The Find, the Gain, and the Stringere

Sword Nerd Alert!

Jun 03, 2025

Is finding the blade synonymous with gaining the blade? Do either or both of those terms mean the same thing as the concept of the stringer?

Since I have been studying the historical texts, people have disagreed and occasionally argued over the correct answer to these questions. So here I want to look at this issue, and pull the thread on what’s important, and what’s really not.

The concept in question

As I wrote in my three-part series on the gain, to gain the opponent’s blade really means to acquire, or control it, even if for a brief time. Go back and review the concept, if you need to.

But in short, to gain an opponent’s blade, you want to place a greater length of your blade over a lesser length of theirs. And you want to turn your true edge - the edge you would usually try to cut someone with - toward their blade, and aim your point at their silhouette or just past it.

In this way you are gaining some level of control over what the opponent is able to do with their sword. Or more precisely, you’re taking away their ability to do some things, while putting your sword in a mechanical advantage.

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Defining our terms

Let’s start by looking at the words themselves. The Italian manuals of course didn’t use the English words ‘find’, ‘gain’, or ‘stringer’.1

So let’s see if the Italian words have the same or similar English definitions in the era in which the manuals were written.

Gain = guadagnare

In the original Italian, the word often used is some form of ‘guadagnare’. In his 1611 Italian-English dictionary, John Florio defined guadagnare as:

Guadagnare: To gaine, to winne, to profit, to get, to acquire.2

Find = trovare

The word ‘trovare’ is used often by Fabris. In Florio’s dictionary, the author defined trovare as:

Trovare: To find, to find out. Also to seek out, to devise, or invent.3

Fabris himself added coloration when he wrote “Finding the sword means occupying it.”4

He further described the action:

Here is something that may help with this concept. If you are in guard, and wish to find the opponent’s sword, you should situate your point against his so that the fourth part of your blade is into the opponent's fourth part, but with a greater portion of yours into his.5

…and…

You should consider your opponent’s sword “found” when your own is situated so as to be stronger than his and cannot be pushed away but, rather, can easily push away that of the opponent.6

Stringer = stringere

Stringere and its variants are used by the Bolognese authors and Capoferro. I still intend to write an entire issue about my research into and thoughts on that word. But looking again at Florio:

Stringere, stringo, strinsi, stretto: To bind, to wrinch, to guird in, to claspe, to clinch, to pinch, to straighten, to wring in. ALSO to urge, to force or constraine unto.7

A sharp-eyed reader will note that ‘stringere’ is a relative of, or even synonymous with ‘stretto’. And stretto has its own definition that hints at my future article…8

So…

So in my view, the definitions themselves are divergent enough to suggest separate meanings. In short, I see the nuance as this:

Trovare means you’re seeking out their blade. Guadagnare means you’ve gained or acquired it. And stringere hints that you’ve bound it, or constrained it - forced it to do something.

The part that matters

In the end, though, I believe the authors themselves probably didn’t agree 100% on how to use those terms.

Always remember that when a martial arts instructor teaches an actual system, they are teaching their own interpretation of that system. Every martial art is shaped by the instructor’s experiences, physical abilities, and understanding of the techniques. No system is perfectly passed on from teacher to student. Which means even students coming from the same school will have variations on their understanding and interpretation of how to apply the concepts.

When I teach, I’m teaching my interpretation of the systems I’ve studied. I’m not strictly teaching Capoferro. I have no idea what Capoferro’s pedagogy would even look like. And as I’ve recently written, I’m probably teaching as much from the Vienna Anonymous as I am from Capoferro these days.

And it’s also true that any term used enough in an art form can eventually become a term of art for that art form that diverges from its normal understood meaning.

So what matters is that you understand what you mean and try to frame that for your students.

And so for you, my virtual students, I’ll explain what’s important in the concepts laid out above.

Three opportunities

Divorcing the actions in question from the terms that people argue over, there are three distinct things happening throughout the overall concept of taking control of their blade.

There’s the action or instant of trying/attempting to constrain their blade;
There’s the instant of having their blade under constraint; and
There’s the instant of the effect of constraining their blade.

These are three distinct opportunities for something to occur.

When you step into wide measure, or when you’re already there and you bring your blade toward theirs in order to constrain it, that is a tempo in which your opponent can act.
When you have brought your sword to a halt over theirs and have gained some level of control over what the opponent is able to do with their sword, that is a separate tempo in which the opponent can act. They are now in a much more dire situation than when you were still trying to find their blade.
Finally when you have gained their blade and are acting on that gain - when your advantage is playing out - that is a third tempo or opportunity for things to be happening. You may be, as Capoferro says, dominating their sword while attacking. Or you’ve provoked their action and are employing a response. Or they are backing out - getting their still-alive asses out of the situation!

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Conclusion

So when you someday find yourself in an argument with someone about whether or not ‘find’ and ‘gain’ and ‘stringer’ are the same thing in the Northern Italian rapier system, take a step back and remember that the terms each person uses are less important than knowing the concepts and how they play out. If you can agree on that, the terms are just semantics.