Who is Salvatore Arista?

Since I will soon be releasing translations of a couple of this man's articles, I thought it prudent to explain who Salvatore Maria Arista is and his significance in relation to the Radaellian lineage. To do this, we will turn once again to what Gelli had to say about him in Bibliografia Generale della Scherma:

[Translation updated 2022/05/20]

 

As long as Arista, Masiello, Pecoraro, and Rossi do not abandon their theories, Radaellianism will continue to ascend its parable of victory.

Arista was born in Palermo in 1856. At the age of 17 he enlisted into the Asti training battalion, and in 1873 he dedicated himself to fencing, driven by Roggia and Milanesi, both excellent Radaellians, who had discovered in Arista the favourable aptitudes of mind and body to become an extraordinary fencer. In Sinigaglia he passed under the direction of Cavalli, who taught him the play of the sword, making him study all day, only allowing him few and short rests.

Towards the end of 1875 Arista was sent to Radaelli in Milan, whom he was very dear to, confident of having found in the young disciple a worthy and loyal continuer of his theories.

Arista was sent to Rome in 1876 by the Ministry of War to represent the Master's School of the army at the fencing congress and tournament, and in the final competition he defeated Baron Miceli, grand champion of the Neapolitan school, which was hurriedly trying to establish superiority over the Radaelli system.

The Neapolitan school was overcome by Masiello, Pecoraro, Rossi, Pagliuca, Scarani, Cerchione, Barraco, and Ciullini. Arista, the main victor, was appointed master for the Turin Military Academy.

At the 1881 international tournament in Milan, held on the occasion of the National Exhibition, along with Pecoraro and other Radaellians, not only did they and Arista defeat the Neapolitan school again, which had convened there in large numbers, but they also affirmed the superiority of the new Italian fencing system over the French system, represented by Paul Ruzé and Ayat, and the German system represented by Hartl.

Arista was awarded the prize to best fencer of the tournament.

While the Radaellians won 15 of the 21 prizes, only 5 touched the School of Naples and one, well deserved, to the French.

At the end of 1881 Arista moved to Trieste, where he and Reich reorganised the training of the local fencing society, abolishing the Slavic method which had dominated there for about 30 years.

Since 1886 Arista has lived in Bologna, where he applies the Radaellian theories with ever increasing success.

As for his publications on fencing, my translations of the only two that I am aware of (so far) will be posted here in the coming weeks.

As an added bonus, I leave you with an additional photo of this dashing maestro.

An Introduction to Radaelli Sabre

Although this blog is normally directed towards those who are particularly interested in Radaelli sabre and the history surrounding it, I thought I'd put together an introduction for those in the wider HEMA community that don't know about this uniquely interesting sabre system.

Giuseppe Radaelli (1873)

The system was created during the latter half of the 19th century by Giuseppe Radaelli, a Milanese fencer master and veteran of the 2nd and 3rd Italian wars of unification, during which he served in the Monferrato light cavalry. He developed his system as a response to what he considered to be serious flaws in the sabre systems being taught throughout Italy. His observations were that using the wrist to power the molinelli (Italian version of the French moulinets - circular motions done with the sabre) often resulted in poor edge alignment, and that cavalry soldiers were not properly being shown how to produce sufficient power in the blows to promptly incapacitate the opponent.

The defining principle of his solution was to move the main point of rotation from the wrist to the elbow. By teaching fencers to exclude wrist flexion and extension, the possibility of the blade landing flat is greatly diminished. In addition, the greater muscle mass that can be utilised in the forearm increases the chance that the blow will have enough force to put the opponent out of action.

The resulting molinelli exercises, with their wide arcs and accompanying body movements, might therefore seem quite large and exaggerated when compared with most contemporary systems, but they served as an effective exercise for increasing flexibility, muscle development, and power generation, while also ensuring good edge alignment when they are used as strikes.

These large movements can then be made smaller in order to be used more effectively as blows. Some other distinguishing aspects of the system are the long forward-leaning lunges,

the extended arm in the three guard positions (3rd, 4th, and 2nd),

and the powerful expulsions known as sforzi.

Radaelli's theories proved so popular that his system became regulation for the cavalry, and soon after the Italian Ministry of War opened a fencing academy in Milan with Radaelli at the head, where military fencing masters were trained in the use of the sabre. Radaelli taught there from 1869 until a few years before his untimely death in 1882 at the age of 49.

