The 1881 Naples Gymnastics Congress (Part 2)

The first bouts for the fencing portion of the Naples Gymnastics Congress began in the morning of 26 September 1881, the second day of the congress. Previous congresses had seen only a modest attendance from Neapolitan fencers, as they were all held in northern or central Italy; this instalment promised a much broader, and thus more representative, roster of Neapolitan fencers of all skill levels. A total of 76 fencers competed at the Naples congress, 61 in foil and 48 in sabre, which was a slight drop from the 75 foil and 55 sabre fencers who had originally registered.¹ A singular piste was erected in the middle of the grand hall in the Palazzo Spinelli di Tarsia, measuring 16 metres long and 8 wide, raised off the ground by about a metre to provide all spectators a satisfactory view of the action.²

The fencing bouts on the 26th were to determine admissions; that is, fencers had to demonstrate that they were sufficiently skilled to be admitted into the rest of the competition. Here, as in the rest of the competition, no distinction was made between amateurs and masters, and bouting pairs were assigned indiscriminately of a fencer's professional status. While the regulations stated that a fencer could be rejected from participation if they were lacking in technical skill, variety, composure or politeness, jurors instead decided to ignore the regulations and be very forgiving in their admission judgements for the sake of simplicity. The result was that all fencers who attended were admitted to the competition, and those who had already done an admission bout in foil were exempt from doing another in sabre.³

Although this was mostly consistent with previous congresses, the skill level of the worst fencers made universal admission a controversial move in some eyes. In particular, it was felt that many of the Radaellians fencers present were of a poor standard and should have been excluded entirely. Nicola Lazzaro, writing for Gazzetta Piemontese, felt that it was 'a mistake' to admit everyone, because the fencing masters of the military 'in their generality made a poor showing and proved how perfectly defective the fencing school being taught in the army is'.⁴

To compensate for admitting everyone, the jury vowed to be much more discerning in the subsequent classification stage, which began on the following day. The foilists were divided into four groups of 15 pairs each, with the first two groups fencing on 27 September and the remaining two on the 28th.⁵ At the end of each bout, jurors were tasked with ranking both fencers in accordance with set aesthetic and technical criteria. Here again, however, the jury opted to simplify the process, disregarding individual scores for each criteria and allowing themselves to simply write on their ballot cards which of the three categories they thought a fencer should be assigned to based on their general impression.⁶ While the original scoring method made it possible to receive a moderate overall score by, for example, being athletic and skilled at touching even if one's fencing was aesthetically off-putting, eliminating this distinction could conceivably have increased the impact of personal bias, as it did not force jurors to consider each performance criterion separately.

Whether or not this did end up significantly affecting the results, a distinctly negative impression of the Radaellian fencers is reflected very early in the event's press coverage. After the first day of fencing, the Gazzetta d'Italia observed a great disparity between the Radaellians and those of the 'so-called National school' (equated here with Neapolitan fencing), finding in the former 'little or no taste, an ugly guard, uncomposed movements', while a fencer of the latter school made 'the perfect gentleman'.⁷ After the second day of foil classification bouts, the same journalist declared that the Radaelli school 'had emerged from the Naples competition with a new condemnation on its shoulders', impressions which were further confirmed by the general assembly on the night of the 27th, as discussed in part 1.⁸ For the correspondent of Paris's L'Événement, the bouts of that day were 'fatal to Redaelli's ridiculous system'—the Neapolitans had 'pulverised' their Radaellian opponents, who supposedly scored only one hit for every ten that landed on them.⁹

Even the Enrichettian competitors, whom Neapolitan partisans were generally more accepting of, mostly flew under the radar in these bouts. The only exception in the classification bouts was the one between the Enrichettian master Giovanni Pagliuca and Masaniello Parise, which for many was one of the most exciting of the entire event. The speed and complexity of their movements was particularly captivating:

The series of ripostes followed one another, the beats, the direct thrusts, the disengages, the feints, all sorts of parries interweave, meddle, and merge. The eyes cannot follow everything that happens.¹⁰

The only marginally positive impression expressed by L'Événement for a Radaellian foilist was in regard to a 'very difficult' recent graduate of the Milan school, Carlo Pessina. Even still, he was no match for his experienced opponent, the Neapolitan amateur Antonio Miceli, a 'colossus of fencing' whose wall of steel was entirely impenetrable to Pessina's speedy attacks.

If many of the foil bouts were perceived as one-sided affairs, this certainly did not diminish the curiosity of the general public. In the first few days of the congress, Nicola Lazzaro noted that the pistol and gymnastics competitions were only sparsely attended, mostly by enthusiasts, and 'the only section of the congress which a reasonable crowd rushed to, including a good number of women, was fencing.'¹¹ Attendance and enthusiasm grew each day, the crowd being noted as 'enormous' on the 28th, with the male journalists always keenly observant of the many fashionable women among them.¹²

In contrast to the strong attendance of local fencers and onlookers, a reduced contingent of military masters, at least compared to the recent Milan tournament, was noted by some. Rome's Fanfulla suggested that while the Neapolitan fencers were clearly superior at the congress, the event could offer no conclusions on the state of the national scene, as the local fencers were not opposed by 'the strongest champions of the other schools'.¹³ Among other absences, Gazzetta d'Italia notes that Ferdinando Masiello had a bad knee (he would undergo a surgical procedure just two weeks later) and Giordano Rossi was ill, while Milan's Il Secolo offered another explanation: 'the Redaellists did not want to go to this congress, because they already knew that things had been prepared to issue a vote against the Milanese school.'¹⁴

