  In the core of the Fornax cluster, on the West side of NGC1399, we have
detected a previously unknown region of intra-cluster light (ICL). It is made
up by several faint ($\mu_r \simeq 28 - 29$~mag/arcsec$^2$) {\it patches} of
diffuse light. The bulk of the ICL is located in between the three bright
galaxies in the core, NGC1387, NGC1379 and NGC1381, at $10\leq R \leq40$~arcmin
($\sim 58 - 230$~kpc) from the central galaxy NGC~1399. We show that the ICL is
the counterpart in the diffuse light of the known over-density in the
population of blue globular clusters (GCs). The total g-band luminosity of the
ICL is $L_g\simeq 8.3 \times 10^{9}$ $L_{\odot}$, which is $\sim5\%$ of the
total luminosity of NGC1399. This is consistent with the fraction of the blue
GCs in the same region of the cluster. The ICL has $g-r \sim 0.7$~mag, which is
similar to the colors in the halo of the bright galaxies in the cluster core.
The new findings were compared with theoretical predictions for the ICL
formation and they support a scenario in which the intra-cluster population
detected in the core of the Fornax cluster is build up by the tidal stripping
of material (stars and GCs) from galaxy outskirts in a close passage with the
cD. Moreover, the diffuse form of the ICL and its location close to the core of
the cluster is expected in a dynamically evolved cluster as Fornax.
