Overview

The warriors of medieval Italy practised a complex and complete martial art, which included the wielding of sword, axe and spear with wrestling, knife-fighting and mounted combat. In the waning years of the 14th century, Fiore dei Liberi was a famed master of this art, whose students included some of the most renowned and dangerous fighting men of his day. Credited by fencing historians as the father of Italian swordmanship, toward the end of his life, Master Fiore preserved his teachings in a series of illustrated manuscripts, four of which have survived to the present day, and have become the basis of a worldwide effort to reconstruct this lost martial art. This magnum opus, Il Fior di Batalgia (The Flower of Battle), composed in early 1409, is one of the oldest, most extensive, and most clearly elucidated martial arts treatises from the medieval period. Flowers of Battle is a multi-volume series of lavishly illustrated hardcover books, combining full colour facsimiles of the Master's original manuscripts, professional, annotated translations, and extensive peer-reviewed essays. Volume III, Florius de Arte Luctandi, presents a translation, transcription and reproduction of chronologically the last, most recently discovered, and visually most lush Flower of Battle manuscript. This posthumous work raises more questions than it answers: for whom was the manuscript creared and why? Why was it translated into a complex, humanistic Latin, and from what prior source? Why are there clear nomenclatures and instruction differences between this and the other three manuscripts, and do these changes reflect an evolution in the Master's thinking, or errors in transmission? Mondschein and Mele tackle these questions and more in a lavishly illustrated introduction that seeks to set the manuscript in context, as an objet d'art, as an example of Renaissance patronage, and as a practical martial arts memorial. Series Note: Vol. I: Historical Overview and the Getty Manuscript Vol. II: Flos Duellatorum Vol. III: Florius de Arte Luctandi Vol. IV: The Pierpont-Morgan Manuscript and General Concordance Vol. V: Leaves of Battle – Fiore dei Liberi’s Martial Heirs and Influence

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9781937439194

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"Ken Mondschein is a history professor at American Intentional College and Westfield State University, as well as a fencing master. he is the author and translator of Fencing: A Renaissance Treatise (2009); The Knightly Art of Battle (2011); and The Art of the Two-Handed Sword (2012). Gregory Mele was a medieval reenactor for 15 years, until turning his attention in 1999 to focus on the research and reconstruction of Historical European Martial Arts, for which he is internationally known. From 2003 to 2009 he wrote a periodic column for Revival Clothing entitled ""From the Pen of History,"" which gave historical context to the company's clothing lines. In 2014 he returned to the hobby of living history by joining La Compagnia della Rosa nel Sole, a small society which focuses on the experience of an Italo-English mercenary company of the late 14th century."

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