Compounding with the general apathy towards sabre fencing in Southern Italy, the absence of many top-tier Radaellians led to an underwhelming start to the sabre event, at least if the meagre press coverage is anything to go by. The 26 sabre classification bouts took place on 29 September (although there may possibly have been more on the 28th) with L'Événement only mentioning Vincenzo Bellini's drubbing of Radaellian master Alessandro Saccenti.¹⁵ In an interesting contrast with the article Niccola Lazzaro wrote for L'Illustrazione Italiana, which was discussed in part 1 of this series, his coverage for Gazzetta Piemontese was noticeably harsher towards the Radaellians. He felt that the condemnation of Radaelli's system which was pronounced at the assembly on the 27th was only further justified in light of the sabre classifications:

Consider these words carefully, weigh their importance and you will see how they attack an entire method so far held in high regard in the army and known by the name of Radaelli, which has given the result that every amateur of the true Italian school fully defeated a military fencing master—with some exceptions—as we saw yesterday in the sabre bout between the Prince of Santa Margherita (amateur) and a certain Gentiluomo (military master). The prince had a flawless victory, that is he landed all his blows without receiving a single one.¹⁶

The resulting classifications broadly reflected the opinions of journalists with regard to foil, but the jury was appeared slightly more forgiving towards the Radaellians with respect to sabre. Below is the list of every fencer who was classified at the congress according to the official report.¹⁷ Unlike the Milan tournament of that year, amateurs and masters were classified together, and the report does not distinguish between them in any way. What the report does helpfully note, however, is the fencing school each fencer belonged to, which I have represented with a letter next to each name.

Key:

E - Enrichetti school

M - Mixed school

N - Neapolitan school

R - Radaelli school

S - Sicilian school

Foil classification:

1st Category	2nd Category	3rd Category
Barraco, Gaetano (N) Bellussi, Federico (M) De Marinis, Ernesto (N) d'Ondes, Lorenzo (N) Miceli, Antonio (N) Pagliuca, Giovanni (E) Parise, Eduardo (N) Parise, Masaniello (N) Parise, Raffaele (N) Pinto, Giulio (N) Rizzo, Antonio (N)	Ardito, Giuseppe (N) Bellini, Andrea (N) Bellusci, Achille (N) Cafarelli, Pasquale (E) Cesarano, Federico (N) Cipolla, Luigi (N) Cipolla, Michele (N) Colombo, Lorenzo (R) Cuddia, Baron Staiti (N) Dattola, Giovanni (N) Emanuele di Villabianca, Gaetano (E) Farina, Baron Francesco (N) La Marca, Vincenzo (N) Musdaci, Raffaele (E) Pellegrini, Giuseppe (R) Pessina, Carlo (R) Robertella, Achille (N) Saccenti, Alessandro (R) Scotti, Arcangelo (E)	Annicchiarico, Concezio (R) Armista, Arturo (R) Audisio, Michele (E) Ballo, Nicola (R) Baroni, Vincenzo (N) Botti, Stanislao (R) Candeloro, Alfonso (R) Capasso, Vittorio (N) Cecirelli, Pasquale (S) Cirillo, Felice (N) Dal Mulin, G. Battista (M) Ferrajuolo, Giuseppe (E) Ferrara, Camillo (R) Ferri, Ferruccio (R) Ferrigni, Raffaele (N) Flauti, Raffaele (N) Franceschi, Nunzio (R) Gabelli, Enrico (M) Gentiluomo, Annibale (R) Massa, Andrea (M) Musciomarra, Francesco (N) Muti, Michele (N) Palmieri, Giuseppe (R) Pasetti, Vittorio (R) Pecci, Scipione (R) Rispoli, Luigi (N) Rossi, Sabato (E) Sirigatti, Salvatore (R) Tagliaferri, Luigi (R) Vacca, Carlo (N) Ugolino, Cesare (R)

Sabre classification:

1st Category	2nd Category	3rd Category
Barraco, Gaetano (N) Bellini, Vincenzo (N) Cipolla, Luigi (N) Candeloro, Alfonso (R) Dattola, Giovanni (N) De Marinis, Ernesto (N) Emanuele, Gaetano di Villabianca (E) Locascio, Cristofaro (N) Pagliuca, Giovanni (E) Pessina, Carlo (R) Saccenti, Alessandro (R)	Armista, Arturo (R) Annichiarico, Concezio (R) Audisio, Michele (E) Bellussi, Federico (M) Botti, Stanislao (R) Colombo, Lorenzo (R) Caffarelli, Pasquale (R) Corvino, Celeste (R) Del Pozzo, Giuseppe (N) Ferri, Ferruccio (R) Musdaci, Raffaele (R) Maffei, Vito (R) Pasetti, Vittorio (R) Pellegrino, Giuseppe (R) Pecci, Scipione (R) Palmieri, Giuseppe (R) Spinelli, Giuseppe (N) Siciliani, Carlo (N) Sammartino, Salvatore (R) S. Margherita, prince (N) Sirigatti, Salvatore (R) Ugolino, Cesare (R)	Atticciati, Ernesto (R) Barone, Vincenzo (N) Ballo, Nicola (R) Bozza, Augusto (R) Dal Mulin, G. Battista (M) De Peppo, Alfredo (N) Ferrara, Camillo (R) Ferrajuolo, Giuseppe (E) Gabelli, Enrico (M) Gentiluomo, Annibale (R) Rossi, Sabato (R) Sallazzaro de Nunnatores (R) Tagliaferri, Luigi (R) Vial, Pietro (N) Valcarenghi, Giordano (R)

One striking observation is that the third category in foil is considerably larger in proportion to the first two, a contrast that is absent in the sabre classification. The difference, as one might have guessed, lies in how the Radaellians were classified. In foil, 15 out of 19 fencers listed as Radaellians were classified in the third category, with the remaining four in the second category. In sabre, Radaellians were more distributed among the three categories, with the bulk (16 out of 28) in second category. Three Radaellians achieved a first category rating and only nine were relegated to the third category.

