The Armour Archive

Sean M

To me, "common" would be anything in a double-digit percentage, maybe as low as 5% ... and "pretty" knocks that percentage down. Here is the problem with that usage in this context. When re-enactors hear common, they think it's something they can have without any issues. They hear pretty common and...

Sean M

Mac has a Pinterest page for everything! One of the long, duffel-bag-shaped pillows in Guiron le Courtois and some of his photos could be an interesting project. It would use up a lot of stuffing, but seems like it would be useful as a back support and maybe other things. Ok, Mazzaoui thinks that It...

Sean M

One of the arquebusiers in Ruprecht Heller's The Battle of Pavia (1529) wears one of these skullcaps with applied rondels over the ears. I wonder if armourers made them 20 at a time like they did new headpieces, or if they were mostly an old pot with some new rondels applied?

Sean M

Do you think they are show nearly as often as sallets or is the difference significant? Because common would be the one in the majority or plurality, and pretty common would be nearly the same number. Now its kinda moot because after looking at them again we'd have to add another category of sallet...

Sean M

I am glad that you have some more satisfactory stuffing! And in turn, I am trying to nail down whether zendado is a lining-weight silk (?cendal?) or a lining-weight linen (?sindon?) in the 14th century.

Maybe you can make a cushion for a fauldstool out of the not-so-satisfactory hair?

Sean M

Now here is a puzzler! Usually you cut buttonholes along a thread to discourage them from decaying (especially MoL buttonholes without the extra reinforcing stitches of some later kinds of buttonhole). Do I still do that along the tulip-shaped curve of the lower sleeve, even if that means that the s...

Sean M

Finished sewing the side seams of the lining, marked buttonholes 2 fingers apart along the opening of the left sleeve, and tried to make a self-stuffing cloth button. Earlier I tried and failed, but this time I had more success! The MoL Textiles and Clothing book and Sarah Thursfield each have their...

Sean M

Working on attaching the right and left breasts of the lining to the assembled back lining.

Sean M

I would start looking at Dutch and German art between (guessing) 1470 and 1520 and see what the soldiers persecuting the martyrs are wearing. If your library does not have good books in the art history section there is also Google. Like MediumAevum says, if you want someone to tell you what to buy a...

Sean M

Also, you have probably noticed that armourers used some of the tricks which modern tailors use. That crest up the front, and brass strips or rows of big-headed nails along the length of the leg, will help the leg look longer and more slender, just like the front crease and outseam in a pair of suit...

Sean M

Yeah, I think they could be great for someone a bit shorter with articulated knees and a demi-greave. I am hoping that one day we will get a book out of Jeff Wasson, Mac, Wade, or James Arlen Gillaspie. I think that late 14th century men-arms probably had differently-shaped calves than most people t...

Sean M

Glad to see Jess Finley in this thread!

Yes, I suspect that a good part of "the art" of stuffing headpieces was finding just the right stuffing. Medieval people were pretty sensitive about different grades of wool and cotton.

Sean M

I have always wondered about that le Bel quote Sean. What are your thoughts on it? Randall, I would like to talk, but I have already lost at least a day's work to this thread and I can't spare any more. I think that those men were the kind with maybe 5 pounds English a year who had called in all th...

Sean M

I can't recall any sources which says just what a headpiece was stuffed with. Usually they just describe the fabric. The liners of Wallace Collection A 158 and A 67 were analyzed by David Hotwell for: T. Philip D. Blackburn, David A. Edge, Alan R. Williams, and Christopher B.T. Adams, "Head Protecti...

Sean M

Here are the greaves in Chartres Cathedral http://www.culture.gouv.fr/public/mistral/memsmn_fr?ACTION=CHERCHER&FIELD_98=OBJT&VALUE_98=1368-1422&DOM=All&REL_SPECIFIC=3 I don't really have good photos of the standing statues from the 1370s I have seen where you can see the back and insides of the knees.

Sean M

They look amazing for a first attempt! {Snipped badly worded paragraph on what I thought Mac and Wade usually recommend} The placement of the bottom edge looks great: Greaves in that period often end higher on the foot than some later styles of greaves do. The top edge feels about 1" too low. I thin...

Sean M

Another source which influenced my view of my period is a passage in Jean le Bel where poor knights present themselves to Edward III at Calais, do arms, and then explain that they have spent all their money equipping themselves and travelling to him, so could he please hire them? When he said no mos...

Sean M

Three Points of Order, Mr. Chairman: This could be a translation problem. English and French sources distinguish between the social role (knight/chevalier) and the military role (man-at-arms "fully armoured man with lance and sword on a good horse"). I think that in Germanic sources Ritter can cove...

Sean M

I wish I could read the gloss. Greg Mele tells me that some of the kinds of duel in Talhoffer are last documented in the 12th century, so just because he taught them does not mean that they were part of life outside his school.

