BarcelonaThe Nadi brothers were a good couple. His father did not look favorably on the way they lived, too scattered, but deep down he was proud of them every time they returned home with cups and medals. And they won a few, in the 1920s. Beppe Nadi was a highly respected master of arms in Italy. He had founded a club in Livorno, his hometown, where he taught fencing in the traditional way, convinced that it served to tidy up people’s lives, to defend honor and to lose fear. Now, he only taught floret and saber. The sword didn’t even want to see it. He considered it an dishonest weapon, which only the French liked. Nedo and Aldo, his children, were educated and trained strictly, but secretly from their father they learned to use the sword while getting into trouble. When in the 10s they traveled to Vienna, where they won the Emperor’s Cup, they ended up arrested for doing their nightmare. Apparently, they ended up on a table in an elegant cafe with a saber in their hand singing Italian patriotic slogans.
Both, in fact, would fight in World War I against the Austrians. And in 1920, when the Olympic Games returned after the pause forced by the conflict, they were the main protagonists of the Antwerp Games. Nedo won five gold medals, and Aldo won three gold and one silver. The passage through the Games of the brothers was well sounded, especially by the temperament of the Aldo. When a journalist criticized him, he wounded him with his sword. And when Filippo Bottino, a weightlifter, confronted him, he claimed he could defeat him in a somewhat strange duel: he would carry a horse-riding whip, one of those thin ones to hit the horse, and Bottino a stick. The lifter agreed, but in a few seconds he had already lost. Faster, Aldo deftly hit Bottino’s hand, causing him to be disarmed.
After the Games, Nedo Nadi would leave for Argentina, where he earned money by training. Aldo chose to pursue the American Dream in the United States, where he did public fencing shows with Giorgio Santelli, another Italian fencing master, in front of elegant audiences. Aldo would also try it in Hollywood, doing extras in several films. He would go on to share a poster with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall in the Howard Hawks film To have it or not.
The Nadi brothers would end up returning to Italy, where another name in fencing already stood out, Edoardo Mangiarotti, who would win 13 Olympic medals. When Mangiarotti told Aldo that the best Italian fencing champion was him and not his brother Nedo, Aldo replied, “You have more medals, but Nedo’s are all gold.” Mangiarotti did not get off the donkey, so Aldo decided to challenge him to a public duel. “With what weapon? Sword, foil or sword?” Mangiarotti replied. And Aldo, thinking that perhaps he had grown old or that Mangiarotti was really fearsome, replied, “Pistol!” The duel did not take place.
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