Of the Enrichettian masters, it is curious to see that several all are listed as such for both foil and sabre. Since late 1877, every Enrichettian had been trained in, and were presumably obliged to teach, Radaelli's method. Assuming fencers self-nominated their fencing school attribution for the sake of this report (although we cannot certain this was the case), choosing to be known as an Enrichettian sabreur rather than a Radaellian one may have given some military masters the opportunity to distance themselves from the Milan school and its controversial director. Giovanni Pagliuca had publicly criticised Radaelli's foil method in a recent publication, and may have wanted to further his standing among the Neapolitans by listing himself as an Enrichettian sabreur at the Naples Congress. Michele Audisio, on the other hand, had been listed as a Radaellian sabreur in the report for the Milan International Tournament that same year, which prompts the question of why he his fencing would be considered any different just five months later.¹⁸

It is also interesting to note that of the three members of the Parise family competing at the Naples Congress—Masaniello, his cousin Eduardo, and uncle Raffaele—not one of them competed in sabre. A higher proportion of fencers competed only in foil, 28 out of 61, than did in sabre only (14 out of 48). Of those 28 foilists who only competed in foil, 25 of them were of the Neapolitan school. While this indicates a lack of interest in sabre in Southern Italy, it is worth noting that eight out of the 14 sabreurs to only fence in that weapon were also of the Neapolitan school, with the remaining being all Radaellians. Of those Neapolitan sabre specialists, Maestro Vincenzo Bellini was considered by many to be the south's answer to Radaelli, having developed his own 'Neapolitan school' of sabre and publishing a short treatise on it a year after the Naples Congress.¹⁹ Before the competition had even begun, L'Événement asserted that the Bellini was 'one of the strongest sabre fencers of Italy, and, in everyone's opinion, he should take the place of that babbler Redaelli.'²⁰ Bellini firmly secured a place in the first category, while his students Cristofaro Locascio and Carlo Siciliani were placed in the first and second categories respectively.

All those classified in the first category received a gold medal, those in the second category a silver medal, and those in the third category a bronze medal. More importantly though, the categorisation established was which fencers would be able to take part in the subsequent fencing events of the congress. Only those classified in the first category could compete in the 'pools', which were single-touch single elimination tournaments, and fencing in the grand exhibition was reserved for those in the first and second categories. The pools for foil and sabre were originally set to take place on the evening of the 29th, but the classification bouts went on for longer than anticipated. Meanwhile, the foilists who had been classified in the first category decided amongst themselves that winning a single-touch pool was of no great importance to them, as the outcome of a single-touch bout was considered little more than a coin toss. The foilists volunteered to give up the special medal reserved for the winner of that foil pool for the jury to award it to whomever they pleased.²¹ Thus only the sabre pool and the grand exhibition would go ahead, both on the following day.

As midday on 30 September approached, a large crowd filed into the grand Palazzo Spinelli di Tarsia, anxiously awaiting the day's events. Over 2000 people had been invited to the grand exhibition, and there seemed to be few absences among them.

There was no room left for a man's foot to stand which had not been taken up by a curious onlooker. The grand windows, the arcades on the upper floors which faced the hall, were crowded with people. Slightly after midday, amidst feverish anticipation, the sabre pool took place.²²

The referee for the day's action, Mario Del Tufo, mounted the raised piste followed by the first two competitors, Alfonso Candeloro and Giovanni Pagliuca, with the former emerging victorious. Alessandro Saccenti then defeated his opponent, Cristofaro Locascio, Vincenzo Bellini defeated Gaetano Barraco, and Carlo Pessina defeated Ernesto De Marinis. With both Giovanni Dattola and Luigi Cipolla being absent from the pool for unspecified reasons, there was an odd number of sabre fencers. This was solved in the customary way by matching the last remaining fencer with someone who had already fenced and won in that round. The person who had to fence a second time would remain in the competition regardless of the bout's outcome. In this instance the odd one out was Gaetano Emanuele di Villabianca, who was paired with and subsequently defeated Pessina (who was therefore not eliminated). In the second round, Pessina defeated Saccenti and Bellini defeated Candeloro. Emanuele was again paired with one of the preceding fencers, this time Bellini, who defeated Emanuele and knocked him out of the pool.²³ The last two remaining fencers, Pessina and Bellini, then took to the piste:

A single sabre blow will bring victory to one of these two. Everyone is on their feet, one dares not even breathe. Bellini vigorously attacks his opponent on the march; the latter retreats while parrying, and at the moment the former finishes his action with a successful blow to the head, Pessina, believing he was still in time to make a stop hit, delivers a descending cut and lightly touches Bellini's arm.²⁴

As the journalist for L'Événement continues, the referee Mario Del Tufo was visibly indecisive about what had occurred. The outraged journalist insists that Pessina was at fault, and that anyone who had spent at least six months in a fencing hall knew it. When pressed by the jury, Del Tufo is unable to make a decision, and they take no heed of Bellini's own attempts to explain the exchange. The jury retires to another room for discussion, emerging six minutes later to declare that a double touch had occurred and that the touches are annulled for both. The bout must continue. The fencers come on guard once more, and an irritated Bellini rushes his opponent, receiving a clean stop thrust to his chest. Pessina wins the sabre pool.

