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A London journal conducted a study of Italian duels in the ten years between 1879 and 1889 and found records and statistics for only a paltry 2,759, though it admitted that many others weren’t on the records.

Originators of swordplay, Italians clung to their rapiers; ninety-three percent of the time they fought with blades. Nearly four thousand wounds resulted, 1,066 listed as serious and fifty as fatal. Of the causes of combat, thirty percent were political, nineteen percent cards and other games, ten percent religious discussions, and only eight percent insults. Five times as many happened in summer as in winter, either because of the inflammatory nature of warm sunshine or because nobody wanted to go outdoors and fight in the cold rains of January. Almost none were fought during Lent; perhaps dueling was a popular indulgence to renounce for the season. Of a hundred principals singled out for inspection, thirty were military and twenty-nine were journalists, along with twelve lawyers, four students, three professors, three engineers, and three members of parliament.

Most damning of all in some eyes, only two percent of the combatants died, making the Italian duel not much more dangerous than football. Since facing possible death was central to the whole mystique why bother to fight at all with odds like that?

- From Gentlemen’s Blood by Barbara Holland