The Armour Archive

James Arlen Gillaspie

I seem to recall reading about chests made of wicker that were used to transport armour, and other things. It seemed to me to make a lot of sense, as such chests would be lighter than a standard wooden chest.

James Arlen Gillaspie

What, Chris, no video?

James Arlen Gillaspie

As I said above, I am quite sure that a salade is what is being depicted, and obviously swirly, but the artist has, in attempting to represent the legendary past, obviously jazzed things up a bit. The question is, how much? And what were his visual sources? Tournament armour, for example, shows up w...

James Arlen Gillaspie

That 'sunburst' motif is what makes me think that someone MAY have decided to forge it right into the skull, rather than just making it part of the crest, which would have been usual. As regards the fluted salade, well, I'm quite sure that is just what it is. I also think it's a figment of the artis...

James Arlen Gillaspie

The Schmidt piece is one UGLY dog indeed compared to the real thing! If you had ever seen Helmschmid's work in Vienna, you wouldn't want that piece of Schmidt in your house! Here's a spiral embossed salade that appears in a tapestry in the V&A, London, depicting the battle of Roncevaux. Hardly a...

James Arlen Gillaspie

It should be noted that the helm is the easiest thing to take, and also the most valuable.

James Arlen Gillaspie

That's not a bad idea. It would take some skill to make the flow of the lines look ggod, but I can kind of visualize it. One thing is for sure, if there ever was a swirly salade it was Burgundian! I'm going to go back to looking at tapestries...

James Arlen Gillaspie

Here is another example. It occurs to me, though, that perhaps there was a design problem with making a 'swirly' sallet. How do you make it work with the brow reinforce?

James Arlen Gillaspie

Lorenzo, that story about your daughter is even better than my fable about the housepainter and the Sistine Chapel! Guy comes in, looks up at the ceiling for awhile, says, "I could do that!"

James Arlen Gillaspie

It should be kept in mind that the Wagner book uses sources from all over Europe for the illustrations, as you will see if you look carefully.

James Arlen Gillaspie

I have a LOT of respect for those who have made a serious attempt at the 'Sigismund' gothic; the time investment even to do it badly is beyond most non-platemaker's comprehension. It'll break your heart. That said, no plate maker knows that harness better than I do, and I can tell you that no near p...

James Arlen Gillaspie

OK... So where in the Sam Hill is that pic of a painting of a camp scene that had a black fellow in amongst all the other Landsknecht?

James Arlen Gillaspie

It's all about whiplash prevention.

James Arlen Gillaspie

These are what go inside. On the one on the right, in particular, you can see the long laces that feed through the grommets on the helm, to be tied in big decorative bows.

James Arlen Gillaspie

This might help to muddy the waters.

James Arlen Gillaspie

The grand bacinet is one of the two things that make it distinctly French! The better French plate makers were ethnic Italians, anyway.

James Arlen Gillaspie

How 'bout a real one? It's actually a fox, though. A pun on the owner's name.

James Arlen Gillaspie

Something to keep in mind; the Friedrich harness may come from Milano, but it is NOT 'Milanese' in style. No way. When people ask me what that harness is, I tell them, "It's armour made by Italians for a German in the French style". Yep, that's right, French. That's what gives it its disti...

James Arlen Gillaspie

Yeah, I kind of like it myself!

James Arlen Gillaspie

I hope this helps, at least for a future project. As you can see, the bottom edge of the occularium has been formed by simply folding the edge over to the inside, rather than trimming it, which makes it much stronger, and the rest is part of the flange. This sort of thing (along with forging over th...

James Arlen Gillaspie

I wouldn't worry about Arms and Armour of the Western World. It is far from essential, and the English translation has some howlingly bad translation. European Armour in the Tower of London by Dufty will do you far more good.

James Arlen Gillaspie

An interesting find in Dr. Williams' research was that the refined wrought irons used for armour that could be tested (somewhat destructive) were remarkably close to modern mild steel as far as its mechanical properties were concerned (NOT, however, when it came to ductility and 'dishability', if yo...

James Arlen Gillaspie

I was thinking he might try in the local equivalent of a pawnshop. Souvenir instruments are definitely a hazard! The trick is to get away from the 'touristed up' areas - but this presents its own challenges.

James Arlen Gillaspie

I'm going to second Robert's call for an oud or two. We simply do not have enough lutes around. Too many ^%$&! guitars!

Years ago I saw a wonderful Egyptian oud in Tucson that had beautiful rose window soundholes... I was short on cash at the time, sigh...

James Arlen Gillaspie

What's your price range?

James Arlen Gillaspie

It does seem to me that Siberian and Caspian tiger would not have been an impossible stretch. Anybody know anything about that?

James Arlen Gillaspie

Yes, there is often a tendency for museums to mount armour so that the waist of the cuirass is down where the tops of the hips would be, and often use mannequins that are too small. This shortens the height by a couple of inches, sometimes more. One of the funnier things I have seen in armour displa...

James Arlen Gillaspie

Well, we all know there's no money to be made in armour. But there can be money in knife making!

Good luck!

James Arlen Gillaspie

It's at Les Invalides, Paris. The data I have is that it is French, c. 1550. Here's another view.

James Arlen Gillaspie

It's a twelve year old piece of crap, but here's my 'band of brothers' harness. The thing I like about this style, is that it has everything I like about the 'Black Prince' style but replaces mail with plate (the One True Armour! ). The action shot shows, though, that you still need the pesky stuff ...

James Arlen Gillaspie

The bardings that I have handled have seemed to me to be in the 0.050" range, thickness wise, with some thinner spots. I would hasten to add that almost all forms of armour cleaning in the past involved abrasion (and dealers often still use it!), which has often lead to significant losses. The ...

James Arlen Gillaspie

This pic shows what happens with those looong English faulds with no tassets. See why they wore mail skirts or briefs?

James Arlen Gillaspie

I have a couple of photos around the place of me and my apprentice of the time clowning about in a couple of 'Late Gothic' German style armours. You can also see some action sequences ('English c. 1430' and '15th c. Italian') involving other forms of 15th c. armour on my website.

James Arlen Gillaspie

It's pretty simple, really. It's basically the same thing as 'normalizing' the steel. If you do it right, the stuff is pretty springy. Playing with how long and how hot you get it, along with ambient air temperature, will affect the final product.

James Arlen Gillaspie

A good deal of real armour was made of medium carbon steel that had a pearlitic microstructure, rather than a tempered martensitic microstructure. This is far tougher and springier than most people would think, without the risks of warping and/or cracking in the quench and the risk of cracking later...