The sabre pool bracket, visualised. The numbers indicate the order of the bouts, while the asterisks mark the extra bouts to resolve the odd number of fencers.

After a 20-minute intermission for the public to recover from the sustained tension of the pool, the grand exhibition begins. The crowd is treated to seven foil bouts from those in the first category, the most memorable of which being Masaniello Parise's bouts with Ernesto De Marinis and Antonio Miceli, the bout between Federico Bellussi and Gaetano Barraco, and the final one between Eduardo Parise and Pagliuca. Five bouts among the first category sabreurs followed, including one between Neapolitans Locascio and De Marinis as well as an exciting rematch between Pessina and Bellini. This time around, the press was in full agreement that Bellini was the better of the two fencers, with the Gazzetta Piemontese commenting that the bout 'showed that the Jury was not entirely right in awarding the prize for the pool to Pessina.'²⁵

At around 4 pm the crowd saw three bouts between the second category foilists, the more appreciated of which being between Enrichettian masters Emanuele di Villiabianca and Raffaele Musdaci. The poor choice of the organisers to schedule the most exciting bouts at the beginning of the exhibition meant that, by the late afternoon, the crowd's interest was waning, and many had started making their way home. Just two sabre bouts from the second category fencers were carried out before the grand exhibition was finally concluded at 6 pm.

In the third and final part of this series, we will see what conclusions the jury drew from the Naples Congress, also taking into account the additional fencing awards presented on the congress' final day as well as considerations on the written works submitted to the didactic exhibition. I will also explore how the congress influenced events in Italian fencing over the following years and how its results were utilised by partisans on either side of the Radaellian-Neapolitan debate.

*******

1 Luigi Cosenz, Il IX congresso ginnastico italiano in Napoli (Naples: Francesco Giannini, 1881), 18. The actual number of fencers who attended was tallied up from the lists on pp. 99–102.^↩
2 'Napoli,' Gazzetta Piemontese, 29 September 1881, 1.^↩
3 Cesare Parrini in Luigi Cosenz, Il IX congresso ginnastico italiano in Napoli (Naples: Francesco Giannini, 1881), 97.^↩
4 Nicola Lazzaro, 'Ultime notizie,' Gazzetta Piemontese, 2 October 1881, 3.^↩
5 Nicola Lazzaro, 'Il nono Congresso ginnastico,' Gazzetta Piemontese, 1 October 1881, 1; 'IX Congresso Ginnastico,' Gazzetta d'Italia, 30 September 1881, 2; 'IX Congresso Ginnastico,' Gazzetta d'Italia, 1 October 1881, 2. There was evidently some confusion about this among the press. Lazzaro's account states that each of the four groups contained 16 fencers each, while the Gazzetta d'Italia states there were 15, but is inconsistent in the number of groups.^↩
6 Parrini in Luigi Cosenz, Il IX congresso ginnastico, 97. The original judging criteria from the congress regulations is quoted in Giacomo Massei, Il XI congresso ginnastico e la sua giuria di scherma (Naples: Stabilimento Tipografico dell'Unione, 1881), 6–7.^↩
7 'IX Congresso Ginnastico,' Gazzetta d'Italia, 29 September 1881, 2.^↩
8 'IX Congresso Ginnastico,' Gazzetta d'Italia, 1 October 1881, 2.^↩
9 Frantz, 'Les grand congrès d'escrime de Naples,' L'Événement, 6 October 1881, 2.^↩
10 Id.^↩
11 Nicola Lazzaro, 'Il nono Congresso ginnastico,' Gazzetta Piemontese, 1 October 1881, 1.^↩
12 Frantz, 'Les grand congrès d'escrime de Naples,' L'Événement, 6 October 1881, 2; E. W. Foulques, 'Chronique de Naples,' Le Voltaire, 12 October 1881, 2.^↩
13 Picche, 'Cose di Napoli,' 4 October 1881, 1–2.^↩
14 'IX Congresso Ginnastico,' Gazzetta d'Italia, 1 October 1881, 2; 'Napoli,' Gazzetta Piemontese, 29 September 1881, 1; 'La scuola milanese di scherma,' Il Secolo, 1 October 1881, 3. On Masiello's knee operation, see Nunzio Spina, 'La prima meniscectomia in Italia: storia di armi, di coraggio e di felici intuizioni,' Giornale Italiano di Ortopedia e Traumatologia 34, no. 2 (June 2008): 90–96, https://old.giot.it/article/la-prima-meniscectomia-in-italia-storia-di-armi-di-coraggio-e-di-felici-intuizioni/.^↩
15 Frantz, 'Les grand congrès d'escrime de Naples,' L'Événement, 6 October 1881, 2.^↩
16 Nicola Lazzaro, 'Il nono Congresso ginnastico,' Gazzetta Piemontese, 2 October 1881, 3.^↩
17 Cosenz, Il IX congresso ginnastico italiano in Napoli, 99–102.^↩
18 Domenico Cariolato and Gioacchino Granito, Relazione del torneo internazionale di scherma tenuto in Milano nel giugno 1881 (Naples: Tipi Ferrante, 1881), 126.^↩
19 Vincenzo Bellini, Trattato di scherma sulla sciabola (Naples: G. de Angelis, 1882).^↩
20 Fioretto, 'Lettres de Naples,' L'Événement, 27 September 1881, 2.^↩
21 Cosenz, Il IX congresso ginnastico italiano in Napoli, 91; Frantz, 'Les grand congrès d'escrime de Naples,' L'Événement, 10 October 1881, 2.^↩
22 Cosenz, Il IX congresso ginnastico italiano in Napoli, 91–92.^↩
23 Confusingly, Cosenz's official report on the pool lacks one of these bouts and does not explain the additional bouts resulting from the odd number of fencers. A better list of the pool bouts is found in 'Congresso ginnastico,' Corriere della Sera, 3 October 1881, 2. This system of resolving an odd number of fencers was also utilised at the 1881 Milan Tournament. See Cariolato & Granito, Relazione del torneo internazionale di scherma, 57.^↩
24 Frantz, 'Les grand congrès d'escrime de Naples,' L'Événement, 10 October 1881, 2.^↩
25 Nicola Lazzaro, 'Il nono Congresso ginnastico,' Gazzetta Piemontese, 2 October 1881, 3. On the shared opinion of Bellini's superiority, see Frantz, 'Les grand congrès d'escrime de Naples,' L'Événement, 10 October 1881, 2; 'Congresso ginnastico,' Corriere della Sera, 3 October 1881, 2.^↩