In the period that Radaelli was teaching for the military, two treatises on his sabre system were produced on his behalf by his friend Settimo Del Frate, whom Radaelli also served alongside of in the Monferrato cavalry. The first of these works was published in 1868 and 1869, the second in 1876, which was more expansive and also included a section on the use of the foil. This version was republished in 1885.

Settimo Del Frate

A common misconception regarding Radaelli’s system is that it was primarily a system intended for sabre duels, which were still relatively common in Italy at the time. A large part of this misunderstanding most likely comes from the fact that in general the Italians preferred to fence with lighter sabres (commonly but misleadingly known in English as 'duelling sabres') than those that would be used in battle. The main reason for this being to prevent the fencers from tiring too quickly, which is especially important if they were training every day. When training cavalry troopers, however, they would be using their heavier regulation cavalry sabre.

The Radaellian fencing sabre is immediately recognisable by its ring surrounding the hand in addition to the typical sabre shell guard. In Del Frate's 1868 text on Radaelli's system, he gives specifications for a Radaelli fencing sabre with a blade 89 cm long, weighing 350 g, and a hilt weighing 370 g, giving an ideal total weight of 720 g.

Radaelli had a huge impact on sabre fencing even well after his death, both in Italy and throughout Europe. His students went on to apply his theories in creating their own systems, two of the most famous ones being Ferdinando Masiello, whose sabre system eventually became the basis for the British 1895 Infantry Sword Exercise, and Luigi Barbasetti, who brought his brand of Italian fencing to Austria-Hungary.

Ferdinando Masiello

Luigi Barbasetti

Radaelli was not without his critics however, and there existed a lively debate between Radaelli’s supporters and his opponents, the latter of whom primarily consisted of the proponents of the Neapolitan school of fencing. The Neapolitan school eventually succeeded in supplanting the Radaelli system in 1884 after a commission chose to replace it with the Neapolitan system as taught by Masaniello Parise. Nevertheless the debate continued for years after this controversial decision. Translations of various articles in this debate may be found here, here, here, and here.

For further reading, Chris Holzman's The Art of the Dueling Sabre cannot be recommended more highly. It contains a translation of Del Frate's 1876 manual on Radaelli's system and a large additional section containing more in-depth explanations of various techniques and fencing concepts and countless supplementary drills. This book can be purchased via the publisher Swordplay Books or via Amazon. My translation of the 1868 treatise can be found on this blog here.

Bibliography

Barbasetti, Luigi. The art of the sabre and the épée. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1936.

Del Frate, Settimo. Istruzione per maneggio e scherma della sciabola. Florence: Tip. lit. e calcografia La Venezia, 1868.

⸻. Istruzione per la scherma di sciabola e di spada del professore Giuseppe Radaelli scritta d'ordine del Ministero della Guerra. Milan: Litografia Gaetano Baroffio, 1876.

Gelli, Jacopo. Bibliografia generale della scherma con note critiche, biografiche, e storiche. Florence: Tipografia Editrice di Luigi Niccolai, 1890.

⸻. L'Arte dell'armi in Italia. Bergamo: Istituto Italiano d'Arti Grafiche, 1906.

Holzman, Christopher. The Art of the Dueling Sabre. New York: SKA SwordPlay Books, 2011.

Ministero della Guerra. Regolamento di esercizi e di evoluzioni per la cavalleria. Vol. 1. Rome: Carlo Voghera, 1873.

Parise, Masaniello. Trattato teorico pratico della scherma di spada e sciabola: preceduto da un cenno storico sulla scherma e sul duello. Rome: Tipografia Nazionale, 1884.

War Office. Infantry Sword Exercise. London: n. pub., 1895.

1885 Italian Cavalry Regulations

Today I bring you digital scans (of photocopies) of the 1885 edition of volume 1 of the Italian Ministry of War's Regolamento di esercizi e di evoluzioni per la cavalleria:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B90B1IqWDLowa0JjajZiWTVRTGs

Previously I have provided the same volume from the 1873 edition and pointed out that it detailed the cavalry application of Radaelli's sabre system. Despite Parise's system becoming the new regulation system in 1884, these 1885 regulations still retain almost exactly the same sabre section from the 1873 edition, meaning that Parise's system had not yet been officially adopted in the cavalry by this time. What makes this all the more interesting is that in Gelli's 1888 booklet Resurrectio he claims that at that time the cavalry were still practising Radaelli's method on a large scale. Perhaps the cavalry never officially adopted Parise's system over Radaelli's, which would have been an implicit acknowledgement of the deficiencies of Parise's method in a cavalry application.

