In April of 2019 I released a rough translation of the Part One of Francesco Antonio Marcelli’s 1686 work Regole della scherma on the Rapierists Facebook group. Only two months later Chris Holzman beat me to the punch with his publication of a complete translation, which was very well-received by the rapier community. Already being mostly finished with the translation (and in love with the material) I continued to work on the project. In exploring the numerous texts Marcelli references, alludes to, and sometimes even copies word for word without attribution I’ve attempted to give future readers a sense of the intertextual nature of his book (and to make a second translation worth reading).
To keep myself accountable, here is the work that remains before deciding how it will be released:
- Additional editing pass through the translation of Marcelli’s text
- Additional editing pass through all footnotes and appendices
- Translator’s introduction
- Plate cleanup
- Review by third-parties
- Final edits
I will be posting updates and informative tidbits as I go, so stay tuned!