Folio 4 / 13
Getty 42r
The flight, and the sword against the lance
Two hinges on one page. [6] closes the lance-against-lance material with the section's only fleeing Master; [7] opens the long run of sword against lance that carries the rest of the section.
[6] The fleeing Master throws thrusts behind him
Pisani Dossi · 30a-a
Illustrations: Pisani Dossi 30a-a; Morgan 4r-b · Text: Getty 42r-b · Morgan 4r-b · Pisani Dossi 30a-b · Paris 3r-b
Getty · translation
This Master who flees is unarmored, and he has a good, fast horse, and he keeps throwing thrusts with his lance behind him to strike the companion. And if he turned to the right side, he could well enter into the Boar's Tooth (dente di zenghiaro) with his lance, or into the Woman's Guard on the left (posta di donna la sinistra), and beat aside and finish as can be done in the first and in the third play of the lance.
Flow of actions
- The premise is a matchup, stated as fact rather than choice: you are unarmored and he is not, so you do not stand — you run. Your one asset is named: a good, fast horse.
- While fleeing, keep throwing thrusts behind you with the lance. The verse concedes what this is: not an attack but the only defense available ("Fleeing, I can make no other defense") — it keeps the pursuer off your back.
- If you choose to end the flight: turn to the right side.
- On turning, enter the lance into the Boar's Tooth ([Mounted 2]) or into the Woman's Guard on the left ([Mounted 4]) — the two carries this section has already taught.
- From either, beat aside and finish exactly as in the first and third plays of the lance. Nothing new is taught: the flight simply delivers you back into the material of 41r–41v.
Fiore treats flight as a tactical state with its own technique, not as a failure. The thrusts thrown behind are also bait — Tactical grouping §8 reads this Master among the guards that invite.
[7] Sword carried against the lance
Getty · 42r-c
Illustrations: Getty 42r-c; Getty 42r-d · Text: Getty 42r-d · Morgan 4r-d · Pisani Dossi 30b-b · Paris 2v-b
Getty · translation
This carry of the sword against the lance is very fine for beating aside the lance, riding on the companion's right side. And this guard is good against all other hand-held weapons (arme manuale): that is, against axe, staff, sword, et cetera.
Flow of actions
- You have a sword; he has a lance. The reach is against you by the length of a shaft.
- Ride to his right side. The side is not incidental — it is stated for this carry, and repeated for the Long Tail at [Mounted 12] and for both horse-grapples at [Mounted 28] and [Mounted 30]. Where you ride decides which of his weapons can reach you.
- From that carry, beat the lance aside and strike — the verse specifies thrust or cut, either.
- Fiore then generalizes: this guard is good against every hand-held weapon (arme manuale) — axe, staff, sword, and the rest. The lance is only the hardest case.
- What the Getty does not say: which guard this is. The plate names a carry and not a posta — see the comparison.
Glossological analysis
- arme manuale ([7]) — hand-held weapons, i.e. weapons kept in the hand as against thrown ones ([Mounted 5]). The category is the point: the guard is being sold as a general answer, not a lance-specific trick.
- portar de spada ([7]) — a carry of the sword. Fiore's word for a mounted guard is often portare rather than posta: on horseback the sword is borne in a position while the horse does the moving. The same noun governs [Mounted 12] ("this carry of the sword is called the Long Tail"), where a portare is finally given a posta's name.
- cavalcando dela parte dritta ([7]) — "riding on the right side". The section's substitute for footwork: the rider cannot pass or void, so the side of the passage carries the tactical weight that steps carry on foot (Glossary, "passing").
- fuzi / fuçando ([6]) — fleeing. Note it is not shameful in Fiore's mouth: the fleeing man here is a crowned Master, and his flight is a taught technique.
- bon cavallo corente ([6]) — a "good, running horse". The one plate in the section where the horse's speed is the asset rather than its mass; contrast [Mounted 28], where a horse's chest is a battering ram.
- finire ([6]) — to finish, i.e. complete the play to its strike. The Morgan reads ferire (to strike) — see below.
Manuscript comparison
- A real divergence at [7]: the guard has a name, and the Getty does not give it. The Getty says only "this carry of the sword against the lance", naming no guard; the Morgan repeats the Getty word-for-word and is equally silent here — but at 4v-b it adds a paragraph in which the same swordsman says outright "I carry my sword in the Woman's Guard on the left (posta donna sinistra)". The Paris independently agrees: its Latin calls the guard "the royal form of the Woman" (regia forma muliebris). So a prose witness and a verse witness, from opposite families, both name a guard the Getty leaves anonymous — and they name the same one, the guard of 41v. The Getty's silence is a gap, not a variant.
- The Morgan's added paragraph also supplies the guard's limit. It ends: "…for the sword cannot defend low, past the horse's neck" — the mechanical reason the horse can be attacked under a sword's beat, which is the premise of the counters at [Mounted 8] and [Mounted 11]. The Getty asserts those counters work; only the Morgan explains why.
- A one-word doctrinal difference at [6]. Getty: turn and "rebatter e finire" — beat aside and finish. Morgan: "rebater e ferire" — beat aside and strike. Two letters apart in the manuscripts, and both readings are live in Fiore's vocabulary; the Getty's finire points at completing the referenced plays, the Morgan's ferire at the blow itself.
- The Paris rewrites [7] as a boast. Where the Getty gives a tactical claim about a category of weapons, the Latin gives an invocation — the sword "will send you down to the shades", "may the powers of heaven only favor it". Its [6] is closer, keeping both halves of the Getty's logic (the turn that harms, the flight that cannot defend) in two lines.
- Illustrations. [6] pairs the Pisani Dossi (30a-a) with the Morgan's own plate (4r-b) — the only Morgan figure reproduced in this section, and worth the look given how much of this page's text is Morgan-only. [7] is shown from the Getty (42r-c, 42r-d).