One curiosity particular to this document is a hand-drawn correction of the depiction of the second movement of the molinello to the head from the left.

A previous owner of this document evidently noticed that the depicted fencer's weight was not shifted fully to left leg as the description states, and so took it upon himself to correct this. There also seems to be some very faint writing to the right of the drawing, but sadly it is not legible on my photocopies.

As for the rest of the volume, a large section was added for instruction on the use of the cavalry carbine. This section consists of instructions for using the rifle both on horseback and on foot, and some bayonet exercises. There is also a section on the use of the Modello 1874 revolver. Aside from the removal of the section "Scuola delle Distanze", there do not seem to be any other major changes.

Special thanks to Biblioteca Malatestiana for providing the photocopies.

Translation - Come il sistema Redaelli fu esautorato by Ernesto Besenzanica

In the link below you will find my translation of Ernesto Besenzanica's 1886 booklet Come il sistema Redaelli fu esautorato: Considerazioni intorno la Relazione della Commissione giudicante dei Trattati di Scherma presentati al Ministero della Guerra dietro concorso indetto il 21 settembre 1882, or in English, 'How the Radaelli system was overthrown: Considerations regarding the Report of the Judicial Commission of the Fencing Treatises presented to the Ministry of War for the competition announced on 21 September 1882'.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=16xHQUjjLtGT1p1bZg4ldJ11_1-_YMM7d

In this essay, Besezanica succinctly criticises the report of the commission that replaced Radaelli's Milan fencing school with Parise's in Rome, while also providing mathematical evidence of the superiority of Radaelli's system, both in sabre and spada. For the sabre, he shows that the wider range of motion incurred by using the elbow as the main pivot instead of the wrist does not cause blows to be slower as a result, due to the greater force that results from using the forearm.

Besenzanica also claims that Parise's system had already been 'practically banished' in the Modena fencing academy, which would not have been much more than a year after it became the regulation system. Along with other such statements, this provides more proof of the backlash towards the introduction of Parise's system in the army, which is supported by Gelli's claims that the cavalry eventually went back to teaching Radaelli's method instead.

Curiously, Angelini never mentions Besenzanica or his arguments in his 1887 critique, which is a shame since Besenzanica raises many good points that are never addressed (as far as I'm aware) by Radaelli's critics.

As for Besenzanica himself, here is what Gelli had to say about him in his 1890 fencing bibliography:

Ernesto Besenzanica was born in Milan in 1864 (4th of December) and studied fencing at the age of 16 with Maestro Giovanni Monti, Radaellian and director of the Scuola Magistrale of fencing in Milan.
At the National Tournament of Lodi (1883), and alone among the many amateurs summoned from all parts of Italy, he got the first prize and won the sabre competition. In Vercelli and Milan he always won prizes.
The laurels achieved on the piste made sure that Besenzanica never forgot the art, which he cultivates constantly in his own fencing hall.
In Livorno, Varese, Modena, Bologna, the engineer Besenzanica held the Radaelli method high.
In 1885 he wrote the cited booklet and published it in January of 1886.

Besenzanica went on to become a highly regarded railway engineer, designing and completing many projects not just in Italy, but also in countries such as Greece, Albania, and Romania. He died in 1940.

The original scans of this document can be viewed here via Harvard Library.

Settimo Del Frate - Obituary and possible birthplace

As a complement to my post from late last year Who is Settimo Del Frate?, I've gathered together some other information about Settimo Del Frate which provides a greater insight into the man's full military career.

Firstly, I present my translation of his obituary In memoria del Tenente Generale Settimo Del Frate ("In memory of Lieutentant General Settimo Del Frate"), taken from a 1919 issue of Rivista di Cavalleria, an Italian cavalry periodical:

History carves on its eternal plates the names of the men who rise to the top of the crowds, some for their great deeds, others for the volumes they wrote or the works they left, others for the eminent positions they reached; lastly, there are others who, like luminous beacons, shine on present and future generations through the intrinsic gifts of virtue and moral beauty.

