The Gladiatoria Group is a series of several 15th-century German manuscripts that share the same art style and cover the same material—various types of armored combat. The texts are contemporary with the tradition of Johannes Liechtenauer, but not directly influenced by it. Gladiatoria is thus one of very few glimpses into the characteristics of a potentially independent German martial tradition.
The core of the Gladiatoria group is a series of devices of armored fencing following the typical progression of a judicial duel: beginning with spears and small shields called ecranches, moving to longswords, then employing daggers on foot and on the ground. (Traditional dueling would begin on horseback before going to foot combat, and the ecranche is designed for mounted fencing, but Gladiatoria skips that stage entirely.) The diverse manuscripts in the group generally describe other kinds of fighting as well, such as the sword and buckler of the Codex Guelf 78.2 August 2º or the longshield of the Ms. German Quarto 16, but these teachings lack some of the common elements of the core Gladiatoria complex and are not considered to be part of it.
There are five known versions of the Gladiatoria treatise, found in the Ms. KK5013, the Ms. German Quarto 16 (the only version with a title page), the Ms. U860.F46 1450, the Codex Guelf 78.2 August 2º, and the Ms. CL23842. Hans-Peter Hils described a sixth lost manuscript identified as Ms. T in his 1987 edition of Gladiatoria,