Radaellians Respond to Pecoraro and Pessina (Part 2)

In the immediate aftermath of Masiello's last article, in which Pecoraro and Pessina received an occasionally warranted harsh assessment of their sabre treatise, no response from the authors was forthcoming. In the meantime, another grizzled Radaellian veteran, Giovanni Pagliuca, took up the pen to provide their own nit-picky and often sarcastic impressions of Pecoraro and Pessina's method. Pagliuca's first appearance in the public press was in 1880, when he published a booklet criticising Radaelli's foil curriculum, which he had learnt at the Milan Master's School in 1876. Aside from that single publication, Pagliuca had shied away from the partisan debates of the 1880s and 90s, being best known as a stellar representative of the Enrichetti school of foil, but occasionally also considered among the old-school Radaellians.¹ In the twilight of his career, Pagliuca resoundingly removes any doubt over his allegiance to Radaelli's theories in his unforgiving review of Pecoraro and Pessina's treatise, which appear in La Nazione of Florence on 7 October 1910.

After my renowned friend and colleague Ferdinando Masiello reviewed the pages of the sabre pseudo-treatise by the gentlemen Pecoraro and Pessina so well, it would seem that nothing else could be said regarding this treatise, so many and innumerable indeed were the flaws found within.
Yet from a less salient but perhaps more practical point of view than that of my friend Masiello, I will try to lay bare all the harm that the theories of the two aforementioned authors would do to the art of fencing if, unfortunately, they found some followers among the innocent beginners of the practice.

First of all, a declaration: when the publication of the treatise in question—the work of Pecoraro and Pessina—was announced, I immediately thought that the theories discussed in it would have neither scientific basis nor proof.