Such was Lieutenant general Settimo Del Frate, whose death we sadly learned of last month. 

He was one of the few survivors of the ardent volunteers of ‘59 who, being protagonists of the first chapter of the History of Italian Independence, had the fortune of seeing its great conclusion: Settimo Del Frate forever closed his tired eyes from the watch of the last triumph for which he had fought as a young man. 

To the memory of the venerable veteran, who devoted a long career to his favourite arm, the cavalry owes a tribute of gratitude, and the Rivista di Cavalleria has the great honour of being able to also extol his name to those who, young of years, could not appreciate his outstanding virtues of mind and character, at the same time sending out a sad thought of condolences to the grandson of the late General Arturo Milanesi, commander of the 7th Cavalry Brigade, on whom he concentrated his friendly affections and his ambitions of an old cavalryman after the premature and painful loss of his son Cesare, a brilliant cavalry officer, laid to rest too soon. 

Born in 1832, Settimo Del Frate was 27 years old when the challenge issued to Austria by Vittorio Emanuele II in the name of the Italian people called the host of volunteers to arms; he left his studies, having already obtained a law degree, and rushed to enlist in the ranks of young Lombards that were welcomed by "Monferrato". — With the early Italic hopes being cut short in Villafranca, Del Frate remained in service and was promoted to second lieutenant in the Monferrato light cavalry, in which he would remain for eighteen years, that is, until his promotion to major. — Major in the "Alessandria" [cavalry regiment], lieutenant colonel in the "Firenze" [cavalry regiment], in 1887 he took command of the Saluzzo Light Cavalry, reaching the age limit in 1892 and putting an end to his industrious career. 

And industrious it truly was; that active industriousness not being fruitless efforts, but noble teachings and practical applications. For many years as aide-de-camp of Colonel Gerolamo Avogadro, whose name still rings in the ears of the few survivors of bygone times, Captain Del Frate devoted his study and activity, aside from in the faultless service and noble passion of fencing, to the perfection of the arms and equipment of the soldier. The result was: the sabre, weapon of the cut and thrust, invented and proposed by him and which the Ministry adopted; and the troop saddle which bears his name and whose essential part, the saddlebow, was studied by him so perfectly so as to make it, in the opinion of many, if well understood and correctly used, unequalled. 

He was a supporter and sponsor of the idea of giving the cavalry a powerful firearm, almost sensing or predicting the necessity of its wide use in the current campaign.
Having reached the rank of major, he deeply intuited the educational mission of the senior officer and to that he directed all his cares with an open mind, far ahead of his time, and predicting new horizons for his young employees, very different to the sterile pedantry of the time. — One of his old subordinates, having later risen to the top of the hierarchy, wrote of him: "Goodness, serenity, common sense, stability, he laid the path to be followed; he was an architect of the moral and intellectual revival which gave our army new life." 

What higher praise is possible? 

The seed that was cast was not lost; it slowly sprouted in the long and drab peacetime years, but it was quick to flourish in the sunlight of conflict. It blossomed superbly and bore fruit on the fields of Monfalcone, Pozzuolo, from the banks of the Piave to the Isonzo. 

In the soul of the valiant cavalrymen, the soul of the volunteers of ‘59 was instilled. The great heart of Settimo Del Frate had multiplied in a thousand hearts… and victory was ours.

F. E. B.

Some additional information can be gleaned from this article about an Italian politician named Enzo Moavero Milanesi. Among other things, this article talks about Milanesi's ancestry in his home town of Cavenago d'Adda, with his ancestors recorded as having lived there since at least 1460. Cavenago d'Adda is a small township of about 2000 people just outside of Lodi, in Lombardy.

How does this relate to Settimo Del Frate? Well, this article also mentions that Milanesi is in fact related to Settimo Del Frate, whose family owned a villa in Cavenago d'Adda that was named "Villa Bocconi Del Frate". Supporting this is the fact that Cavenago d'Adda appears to even have a street named after Settimo Del Frate ("Via Settimo del Frate", although Google Maps has it labelled as just "Via del Frate").

