“All through his life to acknowledge defeat was to risk exposing himself to ridicule—the one thing he feared above all,” wrote Richard Collier, one of his biographers. “Though he wielded his rapier like a bludgeon, grunting and grimacing, he threw out challenges with the aplomb of a d’Artagnan—fighting under bridges, on the banks of streams, once in a rented room after the seconds had piled all the furniture on to the landing.”

On a typical day, he would be up at seven, take a cold bath, swig back a glass of milk, then go off riding for an hour, leaping onto his horse cowboy-fashion. After that he would fence. According to a sympathetic biography published in Italy in 1928, he generally preferred the saber, and with his teeth set in grim determination would fight “with a style that was totally personal, full of clever ruses, sudden counterattacks, blows unexpected according to the logic of his adversary, which the Duce launches like the punishment of God.”

In his early days, he would use a special code with his wife, Rachele, whenever he went off to duel, to avoid frightening their children. “Have spaghetti today,” he would say.

Richard Cohen, By the Sword: A History of Gladiators, Musketeers, Samurai, Swashbucklers, and Olympic Champions (2002)