Masiello wrongly reproaches this deficiency, because he himself and everyone knows that the aforementioned authors were unable to do so. I rather expected, along strict, simple, and perhaps primitive lines, a theoretical exposition of what they have carried out very well, indeed excellently, for about forty years: beautiful practice. But unfortunately even this they were unable to do. Overcome by the obsession of wanting to be authors at any cost, to appear original, even at the risk of bordering on ridicule, they have even forgotten essential principles which do not change, but mould to the evolution of the art, principles which they repeated—and here it must be said by ear—millions of times to their pupils at the Master's School. Thus they have defined speed as a movement, measure as an intuition, tempo (keeping in mind that tempo is almost everything in fencing) as 'the moment the fencer chooses', without reflecting that the moment chosen by the fencer cannot be the tempo: this in the 'artistic sense', as the authors say, 'is the propitious moment for the execution of an action', which is something totally different.
But in the fencing treatise the word tempo has become a myth at the complete discretion of the authors. They toss it around like a toy, to the point of writing on page 60, note 1: 'Since the direct thrust is one of the simple actions, it is necessary, in its execution, for a rapid and coordinated combination of the individual movements and such timing as to overcome, with its simplicity, the opponent's potential defence.'
Timing that overcomes with its simplicity...?! Well, I do not understand that at all. How impressed I was, indeed I was alarmed to discover on page 190 that there is 'GREAT timing'. I hope that the authors also wish to publish something else which announces and explains to the fencing world what medium and small timing are.
And now to the most interesting subject, which demonstrates how the treatise in question can actually bring the art to ruin rather than facilitate its progress.
Since a book which deals with fencing can make itself useful even in small proportions, it is necessary that in such proportions there is an advantage over preceding authors to assist the practice all the more so, facilitating it with suitable simplification. Pecoraro and Pessina's book instead aims at precisely the opposite goal, that is to get even the few connoisseurs of fencing that still exist to avoid those possible complications, those incomprehensible and, even worse, absolutely impracticable prolixities which they wish to introduce 'for artistic finesse' (sic) to the practice of sabre fencing.
Can you imagine a sabre fencer who attempts a circular feint by forced glide with a feint? Or a fencer who amuses himself by melting the air with parries in the opposite direction while his opponent dispenses a powerful descending cut to the head and a strong traversone?
Moreover, the first and indispensable quality of a fencing book which aspires to call itself a treatise is that of presenting the definitions in the clearest and simplest form and at the same time the most synthetic, the most exact, and the most rational form.
Do you want some examples of the precise definitions contained within the book in question?
'The jump back serves to gain a lot of ground' (page 24). Since when one takes a step forward, one loses ground—understood?
'When, in order to defend oneself from the opponents blows, one performs with the sabre a rapid movement aimed at avoiding them, (!) one is said in a fencing sense to have completed a parry' (page 32).
So, the parry avoids a blow; it does not oppose the blow, as every fencer in the world has repeated until now and as the same authors of the ever under-appreciated book have always performed in practice. Yes, a blow can be avoided, but not 'with a rapid movement of the sabre', but with a rapid movement of the body.
Continuing: 'Half-counter parries are those through which it is necessary for the sabre to cover half the path' (page 74). They could at least have added 'of our life'.²
Consequently, dear readers, throw a sabre into the air: when it has reached the halfway point of what it can travel, it will have performed a half-counter parry.
But interrupting ourselves on the topic of definitions—an enormous amount of space would be needed, and we would bore readers too much—I must confess with full sincerity that I did learn something new from Pecoraro and Pessina's book, and with my 63 years of age I will nevertheless try to put it into practice, as it seems to be the most practical thing in fencing and within reach of any person young or old, like me, to immediately finish off any opponent.
I learnt that one imprisons the opposing sabre (pages 105 and following).
So from today onwards I will come on guard with good custody, into which I will immediately introduce my opponent's sabre, locking it up. Except then launching at that poor wretch, who has let their sabre be imprisoned, a good number of flat hits on the meatiest parts of their body.
Finally, irony aside, it can safely be asserted that the book by the aforementioned gentlemen, more than a work of fencing, has resulted in a work of comedy, capable of giving an hour of good humour to anyone who wishes to enjoy looking through it, and nothing more.
As Giuseppe Radaelli, the creator of sabre fencing in Italy, was unable to write the treatise of his theories himself, he was obliged to turn to Captain Del Frate; but he had the frankness to declare it, explicitly publishing in the title:
'The sabre fencing of Giuseppe Radaelli written by Captain Del Frate'.
While the same frankness did not guide the two renowned masters Pecoraro and Pessina, in their defence we should not convince ourselves that everything contained in the book was developed independently of their ability to understand it.
I end with a new declaration: as an old master and old artist of arms I could not help but protest against a book which is the negation of the art of fencing.
If, in pointing out the enormous faults of this book, I was forced to implicate the authors' responsibility, I will not cease harbouring for them, as artists and executors, the greatest respect. And it is through this respect, through the sincere esteem that I have always had in their fencing ability, that I regret the vain ambition that induced them to write a treatise, an ambition which certainly throws them—in their quality as vice-directors of the Military Fencing Master's School—from the lofty pedestal which they had created for themselves with their undisputed practical ability.

Maestro GIOVANNI PAGLIUCA
Via della Croce, 34 — Rome

If we peel away Pagliuca's witty and casual writing style, it becomes apparent that many of his issues with Pecoraro and Pessina's treatise stem from their poor choice of words and unrefined definitions, something which we have seen Masiello point out already. Any criticism of the technical material itself and the overarching method is certainly lacking in Pagliuca's case, but slightly better in Masiello's. Pecoraro and Pessina seem to have had a similar reading of both Masiello and Pagliuca's articles, as is evidenced in their eventual response to their critics on 23 October in Rome's Giornale d'Italia.

Dear Mr. Director,

Since publishing the sabre fencing treatise of which we, Salvatore Pecoraro and Carlo Pessina, are the authors, if there has been no lack of praise from many quarters, especially in private and authoritative letters, from some individuals we were not spared censure. And we would not lament this if the censures had always been proportionate and had not revealed, in the fury of critique, something other than a pure love of the art. In any case, we will not let this distract us from serenely following our path; but we will limit ourselves to a few words in legitimate defence. 
It was our precise intention to collect in our treatise what the experience of a not inglorious artistic career had taught us. To this end, we freely jotted down our thoughts as they flowed from the pen, without any literary pretence and with the conviction that, above all, true fencers would have considered the substance. We were instead deceived, since our detractors—particularly Ferdinando Masiello and Giovanni Pagliuca—met to attack us primarily for literary form, stating with regard to substance only criticisms which, if they express an individual judgement of theirs, have a very relative value that is based on poor familiarity with the special weapon, to which we instead have given and will give all our activity as people and as fencers.
This being the case, while it will not be difficult for us to eliminate in a second edition of our treatise those flaws of a literary nature which our opposers have been pleased to highlight in a noble sentiment of fencing fraternity, we will have the opportunity to better illuminate the quality of our method's substance, which we are not at all disposed to compromise on, and which we are always ready to give a practical demonstration of.
We will declare, however, that any cross-examination of an artistic nature will be accepted by us with those connoisseurs who have deeply studied and taught the noble art of the sabre, achieving practical, and not just theoretical, results.
Because among those who have always studied and sought the progress of sabre fencing, dedicating to it all their physical and intellectual energy, because they considered this art truly sovereign, and those who instead, even setting themselves up as the god almighty of fencing, have defined it as the art of butchering, and, naturally, cannot boast of a single product worthy of remembering, they will serenely judge the true fencers.