I therefore feel that it is not unreasonable to assume that Cavenago d'Adda is Settimo Del Frate's birthplace, or at least where he lived for a large part of his life.

Translation - Ultima Parola sulla Risorta Questione Angelini-Masiello by Achille Angelini

This latest translation is an essay by General Achille Angelini entitled Ultima Parole sulla Risorta Questione Angelini-Masiello intorno alla Scherma della Sciabola del Defunto Maestro Redaelli ('Final word on the revived Angelini-Masiello matter regarding the sabre fencing system of the late Maestro Radaelli'), which was published in 1888.

Click here to read it

Angelini claims he was spurred into writing this after reading Masiello's divisive introduction to his 1887 fencing treatise. In this introduction, Masiello heavily criticises the commission which replaced Radaelli's sabre method with that of Parise, and also justifies his undying support for the Radaelli's principles in spite of all this. Angelini himself states that a large number of arguments contained in this essay of his were taken straight from his 1877 booklet Osservazioni sul maneggio della sciabola secondo il metodo Radaelli ('Observations of the handling of the sabre according to the Radaelli method'), with some additions dealing with quotes from Masiello's 1887 treatise.

It is predominately this article that Jacopo Gelli is responding to in his booklet Resurrectio, where he takes apart all of Angelini's obtuse logic.

An interesting thing to note is that Angelini mentions various articles written in defence of Radaelli's system by Del Frate, Arista, Masiello and others in the journals l'Esercito italiano and l'Italia militare between 1876 and 1878.

Special thanks to Chris Holzman for providing me with the scans of this document.

Radaelli's Horseback Sabre Method

**EDIT: A full translation of the cavalry regulations by Chris Holzman is now available here**

As a follow-up to my post from a few months ago in which I released the first volume of the Italian Ministry of War's 1873 cavalry regulations, I have written up a rough English translation of the section detailing the use of the sabre on horseback, which you may view with the following link:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1m7GTEBnKkXLFt6RQUYCxbn6PRDLjbusZS0WntB6CGqw/edit?usp=sharing

Those of you familiar Masiello's 1891 manual La Scherma di Sciabola a Cavallo will notice the extreme similarity between Masiello's method and that detailed in this manual. Nevertheless, the 1873 cavalry regulations provide some other details that the reader may find interesting. I have also provided a summary of this cavalry system below. For further reading, I highly recommend picking up a copy of Holzman's translation of Masiello's aforementioned cavalry manual.

Guard Positions

The manual gives three guard positions, with all of them being "similar to the guard of 3rd" in Radaelli's system. It only describes the forward guard however, which has the grip above the bridle hand, the point in the direction of the left shoulder, and the edge facing down. The other guards are to the right and the left, which I can only assume are just the normal 3rd guard but with the arm on the right or left side.

Parries

The parries that are used on horseback are those of 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, low 3rd, low 4th, semicircle parry to right, and semicircle parry to the left. The parries of 1st to 6th are the same as those described in Del Frate's 1876 text, whilst low 3rd and low 4th are more similar to Rossi's versions of those parries, with the grip next to the right hip for low 3rd, and next to the left hip for low 4th.

The "semicircle" parries are the same as Masiello describes in his horseback sabre manual, and are used to parry thrusts from bayonets and lances. They are performed by holding the arm and sabre straight up, then vigorously swinging the sabre in a circle, finishing back in the starting position, ready to strike a downward blow.

Cuts

The cuts are distilled down into descending and horizontal cuts. The descending cuts are performed in the same manner as Radaelli's coupés, and are aimed either at the opponent's head or bridle hand. The horizontal cuts are exactly the same as Radaelli's two molinelli to the face. Note the complete absence of the molinelli to the head and the rising molinelli. In all the blows, the cavalryman must also lean their body in the direction of the blow to increase its power and reach, supporting themselves by leaning on the horse's neck with their bridle arm.

Thrusts

Thrusts are performed either horizontally to an opposing cavalryman's chest or abdomen, or downward towards infantry. The cavalryman brings their elbow back to the line of their shoulders, the sabre in line with the forearm, then thrusts in the desired direction with the supporting movement of the torso.

The Charge

The first row of cavalrymen are in the position described above for the thrust, with their elbow drawn back and the sabre pointing forward in line with the forearm. The second row is in the position of parry of 5th.