Getty 27r
[41] and [42] continue the breaking of the thrust from [S2H 39] — a strike to the head, and a half-sword cut with the hilt trapped inside his arm — and then [43]–[44] introduce a mechanism that owes nothing to the sword at all: push his elbow, and strike him as he turns. The Morgan has none of this page.
Again, this play is from the breaking of the thrust, which is the second play before me: when I have beaten his sword to the ground, I immediately strike with my right foot upon his sword; and in that striking, I strike him in the head, as you see.
- Explicitly sourced: this comes from the breaking of the thrust, "the second play before me" ([S2H 39]).
- The state: his sword has been beaten to the ground.
- Immediately strike with your right foot upon his sword — the same foot-on-the-blade as [S2H 40], but note the verb: this one strikes (io fiero cum lo pe), where [S2H 40] sets the foot down with force.
- And in that striking — the two are one tempo — strike him in the head.
The difference from [S2H 40] is entirely in the tempo. There, the foot lands and then the sword works; here the stamp and the head-strike are a single beat. The verse adds the consequence the prose omits here: his sword will remain bent or broken, and useless.
This is yet another play of the breaking of the thrust: if the player — in the breaking, when I have broken his thrust — raises his sword to cover against mine, I immediately set the hilt (elzo) of my sword to the inside of his right arm, near his right hand; and immediately I grip my sword with my left hand near the point, and I strike the player in the head. And if I wished, I would set it to his neck, to saw through the windpipe of his throat (la canna dela gola).
- Also from the breaking of the thrust — the third play Fiore draws out of it.
- The condition: if, in the breaking, the player raises his sword to cover against yours — that is, he does not accept the beat and comes back up.
- Immediately set the hilt (elzo) of your sword to the inside of his right arm, near his right hand. The cross goes inside his arm, so the arm is caught between your hilt and your blade.
- Immediately grip your sword with the left hand near the point. Not the middle — the point. This is a shorter hold than the half-sword of [S2H 5].
- Strike the player in the head.
- And if I wished — the alternative, stated without softening: set it to his neck, to saw through the windpipe (la canna dela gola).
The sword becomes a two-handled bar. And note that the grip is at the point, not the middle: Fiore chooses each hold for the leverage that moment needs and specifies it fresh, rather than naming a standard second-hand grip and reusing it.
Again, when I have beaten aside the thrust — or when I am crossed with a player — I put my hand behind his right elbow and push it hard, in such a way that I make him turn and uncover himself; and then I strike him during that turn that I make him make.
- Two entries are offered, and they are not the same situation: when I have beaten aside the thrust, or simply when I am crossed with a player. The play does not require the break; any crossing will do.
- Put your hand behind his right elbow.
- Push it hard.
- The mechanism, stated as a consequence rather than a hope: the push makes him turn, and turning makes him uncover himself.
- Strike him during that turn — not after it. The opening exists only while he is rotating.
The purest lever in the wide play, and it uses no sword at all: a hand on a joint, and the man's own structure does the uncovering. Note the phrase Fiore reaches for twice — "that turn that I make him make". The turn is authored, not awaited. This is the volta of [S2H 1] applied to somebody else's body.
This scholar before me speaks the truth: through the turn that he makes you make in this way, I come to cut your head from behind you. Moreover, before you could return to your cover, I could give you an open wound in the back with my point.
- The scholar confirms [S2H 43] — "speaks the truth" — and completes it.
- Through the turn that he makes you make, the scholar arrives behind you.
- Cut your head from behind.
- Moreover — a second option, and it is timed: before you could return to your cover,
- give an open wound in the back with the point (in la schena … una piaga averta).
The elbow-push's real value is delivered here: the turn does not merely uncover a target, it hands the scholar the man's back. And Fiore prices the second option in tempo — it exists only in the window before the cover comes home.
Glossological analysis
- elzo ([42]) — the hilt, specifically the cross. Here it is a structural element rather than a handle: set inside the arm, it becomes the far jaw of a clamp. The same word does the same job at [S2H 63] and [S2H 67].
- apresso la punta ([42]) — "near the point". Not the half-sword grip of [S2H 5] (the hand at the middle) but shorter still. Fiore never names a standard second-hand grip; he places the hand fresh in each play that needs one.
- la canna dela gola ([42]) — the windpipe (literally "the pipe of the throat") — and the verb is segare, to saw. Both are precise, and neither is a euphemism.
- cubito ([43], [44]) — the elbow. It is the joint Fiore reaches for whenever he wants to turn a man rather than fight him: the same push answers the hands-in-the-face at [Grappling 18] and the hand at the throat at [Grappling 11].
- penzolo forte ([43]) — "push it hard" (penzare, to push or shove). The instruction is force, applied to a joint — the finesse is in the target, not in the hand.
- voltare ([43], [44]) — to turn, transitively: "I make him turn". Volta has belonged to the sword since [S2H 1]; here, for the first time, it is something done to another man's body — and both plates say it in the same phrase, "that turn that I make him make".
- la schena ([44]) — the back. Set against [S2H 31], where la schena dela gamba is the shin: the same word, opposite sides of the body, thirteen plates apart.
- piaga averta ([44]) — an open wound; averta = opened. The section's most clinical description of what a thrust leaves behind.
Manuscript comparison
- Coverage collapses on this folio. The Morgan has none of it, having ended its wide play at [S2H 38]. The Paris has only [41], and skips [42], [43], and [44] entirely. Three of these four plays therefore exist in the Getty and the Pisani Dossi alone — including the whole elbow-push family ([43]–[44]).
- The Paris re-orders rather than translates. Its [41] carries the same material as the Pisani Dossi's four lines but rearranges it — the boast first, the scholar's teaching in the middle — and adds a clause of its own ("guiding the covered sword, in the cross, along the ground"). As at [Grappling 11], the Latin paraphrases and re-orders where the metre allows; it is not a line-for-line Latinization.
- Both verse witnesses carry a consequence the prose puts elsewhere. At [41] the Getty says only that the scholar strikes the head. The Pisani Dossi adds what became of the weapon underfoot — "your sword will remain bent or broken, and you will not be able to use it any more at all" — and the Paris agrees ("either bent or broken — never will you be able to work with it"). The Getty does make the claim, but one plate earlier, at [S2H 40]. The families agree on the fact and disagree about which plate owns it.
- A second scribal dittography in the Getty at [43]. The manuscript reads quando io, o, rebatuda la la punta — the article doubled. The Getty's copyist repeats a short word twice within two folios (cf. cum cum at [S2H 37]); both are slips, and both transcriptions preserve them.
- Illustrations. [41] is the Getty's (27r-a); [42] shows the Pisani Dossi and the Getty together (21a-d, 27r-b); [43] and [44] are the Pisani Dossi's alone (21b-a, 21b-b).