SALVATORE PECORARO

CARLO PESSINA³

It is noteworthy that in this brief defence the authors are already talking of a revised second edition to correct the errors of the work's 'literary form', thus accepting at least in part the criticism that Masiello and Pagliuca have directed at them. However, their dismissal of other aspects of the criticism as well as their reference to some self-proclaimed 'god almighty of fencing', aside from being unsatisfying as a response, may have also struck Masiello as a veiled personal attack on him. Therefore on 27 October yet another letter bearing his name appeared in the pages La Nazione.⁴

In this reply Masiello is quick to assert that his own well-reasoned observations were unfairly lumped together with all the other critics, and in doing so they had overlooked all his observations of substance in order to focus on those relating to form. He admits that he did repeatedly highlight their substandard grammar, but he considers the problems with their definitions to be far more important than they are willing to acknowledge. Pecoraro and Pessina's accusation that Masiello possessed 'poor familiarity' with the sabre is one which Masiello was unable to go unanswered, as he asserts that his tireless advocacy for sabre fencing was by then indisputable. Aside from his 1887 treatise as proof of the quality of his studies, he refers to a well-received public demonstration of his sabre method that he gave in Rome in 1890, which Pecoraro and Pessina curiously did not attend, as well as the fact that he personally went to London to organise the British army's fencing programme at Aldershot in the 1890s.

As to their own practical results from their teaching at the Master's School, Masiello does not consider this enough to make somebody a good author, nor are one's competitive accomplishments sufficient to demonstrate the quality of a fencing system. Masiello is slightly comforted, however, that the two authors are already proposing a revised and corrected second edition of the treatise, for which he hopes his own observations might serve some use to them. Just as Pecoraro and Pessina had asked their detractors to withhold judgement on their treatise before reading it, Masiello now asks them to wait for his imminent publication, in which he will expand upon all his gripes and grievances regarding their method. Through this more detailed response, Masiello hopes that they might reconsider their view of him as being simply a 'detractor' and take his observations to heart for the benefit of their method, and not simply in a literary sense.

In the next post we will be focusing on this long-awaited, expansive critique from Masiello.

*******

1 For more biographical information on Pagliuca, see Sebastian Seager, "Radaelli Under Fire: Giovanni Pagliuca," Radaellian Scholar (blog), 18 April 2023, https://radaellianscholar.blogspot.com/2023/04/radaelli-under-fire-giovanni-pagliuca.html.^↩
2 Translator's Note: This tongue-in-cheek remark is a reference to the opening line of Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy: 'Midway upon the journey of our life ...'.^↩
3 Reproduced in Ferdinando Masiello, La Scherma di Sciabola: osservazioni sul Trattato dei Maestri Pecoraro e Pessina Vice-Direttori della Scuola Magistrale militare di Scherma (Florence: G. Ramella, 1910), 23–4^↩
4 Ferdinando Masiello, "Polemiche schermistiche: Una lettera del M.° Masiello," La Nazione, 27 October 1910, 2.^↩

Radaelli Under Fire: Giovanni Pagliuca

This is the seventh and final article in the 'Radaelli Under Fire' series. Click here to return to the introduction and view the other entries in the series.

In each of the three critical works seen so far in this series, the observations given on Radaelli's method, whether for the sword or the sabre, have predominantly been limited to the theoretical realm, based off the critic's own readings of Del Frate's 1868 and 1876 treatises. What sets this work apart from the others is the fact that its author, Giovanni Pagliuca, had learnt Radaelli's system in person at the Milan Military Fencing Master's School. Although not published until at least 1880, Pagliuca's rare booklet Cenni di critica sul sistema di scherma Redaelli ('Brief critique of the Radaelli fencing system') consists essentially of journal entries, written while he was attending the Milan school, criticising each element of Radaelli's sword method as it was taught and comparing it to the method he previously learnt from Cesare Enrichetti.¹

***Click here to read the translation***

Pagliuca had already been a fencing master for several years by this point, but since Radaelli's method became the sole approved method for the Italian army in late 1874, each military fencing master who had received their qualification Enrichetti's school in Parma was eventually sent to Milan to attend a 9-month conversion course in the Radaelli method.² It was this course which Pagliuca was taking part in while writing this critique. However, as can be seen by the date of the reply to Pagliuca's dedication, his notes were not published until at least December 1880, or more likely early 1881. Therefore Pagliuca's work occupies a unique position in this series in that it was the earliest to be written out of the four works, while also the last to be published. The first entry in the booklet after the dedication is dated 31 July 1876, which means the course at the Milan school already been underway for four and a half months by this point. Presumably that time had been spent learning Radaelli's sabre method, with the remaining time, that is from August to December, to be dedicated to the sword and general consolidation.

The booklet is dedicated to Baron Ottavio Anzani, who was a highly regarded amateur fencer from Naples. Shortly after writing his reply to Pagliuca's booklet dedication, Anzani would find himself in the middle of a great controversy at the 1881 international tournament in Milan, where the jury became hotly divided over the decision of whether to give the tournament's most prestigious prize for the 'best fencer of the tournament' to Anzani or the young Radaellian master Salvatore Arista. Ultimately it ended up going to Arista, but as a concession to the Neapolitan partisans of the jury another prize of 'equal merit' was also awarded to Anzani.³ Although Anzani stopped fencing at competitions and public exhibitions after the Milan tournament, his most fateful moment in Italian fencing was his participation in the 1883 government fencing treatise commission, which resulted in Parise's method being chosen as the army's new regulation method and a reversal of the power dynamic between the Radaellian and Neapolitan factions for the next two and a half decades.⁴ Pagliuca was said to have submitted a manuscript of his own to the treatise commission, and it ended up being ranked second after Parise's.⁵ If this is true, one cannot help but wonder if the relationship between Pagliuca and Baron Anzani changed at all as a result.

