By the Sword: A History of Gladiators, Musketeers, Samurai, Swashbucklers, and Olympic Champions

Richard Cohen

Dec 2007 · Sold by Modern Library

About this ebook

“Like swordplay itself, By the Sword is elegant, accurate, romantic, and full of brio—the definitive study, hugely readable, of man’s most deadly art.”—Simon Winchester

With a new Preface by the author

Napoleon fenced. So did Shakespeare, Karl Marx, Grace Kelly, and President Truman, who as a schoolboy would practice fencing with Bess—his future wife— when the two of them returned home from school. Lincoln was a canny dueler. Ignatius Loyola challenged a man to a duel for denying Christ’s divinity (and won). Less successful, but no less enthusiastic, was Mussolini, who would tell his wife he was “off to get spaghetti,” their code to avoid alarming the children. By the Sword is an epic history of sword fighting—a science, an art, and, for many, a religion that began at the dawn of civilization in ancient Egypt and has been an obsession for mankind ever since. With wit and insight, Richard Cohen gives us an engrossing history of the world via the sword.

Praise for By the Sword

“Touché! While scrupulous and informed about its subject, Richard Cohen’s book is about more than swordplay. It reads at times like an alternative social history of the West.”—Sebastian Faulks 

“In writing By the Sword, [Cohen] has shown that he is as skilled with the pen as he is with the sword.”—The New York Times

“Irresistible . . . extraordinary . . . vivid and hugely enjoyable.”—The Economist

“A virtual encyclopedia on the subject of sword fighting.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“Literate, learned, and, beg pardon, razor-sharp . . . a pleasure for practitioners, and a rewarding entertainment for the armchair swashbuckler.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Ratings and reviews

I would have given this book a five stars, except it had very little in the original book about sword play in the Philippines. I consider myself somewhat of a serious swordman beginning in 1971, when I was exposed to and learned Filipino martial arts. I haven't yet purchased this book; I read it after taking it from my local library back in 2020. I revisited it again in 2024, and I plan to purchase it this year for my private library. U. S. military bayonets given to us by my dad during an early childhood holiday season was the beginning of my swordplay, back when our family returned from Europe. My first exposure to "fencing" was when a neighborhood friend and I used my grandfather's real non-buttoned foils to engage each other and I nearly lost my eyesight. Visiting Cranford, N.J. in an attempt to revisit my Judo career, I located a fencing school. With every intention of training in that school I took the brochures home to read. That was of course pre-pandemic, I'll try again.

KICKS ASS!!

About the author

Richard Cohen was five times U.K. national saber champion and was selected for the British Olympic team in 1972, 1976, 1980, and 1984. More recently, he has been four times world veteran saber champion. A former director of the Cheltenham Literature Festival, he is the author of Chasing the Sun: The Epic Story of the Star That Gives Us Life. He lives in New York City, where he is working on a new book, The History of Historians.