Armizare was the name the warriors of medieval Italy gave to their martial art, which combined the wielding of sword, axe and spear with wrestling, knife-fighting and mounted combat.  The famed master of arms, Fiore dei Liberi preserved his tradition in a beautifully illustrated manuscript, which now survives in four distinct copies, and which have formed the basis for a world-wide effort at reconstructing this ancient "art of arms".

What many students of the art do not realize is that Fiore wrote in the loose verse common to many medieval authors, who used rhyme to aid in memory. However, the size of Fiore's work and length of each passage makes memorization difficult. By contrast, mnemonic "teaching verse" was part and parcel of the German masters of the same era. To balance the scales, Guy Windsor, one of the most renowned authors, researchers and teachers of armizare has sharpened his quill and penned this vade mecum, or reference book for the modern student. Both pithy and profound, at times comically gory, the Armizare Vade Mecum is both an homage to this famous swordsman and a practical aid in learning his deadly art.