Pagliuca explicitly states that his remarks were confined solely to those aspects of Radaelli's sword system he thought were particularly egregious, leaving out insignificant flaws as well as aspects of the system which aligned with his own Enrichettian foundation. While most of Pagliuca's observations can be found in one of the previous books seen in this series, we do find several unique insights that are the direct result of his insider knowledge. One is his observation that the Radaellians, who care little about maintaining a 'correct' guard position at all times, sometimes shift their body weight entirely onto the front leg as a way to invite their opponent to strike, which may be describing the slight lean seen in the illustrations of Del Frate's books, a topic discussed here previously. Another is Pagliuca's description of the technical term margin, used by the Radaellians to refer to fencing measure. The word margin is not found in any of Del Frate's writings on Radaelli's system; however, it does appear on two occasions in the handwritten notes of two student copies of Del Frate's 1876 book. Thus Pagliuca confirms that although Del Frate's writings contain no discussion of fencing measure, the concept was not totally alien to Radaelli's students, even if the term they used was to describe it was, like much of their terminology, quite different to what was common at the time.

As for Pagliuca himself, it is hard to say too much about the man aside from the simple facts of his respectable if rather quiet career, as he spent most of his adult life teaching fencing in the military. Born in Naples on 3 September 1847, Giovanni Pagliuca joined the military at the age of 17 and began his foray in fencing four years later, soon graduating from the renowned Fencing Master's School in Parma directed by Cesare Enrichetti. After learning Radaelli's method in 1876 Pagliuca would continue to maintain his Enrichettian style for the sword, although it is likely his sabre fencing took on more of a Radaellian character, as was observed in most Enrichettians following the merger of the two schools. His early career saw him teach in Turin for a few years, making a name for himself among the local civilian fencing scene at the Club d'Armi, as well as at the Naples military college, during which time he received a promotion to 'civil gymnastics master' in late 1883. This was improved the following year to civil master of gymnastics and fencing while attending a 3-month course in Parise's method at the Fencing Master's School's new location in Rome.⁶

In 1887 Pagliuca found himself back at the Scuola Magistrale, this time as an instructor. His many years of experience earned him the role of vice-director of the school in February 1889 along with Salvatore Pecoraro, but this only lasted until October of the following year, when he was transferred to the Rome military college; here Pagliuca spent the rest of his teaching career, aside from a brief period at the Modena military school around 1897.⁷ To my knowledge, the only other occasion Pagliuca stepped into the realm of public debate on fencing matters was in 1910, joining Ferdinando Masiello in criticising the recently-published sabre treatise of Salvatore Pecoraro and Carlo Pessina.⁸ Giovanni Pagliuca retired from the army in December that same year.

Thus to my knowledge we are left with only two surviving writings by Pagliuca, both being critiques of Radaellian authors, but in starkly different contexts. While in 1876 the Radaellian method was still having to prove itself to the jealous defenders of traditional Italian sword fencing, by 1910 Italian sabre had exploded throughout the Western World, and the graduates of both the Milan and Rome Fencing Master's Schools were its most decorated representatives. Having witnessed this dramatic development take place over the past 40 years, and despite his harsh words for the teaching practices at the Milan school in the 1870s, Giovanni Pagliuca was in no doubt as to who the founder of this movement was: 'Giuseppe Radaelli, the creator of sabre fencing in Italy'.⁹

*******

1 Giovanni Pagliuca, Cenni di critica sul sistema di scherma Redaelli (Turin: Tipografia Letteraria-Forense-Statistica, [1880?]).^↩
2 Cesare Ricotti-Magnani, "Circolare N. 21. - Istruttori e sottistruttori di scherma chiamati alla scuola magistrale di scherma in Milano," Giornale Militare 1884: parte seconda, no. 4 (28 January 1876): 67.^↩
3 Domenico Cariolato and Gioacchino Granito, Relazione del torneo internazionale di scherma tenuto in Milano nel giugno 1881 (Naples: Tipi Ferrante, 1881).^↩
4 Paulo Fambri, "Relazione," in Masaniello Parise, Trattato teorico pratico della scherma di spada e sciabola: preceduto da un cenno storico sulla scherma e sul duello, (Rome: Tipografia Nazionale, 1884), i–xxxv.^↩
5 Egidio Candiani, "Masaniello Parise," La Stampa Sportiva, 30 January 1910, 17.^↩
6 Edoardo De Simone, La Scuola Magistrale Militare di Scherma. Dalla sua fondazione in Roma a tutto l'anno 1913. Note storiche (Rome: Tipografia Editrice "Italia", 1921). Date of birth and military enrolment date are found in Annuario militare del Regno d'Italia. Anno 1909, vol. 1 (Rome: Voghera Carlo, 1909), 247.^↩
7 For the specific dates of Pagliuca's various appointments and transfers see the relevant volumes of Ministero della Guerra, Bollettino ufficiale delle nomine, promozioni e destinazioni negli ufficiali del R. Esercito Italiano e nel personal dell'amministrazione militare (Rome: Voghera Carlo).^↩
8 Giovanni Pagliuca, "La scherma di sciabola di Pecoraro e Pessina," La Nazione, 7 October 1910, 2.^↩
9 Ibid.^↩