of fencing books. Problems of writing down a practice without writing. In: Hagen Keller , Klaus Grubmüller, Nikolaus Staubach (eds.): Pragmatic writing in the Middle Ages. Appearances and stages of development. Munich 1992 (= Münstersche Mittelalter-Schriften. Volume 65), pp. 251–282.
Web links
- Overview of German fencing manuscripts
- i.33 / "Towerfechtbuch", the oldest known fencing book
- ARMA
- Krîfon - fencing literature
- André Schulze: fencing books . In: Historical Lexicon of Bavaria
Individual evidence
- ↑ Gundolf Keil : 'Gladiatoria'. In: Burghart Wachinger u. a. (Ed.): The German literature of the Middle Ages. Author Lexicon . 2nd, completely revised edition, ISBN 3-11-022248-5 , Volume 3: Gert van der Schüren - Hildegard von Bingen. Berlin / New York 1981, column 48.