Bologna and her university has had a long line of academics and artists come from her gates, from the Archbishop and Saint Thomas Becket to the philosopher and physician Paracelsus. The two new Bolognese graduates are no exception to the growing number of notable alumni, Antonio Manciolino and Achille Marozzo. Both of these two men studied heavily under the famed Bolognese fencing instructor Guido Antonio di Luca and have dedicated their lives to the propagation of the 'Dardi' school of swordsmanship. In order to show their new understandings of combat and to show patronage to the Bengtivoglios, the two students of combat have collated information from their masters and from their own experience to create the 'Opera di Spade', The Work of Swords.

You can set yourself against your enemy in coda lunga e stretta with your left foot forward, keeping your glove hand together with your sword hand, making sure that your right foot pushes your left forward from this position. Do not attempt an attack but keep your eye fixed on the enemy's sword hand. When he attempts any type of blow to your upper body, in whichever manner he pleases, be they stoccate, imbroccate, overhand, underhand, or attacks of any other type, you should parry with your sword in guardia di testa, and with gracious dexterity grab his sword from the inside with your gauntlet hand.

~ Excerpt from the Opera di Spade, Chapter IV, Side-Sword and Gauntlet

The magnum opus of both Manciolino and Marozzo came to fruition in 1502, after nearly eleven years of research and collating. The Opera di Spade focuses primarily on the use of swords as well as a secondary focus of pole weapons. While the Dardi school has always been more focused upon the use of the side-sword, Marozzo had the idea to include the study of pole weapons which would ideally help lay the foundations for a treatise that could be replicated and thus taught across Italia.

The Opera di Spade is said to be the updated and revised version of the treatise that Filippo Dardi had written in 1434 on fencing and geometry (sans the geometry) which subsequently got him appointed as a professor in geometry at the University of Bologna. While they did indeed base their original findings off of Dardi's own, the two men have found updated information through experience as followers of various Condottieri and seeing war firsthand.

So first you will take the partisan in hand and you will make him set the left leg forward very neatly: the partisan you will make him hold in the hand in the fashion of throwing it, but he holds the said rotella (if possible) so that the right hand is covered, so that the enemy can by no means see it; tell him in this way, for his use, that he must be patient, that is wait for the enemy to strike at him first.

~ Excerpt from the Opera di Spade, Chapter VII, Pole-Arms

While the treatise has largely been accepted by the Dardi school of fencers and has found its fit within the intellectual community of swordsmen, it has yet to be seen if the Opera di Spade will gain fame (or infamy) across Italia and if it will see use in the training of the many different militias and Venturieri.