(Other articles in this series: Part 1 | Part 3)
In part 1 of this article we read that Parise had collaborated with Radaellians Salvatore Pecoraro and Carlo Guasti on refining his sabre method such that it was accepted by the Ministry of War for use in the cavalry and artillery. We read of the glowing praise showered upon Parise and Pecoraro, with them both receiving knighthoods for their labours. And finally we read claims about how the Master's School's supposed attempts at reconciliation with the Italian fencing community were rather superficial, with the editors of Scherma Italiana claiming that their magazine was forbidden among the school's staff.
However in that very same issue of Scherma Italiana in February 1891, they also published a letter from none other than the Vice-director of the Master's School, Salvatore Pecoraro:
MOST ILLUSTRIOUS MR. EDITOR.
I read in the first number of the newspaper Scherma Italiana that the new sabre handling [method] for the cavalry was completed by Cav. Parise in union with the Radaellian masters Pecoraro and Guasti, and that Mr. Parise 'by changing his mind about the many defects found in his method, has sacrificed self-esteem and self-interest for the art'. This is not correct, as this new fencing method was the sole work of Cav. Parise, who had been writing it since 1885, save for a few slight modifications made by him on the advice of the Turin Commission, but not in the sense that the newspaper Scherma Italiana suggests.
The masters Cesare Cavalli, teacher at the NCO School, and Ettore Dabbene, a teacher at the Cavalry School, can testify to what I write.
So much for the truth of facts.
In asking you to publish this, Mr. Director, accept the kind regards of
Yours truly
SALVATORE PECORARO.1
This letter is in response to the first extract from Scherma Italiana shown in part 1. By responding to this article Pecoraro obviously puts extreme doubt on the claim that staff were forbidden from reading the newspaper. His response is also rather humble regarding is own contribution into the new sabre method, such that it almost seems to contradict the previous articles with respect to his involvement.
All this excitement around rumours from Rome meant that the editors of Scherma Italiana seem to have got their hopes up for a sort of fencing redemption, as seen in this notice from an October 1891 issue:
A very dear friend of ours writes to us from Rome that in the Ministry of War there exists a special Commission charged with compiling a new official fencing treatise, drawing from the various methods now in existence.
In a word, it would be a matter of taking the good of the various schools now in existence and merging that into a new and unique system that satisfies everyone and gets rid of the fencing friction that now troubles our amateurs and professionals.
This project, which seems to be becoming a reality, was advocated by us in the first issues of Scherma Italiana.2
Unfortunately this does not seem to have occurred, as just three months later Scherma Italiana then republished the following excerpt from another newspaper:
On the first of February the NCO fencing instructors from the regiments in which the new system of fencing for the mounted forces has not yet been adopted will be called to the Master's School in Rome. With this measure the total suppression of the application of the Radaelli system will begin.3
This put a definite stop to many of the Radaellians' hopes for reconciliation in Italian fencing, Scherma Italiana included. In their comments below this excerpt they claim to have been told previously that the sabre system now being taught at the Master's School was 'pure-blood Radaellian', so the announcement of the 'total suppression of the Radaelli system' must have been particularly shocking to them.
This supposed suppression seems to have occurred quite quickly, as can be seen just one month later when Scherma Italiana republished the following three excerpts from Corriere Italiano, Sport Illustrato, and Esercito Italiano, respectively:
The NCO fencing instructors of the regiments in which the new system of fencing for the mounted forces has not been adopted will be called to the Master's School on the 1st February. This will establish the unique system of fencing for all mounted forces.
It is desired to know if the Parise-Pecoraro system, subject of lively and fair criticism, should be taught to the new fencing masters for the mounted forces after the unattractive trial was done.
——————In Rome is the first group of NCO fencing masters in the artillery regiments, called for the instruction of sabre fencing on horseback, according to the method presented by Cav. Masaniello Parise and approved by the Commission appointed in the last year by the Ministry of War.
The lessons will be imparted by the Vice-director of the Master's School, Cav. Pecoraro, and will last five hours per day.
We have sought to obtain a copy of this method, but everywhere we looked we were told that it was not been given to the presses. It pains us, not only because in this way we can only have very vague notions about it, but also because the means of the tradition does not seem the most appropriate to us, and it can encounter danger when the masters, after having learnt it in Rome one way, having arrived at their regiment, teach it in another way.
The printing of a few pages costs so little!
——————At the 13th artillery regiment the special course of instruction for the handling of the sabre on horseback has closed, to which all the fencing instructors of the artillery regiments were called.
Taking part in this course, aside from the NCO troops, were also the one-year volunteers and officer cadets of the same regiment.
Tomorrow the fencing instructors will depart for their respective regiments.
The course was done under the personal direction of the director of the Master's School of fencing Cav. Parise and Vice-director Cav. Pecoraro.4
So it seems that by February 1892 all military fencing instructors had received their training in the new Parise-Pecoraro cavalry sabre method, however it was still not accepted as satisfactory by all. There was also still some confusion as to what exactly the new method looked like, and whether this could be considered as a partial success for Radaellian principles. In April of that same year Scherma Italiana writes:
We are grateful to Sport Illustrato, who kindly inform us that the new sabre instruction — as was reported to us by a person deemed trustworthy — is not pure Radaelli; but a cross with what the previous molinello tried to amalgamate, to perform the cut (Radaelli system) with the slicing molinello5 (Parise system) which follows the same cut. In short: with a hybrid combination, the effectiveness and power of the cut achieved by Radaelli with his molinello was sacrificed to the idea of slicing.6
These conflicting ideas of what the Parise-Pecoraro system entailed continued to circulate among Italian fencing enthusiasts. An article published by Scherma Italiana over two years later states that there had still been no publication of the Parise-Pecoraro method, and that there were still many conflicting reports as to who was actually involved in its formulation and how Radaellian it truly was.7
In part 3 we will take a look at the military regulations and determine what exactly the Parise-Pecoraro method looked like and how it compared to the old Radaellian method.
1 Salvatore Pecoraro, "Tra '1 si e '1 no... di parer contrario," Scherma Italiana, 28 February 1891, 30.↩
2 "Un nuovo metodo ufficiale?," Scherma Italiana, 1 October 1891, 143.↩
3 "Chiamata," Scherma Italiana, 25 January 1892, 8.↩
4 "Maneggio di sciabola a cavallo," Scherma Italiana, 27 February 1892, 12.↩
5 'molinello di trinciamento'↩
6 "Maneggio di sciabola a cavallo," Scherma Italiana, 8 April 1892, 28.↩
7 Jacopo Gelli, "La scherma in tribunale?," Scherma Italiana, 26 November 1894, 85.↩