Fiore dei Liberi
The life and legacy of the master behind our art
Born in Cividale del Friuli
Cividale del Friuli, Italy
Fiore Furlano de’i Liberi is born into a noble family in Cividale del Friuli, in the Patriarchal State of Aquileia. His family may have held Imperial immediacy, granted to the Liberi house of Premariacco by Emperor Heinrich V in 1110.
Wikipedia (Fiore dei Liberi) →Training Under Italian and German Masters
Northern Italy & the Holy Roman Empire
Fiore travels widely, studying under “countless” masters from both Italian and Germanic lands. His foremost teacher is one Johane Suveno, a disciple of Nicholai de Toblem. During these years he develops what he describes as a natural inclination for the martial arts.
Wiktenauer (Fiore de’i Liberi) →Five Duels Against Rival Masters
Various locations, Italy
On five separate occasions, Fiore is forced to fight duels for his honour against envious masters who are angry that he refuses to teach them his art. All five are fought with sharp longswords, wearing nothing but gambesons and chamois leather gloves. He wins every one without injury.
Wiktenauer (Fiore de’i Liberi) →First Student Duel in Perugia
Perugia, Italy
Fiore’s student Piero Paolo del Verde fights a judicial duel against Pietro della Corona. This is the earliest datable event connected to Fiore’s teaching career, placing him as an established master-at-arms by his early thirties.
Wikipedia (Fiore dei Liberi) →Inspector of Udine’s Arsenal
Udine, Italy
Fiore arrives in Udine during the Aquileian War of Succession and sides with the secular nobility. The high council tasks him with inspecting and maintaining the city’s weapons, including the large crossbows and catapults defending the walls.
Wikipedia (Aquileian War) →Magistrate and Mercenary Captain
Udine, Italy
Fiore is sent to recruit a mercenary company for Udine, then sworn in as a magistrate charged with keeping order in one of the city’s districts. After May 1384 he vanishes from the historical record for over a decade.
Wiktenauer (Fiore de’i Liberi) →The Boucicaut Duel
Padua, Italy
Fiore trains the mercenary captain Galeazzo Gonzaga to fight Jean II le Maingre, the famous French marshal known as Boucicaut, who had questioned the valour of Italian fighters. The duel begins with spears on horseback. Boucicaut grows impatient, dismounts, and attacks before Galeazzo can mount. Galeazzo lands a solid blow on Boucicaut’s helmet but is disarmed. The Lords of Padua and Mantua intervene to end the fight.
Wikipedia (Boucicaut) →Duel Before the Duke of Milan
Pavia, Italy
Fiore trains Giovannino da Baggio for a duel against a German squire named Sirano, hosted by Gian Galeazzo Visconti, Duke of Milan. The format: three bouts each of mounted lance, then dismounted pollaxe, estoc, and dagger. On the fifth lance pass, Baggio impales Sirano’s horse through the chest, killing it. They fight the remaining nine bouts as scheduled. Both survive.
Wikipedia (Visconti) →The Flower of Battle
Northern Italy
Fiore compiles his masterwork: the Fior di Battaglia, representing over forty years of martial study and six months of intensive writing. The treatise covers the complete system of combat from unarmed wrestling through dagger, longsword, spear, and pollaxe. He dedicates it to Niccolò III d’Este, Marquis of Ferrara.
Wikipedia (Fior di Battaglia) →The Pisani Dossi Manuscript
Venice, Italy
The only explicitly dated manuscript is completed on 10 February 1409. It contains two prologues, one in Latin and one in Italian. Believed lost during World War II, it resurfaced in a private Italian collection in 2005.
Wikipedia (Fior di Battaglia) →The Paris Manuscript
Paris, France
The only fully painted version of the treatise, written entirely in Latin as Florius de Arte Luctandi. Possibly a presentation copy for Lionello d’Este. Rediscovered in 2008 by scholar Ken Mondschein at the Bibliothèque nationale de France.
View at BnF Gallica →The Getty Manuscript
Los Angeles, USA
The longest and most comprehensive surviving copy, 49 pages covering 229 individual martial plays. Originally written in Venice, it passed through Venetian and Austrian collections before entering the Ludwig collection in 1966 and being donated to the J. Paul Getty Museum in 1983. This is the manuscript most HEMA practitioners study from today.
Getty Museum →The Art Lives On
Penzance, Cornwall
Six hundred years after Fiore set down his system, we train it every Tuesday evening at Penzance Leisure Centre. The guards, the cuts, the plays, the grappling. The same art, still alive, still being tested. Come and be part of it.
Join us →