Getty 36v
The plays proper. [7] is not a technique but the entry condition for all of them — beat his axe to the ground — and [8]–[10] are three things to do once you have. [10] closes by saying the chain runs in both directions.
These are the plays over which the guards contend; each wants to seize them, and believes herself in the right. He who can beat his companion's axe to the ground, as is depicted here — let him do these plays; he will do them all, if the counter does not hinder him.
- Doctrine, not technique: this plate declares who owns the plays that follow.
- The guards of 35v–36r are all claimants and none has title: "these are the plays over which the guards contend (fano questione); each wants to seize them, and believes herself in the right".
- The condition: whoever can beat his companion's axe to the ground (sbatter la azza… a terra) may do these plays.
- Having done it, he may do all of them — Fiore rations them by no guard and by no order.
- The one proviso: "if the counter does not hinder him" (se lo contrario non lo impaza).
That proviso names a counter the section never shows. There is no Counter Master anywhere in the axe, and no counter-play: contrario occurs exactly once in the Getty's axe text, here. Compare the sword in armor, where the Counter Master gets two plates of his own ([SwordArmor 27]–[SwordArmor 28]).
The scholar drives his axe between the player's legs, and with his left hand he covers his sight. And when the player cannot see, if he tries to turn, he quickly goes to the ground without fail.
- Put your axe between his legs. (The text says only that much: not how the axe lies, not which end goes through.)
- With your left hand, cover his sight — covering the vision, not attacking the eyes (contrast [Grappling 21]).
- He is now blind.
- If he tries to turn — the natural answer to a covered face — "he quickly goes to the ground without fail".
- The play never throws him. It puts the axe where his own movement will throw him over it.
Also the scholar who is before me can do this play when he is at close quarters (ale strette), as you can see: let him set his left foot upon the player's axe and draw his own back, and put the point in the player's face.
- His axe is on the ground — [Axe 7]'s condition, now cashed in.
- You are at close quarters (ale strette).
- Set your left foot on his axe: pin it, so that he cannot recover it.
- Draw your own axe back — free it.
- Put the point in his face.
- Fiore attributes this to the same scholar as [Axe 8]: it is an alternative use of the same position, not a continuation of it.
The scholar who is before sees that with the point of the axe he could do nothing to the player's face, because of the visor, which is strong. He advances the left foot and lifts his visor, and puts the point in his face with as much force as he can give to his axe. This play that I do follows those before, and then all those behind, every one.
- [Axe 9] has failed at its last step: the point could do nothing to the face, "because of the visor, which is strong".
- Advance the left foot.
- Lift his visor. With what, the Getty does not say; the Paris says the hand, and describes the action differently again (see the comparison).
- Put the point in his face — "with as much force as he can give to his axe".
- Fiore closes with a structural note, not a tactical one: this play "follows those before, and then all those behind, every one". The run is a chain that can be entered from either direction, not a branching tree.
The armored sword makes the identical play from the identical premise ([SwordArmor 10]): the thrust cannot enter because of the visor, so the visor is lifted and the point goes in. The two sections are running one program with two weapons.
Glossological analysis
- sbatter ([7]) — to beat down, to knock to the ground; the section's governing verb. The plays belong to whoever can sbatter the other man's axe — which is exactly what the Long Tail promised to do at [Axe 5].
- questione ([7]) — a quarrel, a contention — not a "question". "The plays over which the guards contend": the guards are disputing possession.
- rasone ([7]) — "in the right" (lit. reason): each guard "believes herself in the right" (crede aver rasone). With questione it makes the guards litigants — a legal idiom for a fencing dispute.
- impazare ([7]) — to hinder, to entangle: "he will do them all, if the counter does not hinder him". The Pisani Dossi uses the same verb for what the strong key does to a man ([Axe 11], ti faro impaço).
- la vista ([8]) — the sight, the man's vision: "he covers his sight". Not the visor, which is visera two plates later. Fiore distinguishes blocking a man's vision from moving the plate in front of it.
- ale strette ([9]) — at close quarters, the near measure; the same term as [SwordArmor 11].
- visera ([10]) — the visor: the axe section's hinge, as it was the sword's ([SwordArmor 10]). It stops the point here, and by [Axe 13]–[Axe 14] it has become a handle.
Manuscript comparison
- Coverage is uneven inside the folio. [7], [9] and [10] have all three surviving witnesses. [8] is the Getty's alone — no couplet, no Latin, and its figure is the Getty's own (36v-b). The axe between the legs and the blinding hand exist in one manuscript.
- A divergence at [10]: the visor, or the face. The Getty and the Pisani Dossi agree that the visor is lifted ("your visor I have lifted — you feel it"). The Paris says something else: "behold, I press your face hard with my hand" (En premo forte manu tibi vultum). Pressing a face is not lifting a visor — and the Latin alone names the instrument. Where the Getty leaves the means unstated, the two verse witnesses fill the gap differently.
- The verse witnesses agree on the teeth. Both couplets end [10] on the same image: "with my axe I will dig out your teeth" (PD), "this my consecrated poleaxe will draw out your teeth" (Paris). The Getty has no teeth — only "the point in his face, with as much force as he can give". The verse family's habit of keeping the picture and dropping the mechanism is unusually clear here.
- The Paris consecrates the weapon. haec nunc mea sacra tricuspis — "this my consecrated poleaxe". Nothing in the Italian answers to it; it belongs with the Jupiter of [Axe 1] and the Fates of [Axe 12].
- Illustrations. [7] is the Paris's figure (09r-c) — the only Paris illustration in the section; [8] is the Getty's (36v-b); [9] and [10] are the Pisani Dossi's (27b-b, 27b-c).