Dueling in thirty days: day seven

To bring the first week to a close, I thought it would be useful to summarize what we've discovered, and where we will need to be going next. In particular, I've read through the treatise again, and I've found a number of places (in the section on defenses, provocations and their counters, plays of the half sword) where the exact action - with or without footwork - is described. Unless the words of the text themselves change, I don't foresee this interpretation changing much, if at all.

The footwork

Dall'Agocchie is very clear concerning the movements of the feet in defending with a riverso sgualimbro, and striking with an imbroccata: against all five attacks (he does not include a mandritto to the leg or a riverso ridoppio, perhaps because they would be unlikely attacks against this guard), we parry with a riverso sgualimbro (a cut that goes from the right shoulder to the left hip) with a step to the enemy's right side with the left foot, do a mezza volta of the wrist (i.e. a riverso ridoppio), and thrust an imbroccata to the appropriate target (face, chest or flank) with an increase of the right foot towards the enemy. The only exception to this rule is not in the footwork, but in the parry: the riverso to the leg must be parried with a riverso ridoppio, as the sgualimbro does not cover low.

Why the riverso ridoppio?

I was initially skeptical of putting in a seemingly extra motion when there was no explicit mention of one in the final section of the third day of dialogues, but after reading and typing up an updated version of all of the defenses, provocations and their counters, I found a number of instances - no less than five - that describe this exact action: parry with a riverso sgualimbro, do a mezza volta of the wrist, which is another way of saying throw a riverso ridoppio, and thrust an imbroccata to the available target. Here are two additional reasons for this interpretation, which are drawn entirely from performing the action numerous times:

1) The person thrusting the imbroccata by way of the riverso ridoppio is completely covered throughout the entire action.

2) When done correctly, the action is very fluid, which is unlike the initial interpretation, which felt an awful lot like "flinging" the arm forward.

The simplest version of the drill

Finally, I'd like to put up the absolute simplest version of the drill, which in theory could last forever, provided neither fencer makes a mistake. We've found that we really only need to work on finding places to thrust the stoccata, and throw a mandritto or riverso to the leg; the riverso sgualimbro and imbroccata are automatic.

1) A thrusts an imbroccata with an increase of the right foot.

2) B parries with a riverso sgualimbro, stepping to A's right with the left foot, and then immediately throws a riverso ridoppio to Alicorno, and goes to thrust an imbroccata with an increase of the right foot towards A.

3) A parries with a riverso sgualimbro, stepping to B's right with the left foot, etc.

As I said earlier, our current plan is to flesh out this drill by adding in all of the attacks "at random" - kind of a misnomer, as there are specific instances where each attack is appropriate - and then eventually include different kinds of defenses, which involve different footwork: a falso manco, Guardia d'Entrare, cut to the hand while passing back, etc. Only twenty-three more days to go!