Several subdisciplines within historiography, most notably the arms and armour or martial arts studies, are interested in inferring physical qualities of historical material objects from historical sources. Scholars from these fields face serious deficiency of written accounts when it comes to various crucial information regarding their subject matter. Therefore, researchers’ attention is often drawn to iconographical sources, sometimes resulting in certain fascination with the material culture depicted in primary technical literature (Fachliteratur). This tendency seems particularly strong in studies on HEMA which rely heavily on pre-modern combat treatises known as ‘fight books’ (Fechtbücher) and are tempted either to treat the available iconography as a faithful representation of its corresponding material reality or to interpret apparent mismatch between icono-graphical representations and their material source domain as evidence for the inferior skills of the illustrator. We would like to put forward that there is a fundamental oversight in such approach to Fachliteratur in general and fight books in particular, namely the lack of consideration for the artwork as a diagrammatic representation of the functional aspects of depicted embodied technique, where proportional ‘realism’ is of lesser priority. It may be fruitful to develop a more nuanced method of ‘reading’ such images. Our survey of select late-medieval fight books shows that equipment, and even body parts, are regularly distorted in their depictions in the fight books to better communicate the subject matter, especially where textual descriptions would be complicated. Interpreted in Gestalt terms, this phenomenon may serve as an example of historical pragmatic application of the cognitive principle of holism – that the whole is something different than the sum of its parts.

If we turn to " bodies in battle " in the Middle Ages, the question how fighters of the past actually used their bodies in combat is a quite obvious one. Unfortunately, it is difficult to answer. Only very few medieval sources document movements in a way that would allow a detailed reconstruction. Additionally, the interpretation of these sources greatly involves the interpreter's own perception of her body and movement, a knowledge that is usually subconscious and difficult to communicate to a (reading) scientific community. From the point of view of cultural history, this hermeneutic framework and the resulting communicational gap is crucial to any scientific approach towards medieval " techniques of the body ". The most promising historical documents concerning body techniques of combat are the late medieval and early modern fight books. In this contribution, I shall focus on a series of five 15 th century manuscripts ascribed to the fencing master Hans Talhofer. These treatises will serve as a case study to discuss the communication strategies of medieval fight books and the connection between the integrated didactic images and the embodied knowledge of their makers.

“Text and Image: Essential Problems in Art History” has been launched as an international electronic journal with the aim of contributing to the development of scientific communication between researchers who study fine art in historical and cultural contexts. Special attention will be paid to the problem of historical narrative and visual imagery correlation, in various cultures, from ancient to recent history.

This thesis provides analysis, transcription, and translation of Paul Dolnstein\u27s early sixteenth century annotated sketchbook. The study offers insight into one `type\u27 of German Renaissance mercenary, the sedentary type. Known as Landsknechts, German Renaissance mercenaries were prized for their discipline on the field and for their commanders\u27 ability to provide well equipped and well trained armies for the battlefields of Europe. As opposed to roving Landsknechts who followed the drums of war year in and year out, the sedentary Landsknecht retained his roots and returned to civilian work in his town of origin between campaigns. He might serve in only a few military campaigns, or he might serve in several. In all his warring, the sedentary Landsknecht maintained his ties to a particular locale and occupation, often that of an artisan. This study argues that at least one such sedentary Landsknecht, Paul Dolnstein, saw his world through the lenses of both warrior and artisa...

(**) At a certain point in a letter describing the siege of Ostende in 1604, Don Giovanni de' Medici, hero of various engagements in Flanders and later in Friuli, gives his brother the grand Duke of Tuscany the following account: "arriving at the platform from the highest point we observed the enemy's retreat, a thing well worth seeing, as it was carried out with such elegance and regularity that it seemed to be painted." To be sure, the vantage point above the action, shared with his highness The Archduke Albert of Austria, commander of the Spanish forces against the United Netherlands, was highly privileged, especially considering the many rows of trenches at ground level, and pits more filled with brackish water than with sappers attempting to mine the forts' foundations, in weather friendlier to frogs than to human beings. Yes, from afar, the battle seemed painted and the stench of singed or rotting horse or human flesh hanging in the mist sickly combined with the whiff of culverin-and harquebus-shot, could almost seem sweet. But for Don Giovanni war and art were not two distinct poles of the beautiful and the ugly, combined, whenever there was the chance to climb above the footsoldiers' shoulders, so to speak, and observe battles that are no longer battles but ant-like movements across the vast screen of a landscape. No, art and warfare were two sides to the same coin. (**) When not pursuing one he pursued the other, and sometimes he pursued them in tandem, or in various combinations – as when, during this very siege, on breaks from the action, he scrounged around or had his servants scrounge around the artists' studios and impresarios shops in Flanders and even in the enemy Holland to find the best painters for executing a series of 17 battle paintings, for which the grand duke's instructions were very precise: They were to be in the shape of lunettes, and " painted with joy and with gracious colors, " and the subjects were to be " various military enterprises, and various armed engagements, that have occurred. " (**) They were to hang in the salon of the grand Duke's new so-called hunting lodge, the Fernandina, in Artimino, outside Florence, a vast 100-plus room mansion designed to provide a temporary resting place on grand ducal trips where mass killings were supposed to take place – not of humans, except by accident, but of wild boar and deer in the vicinity. The spilling of blood was a normal accompaniment to life at whatever end of the social scale in the violent society of the late Renaissance, and the thematization of violence entered art as easily as art entered violence. No wonder Peter Paret, in his suggestive survey, notes that "as a significant historical force, and to those who encounter it, a singular personal experience, war occurs often enough to be a common subject in art." (**) Just how common or since when, no-one knows. The earliest visualization of war is thought to be the Narmer Pallette in the Cairo Archeological museum from the 3rd millennium BC, supposedly depicting the struggle to unite lower and upper Egypt under King Narmer, and also containing some of the earliest known hieroglyphics. The theme includes King Narmer waving the rod of authority but pretty much looking like he's going to slam it on the head of the submissive enemy there in the left-hand image; and on the flip side of the stone (image to the right) you have an array of dead bodies stacked one on top of the other. At least a few recurrent ideas in war art are represented here.