The Neapolitan school was not an academy but more of a training zeitgeist involving many academies and schools who were developing and refining Equestrian skills. Giovan Battista Pignatelli, was a leading light of the period, operating from roughly the 1560s onwards, refined and transmitted Grisone's method through personal instruction rather than print: among Pignatelli's students were Antoine de Pluvinel and Salomon de La Broue, who would carry the Neapolitan techniques northward into France and transform them according to the courtly aesthetics of the Bourbon monarchy. Cesare Fiaschi, publishing his Trattato dell'imbrigliare, atteggiare e ferrare cavalli in Ferrara in 1556, extended systematic treatment to bridling, bitting, and farriery. Claudio Corte's Il cavallarizzo (1562), printed at Lyon for a broader European audience, consolidated the Italian method and made it accessible to Northern readers. Together, these four figures — Grisone, Pignatelli, Fiaschi, and Corte — constitute the Neapolitan school proper.

The city of Naples in the early 16th century constituted the crucible from which all European training would flow.  Under Spanish Aragonese and then Hapsburg rule, the city possessed the wealth, the aristocratic culture, and the specific military and courtly culture that made the development of a refined art of riding not only desirable but necessary.

Of the gentlemen above we'll once again discuss student of Pignatelli, Salomon de La Broue. Another of Pignatelli's students, Antoine de Pluvinel, who we will look at next time gets most of the credit for the art of maniege riding becoming French however, La Boue's book, Le cavalerice françois  predates Pluvinel, as equestrian writing in French rather than Italian. Among the great architects of classical equitation, he deserves far wider recognition than he has traditionally received. For modern dressage riders—particularly those interested in the historical roots of collection, lightness, and correct schooling—La Broue stands not merely as a precursor to later French masters, but as a decisive bridge between Renaissance horsemanship and the emerging principles of classical dressage.

La Broue did not simply transmit Italian methods into France. Instead, he adapted and refined them, placing greater emphasis on moderation, tact, and the rider’s responsibility toward the horse. La Broue operated in an environment where riding was no longer purely military. Horsemanship had become a courtly art—one that demanded elegance, precision, and intellectual clarity as much as strength or courage.  Here he is seen working out the control of balance through use the square volte which was credited to de La Guerinere but was developed by Pignatelli.

La Broue like many of the Pignatelli students is insistent that correct riding is not merely effective—it is morally informed. He repeatedly emphasizes that the rider’s hand, seat, and aids must be governed by judgment and restraint. Excessive force, he warns, damages not only the horse’s body but its willingness to cooperate.

This philosophy places him in direct opposition to the harsher Renaissance traditions associated with earlier Italian manuals. Instead, La Broue anticipates the later French insistence that true mastery lies in doing less, not more, and in allowing the horse to offer movement freely rather than extracting it through compulsion.

Another feature that sets Le cavalerice françois apart is its insistence that riding is an intellectual discipline. La Broue assumes that the rider must observe, reflect, and adjust constantly. He does not offer rigid formulas, but rather principles that demand thoughtful application.

For the historically minded dressage rider, this is especially significant. La Broue is not writing a “method” in the modern sense; he is articulating a way of thinking about training—one that treats the horse as a sentient partner rather than a mechanical object.

The images show training patterns based on circles, changes of bend, and squares that create suppleness in the horse and then collection.