Massinger and Carranza: A Note on Fencing and Points of Honour in Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century Drama
2007; Oxford University Press; Volume: 54; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1093/notesj/gjm185
ISSN1471-6941
Autores Tópico(s)Martial Arts: Techniques, Psychology, and Education
ResumoIT is not uncommon to come across duelling scenes throughout European theatre of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century, especially in Spanish golden centuary and English Elizabethan and Stuart drama. Duelling practices were often illustrated and regulated by different manuals which proliferated in Europe at that time. Modern fencing manuals first appeared in Spain in the late fifteenth century, with such works as La verdadera esgrima (1472)1 by J. Pons, and El manejo de las armas de combate (1473)2 by P. de la Torre. From here, they spread to Italy, where they acquired scientific status.3 In England, the fashion and emphasis were often placed upon Italian and French models; but Spanish treatises were also consulted, as this passage from Philip Massinger's The Unnatural Combat (1624–5) reveals: Page: Feare not, my brave Lord Your noble father; fighting is to him Familiar as eating. He can teach Our modern duellists how to cleave a button, And in a new way, never yet found out By old Caranza. (The Unnatural Combat, II. ii. 9–13)4
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