Is that a haubergeon with a built-in panty/brayette in the upper left?

Sean M

I am glad to see a practical thread like this!

GreenLeaf Workshop in the UK has a tutorial video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1APNUh5GTKA

"Boiled" linseed oil has some chemicals in it to make it dry faster ... it might be worth checking the bottle to see if they warn against breathing the smoke.

Sean M

Thanks for the find Aleksa! I am sure that there are more pictures and chronicles and documents out there if people look. It doesn't take any special skill, just staring at photos in libraries and databases and reading whatever medieval language is closest to your native language. I think there are ...

Sean M

Jessica Finley of Fühlen Designs has been fascinated by this picture for some time. She thinks it shows an eyelet doublet. I have asked her for the shelfmark and folio, but until then, does anyone else recognize it? https://bookandsword.files.wordpress.com/2017/09/doublet_cut_full_of_holes.jpg Tiney...

Sean M

Nobody knows? Well, I think that style of helmet was popular around the year 1500, so it is outside the area of my expertise. But in the 14th century I would not be shocked to see someone in half armour (a pair of plates, sleeves of mail, bracers, gauntlets, collar of mail, and bascinet with aventa...

Sean M

The thing that I have trouble grokking is the linings of sindon and velvet. I have never tried it, but wouldn't that get sweaty and miserable? What say the people who spend more time in helmets than I do? As I understand it, sindon is a light, plain weave linen. I usually use heavier linens for lin...

Sean M

It is the end of construction season, and some local sites are littered with steel pallet banding 10-15 mm wide. The price of 0 Euros 0 is definitely right for a starving student. Back in the day I remember hearing that those were usually medium-carbon steel and made great scales or gauntlet fingers...

Sean M

What is the inventory number of this salet? I could happily use it to illustrate the documents which tell us what the caps inside headpieces in the trecento were made of and what colour they were. The thing that I have trouble grokking is the linings of sindon and velvet. I have never tried it, but ...

Sean M

Thanks for your answers, everybody! By the way: I've been told that if I'm ever going to get a full-plate armour, I should have it all made by the same smith and all at once, because that way everything will fit well and be in the same style. However, when people back then loaned armour or bought u...

Sean M

Also, there is a series of photos in The Peel Affinity with their best guess at the range of kit which you would see in an English company in France in 1381. They are just guessing, but so are we all: the kinds of guys who did most of the dying did not leave wills or inventories or financial records...

Sean M

I can think of four main options in the 14th or 15th century: - He could show up with a good horse and as much armour as he could get and try to talk someone into enrolling him (or worse, serve for loot). I gave two sources who describe what these guys looked like in France in my period, but its up ...

Sean M

What I mean is a knight who can afford the equipment that is absolutely necessary, but nothing extra. Let's compare it to cars: most people can afford an average car that is good but still affordable, let's say a Volkswagen. Those who are better off may drive a Mercedes or BMW and the elite drives ...

Sean M

Also ... by 1515, an English document mentions that if settlers in Ireland say they are too poor to afford a jack, they have to at least buy a breastplate, because nobody could complain about the price of one (Ian Eaves, “On the remains of a jack of plate excavated from Beeston Castle in Cheshire,” ...

Sean M

Art Institute of Chicago, George F. Harding Collection, 1982.3044 is now on display and easy to photograph. It definitely has both a buckle and a hook.

Sean M

This is a complicated topic. Jacques de Hemricourt and Jean le Bel describe poor men-at-arms with just a headpiece and haubergeon ... the problem is that contemporary sources make it very clear that you need much more kit to claim a man-at-arms' pay. Even the gross valets in French armies were suppo...

Sean M

Thanks for the treatise on types of helmet lining!

Sean M

Now I have to figure out how I'm actually going to get it there. Does anyone know which shippers will and will not accept a strangely shaped thing like this? Mac I dont have help to offer, but I am glad that I am not the only one who struggles with this! My armourer shipped my harness from Poland t...

Re: Anyone seen this before

Re: An old project returns

Re: Anyone seen this before

Re: Anyone seen this before

Re: An old project returns

Re: A doublet of white linen

Re: A doublet of white linen

Re: A doublet of white linen

Re: This is my equipment, what I can be? (15th century)

Re: Leg Harness

Re: Leg Harness

Re: An old project returns

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: An old project returns

Re: Leg Harness

Re: Leg Harness

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: Late Fourteenth Century Arming Garments II: The Upper Bo

Re: Oil-Blackening Mild Steel

Re: Late Fourteenth Century Arming Garments I: Caps

Re: Late Fourteenth Century Arming Garments II: The Upper Bo

Re: Visored helmets: only combined with full plate? (15th c)

Re: An old project returns

Palet banding as material

Re: An old project returns

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: Discussion of extant mail standards

Re: Poor 'budget' knights and their equipment

Re: An old project returns

Re: Dusting off the cobwebs