"Never, never, did I imagine that dueling could be so enthralling, outrageous, gruesome, tragic, and, yes, ridiculous...Lively humor and sparkling prose." -Wall Street Journal The medieval justice of trial by combat evolved into the private duel by sword and pistol, with thousands of honorable men-and not-so-honorable women-giving lives and limbs to wipe out an insult or prove a point. The duel was essential to private, public, and political life, and those who followed the elaborate codes of procedure were seldom prosecuted and rarely convicted-for, in fact, they were obeying a grand old tradition. Based on her fascinating 1997 Smithsonian article, Barbara Holland's Gentlemen's Blood is the first trade book to trace the remarkable, often gruesome, sometimes comical history of the Western tradition of defending one's honor.

A compelling history of the art of dueling describes how the duel evolved from the medieval practice of determining justice through trial by combat into a practice that followed elaborate codes of procedure and tradition, offering a definitive guide to this courtly violence around the world. Reprint.

These Straggling, Excited Groups Were Mainly Composed Of Men With Green Boughs In Their Hats And The Most Ludicrous Of Weapons In Their Hands. Some, It Is True, Shouldered Fowling Pieces, And Here And There A Sword Was Brandished; But More Of Them Were Armed With Clubs, And Most Of Them Trailed The Mammoth Pikes Fashioned Out Of Scythes, As Formidable To The Eye As They Were Clumsy To The Hand. There Were Weavers, Brewers, Carpenters, Smiths, Masons, Bricklayers, Cobblers, And Representatives Of Every Other Of The Trades Of Peace Among These Improvised Men Of War. Bridgewater, Like Taunton, Had Yielded So Generously Of Its Manhood To The Service Of The Bastard Duke That For Any To Abstain Whose Age And Strength Admitted Of His Bearing Arms Was To Brand Himself A Coward Or A Papist...FROM THE BOOKS.