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Archeology Director, Fencing Masters Program,
San Jose State University, CA Maestro di Scherma,
Accademia Nazionale di Scherma, Naples, Italy
(photo of Dr. Gaugler from the backcover of THE
HISTORY OF FENCING, Laureate Press, 1998)
Epic Encounters Between Italian and French
Fencing Masters 1881-1911
reported in Italy between 1879 and 1889, and of these 93 per cent were fought with edged weapons.
Franco-Italian fencing rivalry existed for centuries. Arsene Vigeant describes the most famous
encounter in his book, Un maitre d'armes sous la Restauration (Paris 1883). This occurred in Spain in
1814 when Italian soldiers from the 1st Regiment and French soldiers from the 32nd Regiment of the
3rd Division of the French Army quarreled. To restore discipline a council of senior officers determined
that 30 swordsmen -15 masters and assistants from each regiment - would settle the affair with
duels, which were to take place on an elevated natural plateau outside Madrid before the entire army
of 10,000 men. The victor was to continue fighting until he was either wounded or killed.
The duels began with the leading fencers of each regiment, the Florentine master, Giacomo Ferrari,
and the French master, Jean-Louis Michel. Jean-Louis, a mulatto from the island of Hispaniola (today
the Republic of Haiti) , was one of the most brilliant fencers of his time, and in approximately 40
minutes, with 27 thrusts, killed three adversaries, including Ferrari, and wounded ten others. Although
two Italian opponents remained, the military commission decided at this point that enough blood had
been shed, and called a halt to the hostilities. The members of the commission declared that honor
had been satisfied, and the troops from the two opposing regiments were ordered to embrace one
another. Thus, harmony was restored, and the exploits of Jean-Louis became legendary.
The political events culminating in the establishment of the Third Republic in France, and the struggle
for the unification of Italy, very likely contributed to some extent to the limited contact between French
and Italian fencers prior to the 1880’s. One of the first Italians to cause a sensation in Paris was the
Baron di San Malato who arrived in 1881. An exhibition match was arranged between him and Louis
Merignac.
Merignac was regarded as the greatest French foilist of the second half of the 19th century. According
to contemporary accounts his fencing embodied all the features most admired in a fencer of that era.
His straight thrusts and disengagements from immobility were the last word in the art of fencing; he
struck with lightning-like speed, and his point control and sensitivity of touch were without equal.
On the occasion of the encounter with San Malato, Prevost states that Merignac appeared
immaculately clad in white, while the Baron was dressed in a blue costume with black riding boots.
With shouts and bounds, San Malato advanced on this opponent in the most extraordinary manner.
When he got within range, Merignac launched a lightning thrust that hit full in the chest. After each hit,
the combatants retired to the ends of the piste and the performance was repeated. The bout ended in
favor of Merignac 11 to 1.
In 1883 Masaniello Parise, a young Neapolitan fencing master, was appointed director of the newly -
founded military fencing masters school at Rome, the Scuola Magistrale. Among the first masters to
graduate from the Scuola Magistrale was Agesilao Greco (1887), an extraordinarily gifted athlete, who,
within a year of receiving his master’s diploma, had defeated nearly al the best amateur and
professional fencers in Italy.
On 17 June 1889, Greco and his compatriots Pessina, Guasti, and Foresti competed in an important
international tournament in Paris. It was one of the first major encounters between representatives of
the Sculoa Magistrale and Parisian masters.
The noted French fencing master and author, Arsene Gieant, writing in Le Figaro, observed, “The
merits of the Scuola Magistrale were clearly evident in the performance of three brilliant fencers:
Agesilao Greco, a young master with a great future, gifted with marvelous power and originality and
elegant: and Carlo Pessina, astonishing in his agility and quickness of eye.”
But Maitre Rupiere, fencing critic for the Evenement, disagreed; he wrote, “The Roman masters have
not yet abandoned theatrical postures, useless movements and contortions, and the continuous
beating of the adversary’s blade, which they search for systematically in monotonous fashion... and
they extend the arm almost completely... But the attack executed from immobility is always superior to
the attack performed with an advance, because the latter provokes one of the most terrifying
thrusts... the stop hit....”
After the competition opinions were mixed: some amateur foilists admired the Italian fencers, but the
majority, while recognizing great qualities in the Italians, nevertheless saw their fencing as trickery.
One commented, “Our Italian neighbors are not impressed with our speed, because they are also
quick, indeed, more rapid than the majority of our masters; their renewed attacks and replacements
are lightning fast; they do not think of the fencing phrase; their game is to find the opposing steel, to
parry and to riposte.”
Fencers Quarterly Magazine, 848 South Kimbrough, Springfield, MO 65806
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