The Academy of the Sword. Illustrated Fencing Books, 1500-1800

The Academy of the Sword centers on an assemblage of rare illustrated books devoted to the subject of fencing and dueling, drawn (with one exception) from the library of the Arms and Armor Department of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The title is taken from Girard Thibault’s Academie de I’Espee (Leiden, 1628), the most lavish fencing book ever produced, which was kindly lent by the Museum’s Thomas J. Watson Library. Accompanying the books and giving vivid impact to their illustrations are a selection of swords, rapiers, parrying daggers, bucklers, and other accoutrements, which follow the chronology of, and changes in, fighting styles depicted in the books.
These weapons were frequently treated not only as sidearms, but also as fashionable costume accessories. The decoration of hilts, scabbards, and belts often exemplifies the prevailing artistic styles of a given period, from Renaissance and Mannerism through Baroque and Rococo to Neoclassical. Hilts were designed by well-known engravers such as Hans Sebald Beham and Virgil Solis, leading goldsmiths including Wenzel Jamnitzer and Luigi Valadier, and major artists from Hans Holbein and Giulio Romano to Jacques Louis David.