Camillo Agrippa's widely influential "Treatise on the Science of
Arms" was a turning point in the history of fencing. The author -
an engineer by trade and not a professional master of arms - was
able to radically re-imagine teaching the art of fencing. Agrippa's
treatise is the fundamental text of Western swordsmanship. Just as
earlier swordsmanship can be better understood from Agrippa's
critiques, so too was his book the starting point for the rapier
era. Every other treatise of the early-modern period had to deal
explicitly or implicitly with Agrippa's startling transformation of
the art and science of self-defense with the sword. Likewise, all
of the fundamental ideas that are still used today - distance,
time, line, blade opposition, counterattacks and countertime - are
expressed in this paradigm-shifting treatise. This is a work that
should be on the bookshelf of anyone interested in the history,
practice or teaching of fencing. His treatise was also a microcosm
of sixteenth-century thought. It examines the art, reduces it to
its very principles, and reconstructs it according to a way of
thinking that incorporated new concepts of art, science and
philosophy. Contained within this handy volume are concrete
examples of a new questioning of received wisdom and a turn toward
empirical proofs, hallmarks of the Enlightenment. The treatise also
presents evidence for a redefinition of elite masculinity in the
wake of the military revolution of the sixteenth century. At the
same time, is offers suggestive clues to the place of the hermetic
tradition in the early-modern intellectual life and its
implications for the origins of modern science. Camillo Agrippa's
"Treatise on the Science of Arms" was first published in Rome in
1553 by the papal printer Antonio Blado. The original treatise was
illustrated with 67 engravings that belong to the peak of
Renaissance design. They are reproduced here in full. "Mondschein
has at last made available to English-speaking readers one of the
most important texts in the history of European martial arts.
Agrippa marks a turning point in the intellectual history of these
arts.... Mondschein's introduction to his work helps the reader
understand Agrippa - and the martial practices themselves - as
pivotal agents in the evolving cultural and intellectual systems of
the sixteenth century. Above all, Mondschein's translation is
refreshingly clean and idiomatic, rendering the systematic clarity
of the Italian original into equally clear modern English -
evidence of the author's familiarity with modern fencing and
understanding of the physical realities that his author is trying
to express. Mondschein's contextualization of his topic points the
way for future scholarly exploration, and his translation will
doubtless be valued by both students of cultural history and
practitioners of modern sword arts." - Dr. Jeffrey L. Forgeng, Paul
S. Morgan Curator -Higgins Armory Museum, Adj. Assoc. Prof. of
Humanities, Worcester Polytechnic Institute First English
translation. Hardcover, 234 pages, 67 illustrations, introduction,
bibliography, glossary, appendix, index."
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