The Armour Archive

A friend of mine wish to have a replicas of this helmet:

http://www.clevelandart.org/art/1923.1065

But he needs help to figure out what this helmet looked like when he was still in use. He would like to have more informations about the possible shape of the visor, and also more informations about how the vervelles were made.

And personally, I am very curious to see an example of what it looks like with the aventail. Does someone have a good replicas of this particular helmet and could post some pictures?

And finally, can you give us armourers names for this kind of project? Personally, not my cup of tea, so I will not do it. I know nothing about early XVth century helmets and my eye needs much more practice before I could easily make a high quality replicas of a early helmet like this one.

Thanks

I have some more pics for you. The helmet is Goll's # 2051







Mac

Thanks a lot! I added the pdf file to my ''Cleveland helmet'' folder.

This is crazy all the informations I already have on my computer but I just don't know where it is ; )

As far as it's original look... I think that the presence of the double hook with a hole just above tells us that it almost certainly had a removable Klapvisier. Perhaps one of those "keyhole shaped" visors would be appropriate. I think there's a Pisanello sketch that might be appropriate. I'll try to find it.

Mac

Here's the guy I meant. It's nice of Antonio to show us the stitches that hold in the lining!



And here's another that I had not seen before.



It's interesting that neither of them has any mail, even though it looks like the helmets have an aventail band. That's not the first time I have seen helmets represented that way. I wonder what's up with that.

Mac

Old habits die hard?

Wonderful illustrations!

About the aventail band, that's weird! On these representations, we see only the vertical parts of the band, but all the holes are present on the Cleveland helmet. In my opinion, because of its back shaped like a sallet, an aventail would look a little bit weird on the Cleveland helmet. I begin to think like you Jason: Old habits die hard?

to me this seems similar to the black sallet in Vienna. It also has a row of rivets down there, but for what purpose? I believe that the dating is quite off and it belongs to the first half of the 15th century. One of the early sallets and the rivet row is just a leftover from the bascinets.
https://farm9.static.flickr.com/8209/81 ... 022a_b.jpg

Here are some more guys with what appear to be aventail mountings, but no aventail. Of the four of them on the right who are easy to see, only one has an aventail. The rest appear to have standards or pizanes.



Has someone got a better image of this?

Mac

Mac wrote:Here are some more guys with what appear to be aventail mountings, but no aventail. Of the four of them on the right who are easy to see, only one has an aventail. The rest appear to have standards or pizanes.



Has someone got a better image of this?

Mac

Of course Andrea has some great photos

Click on images below to open much larger versions:

I'm going to suggest that what we are looking at may be a system by which the aventail, integral with the lining and padding or not, is removable and suspended internally.

-Adair

Or more simply, the bascinet makers attached the vervelles and aventail band covers, but the mail makers were responsible for attaching the mail to the leather.

If I have to to be honest, I'd say that there is no aventail with these helmets. If you look at the picture Mac posted, these four guys, only the one in the left has an aventail. His helmet looks like a real bascinet to me. While the other three to me look like they are wearing mail gorgets. Just look how the mail wraps around their neck. While the guy to the far left has mail that wraps more around his head/face.

With those new informations, this is how I imagine The Cleveland museum helmet for now:

-No aventail(replaced by a seperate mail collar) on it, but still have the aventail leather band. Probably for cosmetic reason, and also to cover the liner stitches in this particular case.
-Not sure about the type of visor because of the 45 degrees(well, not exactly 45 but i'm sure you understand what I mean) cut each side. It seems the ''keyhole shaped'' visor would create a small gap every side, because of the 45 degrees cut. Well... even the visors on the Pisanello sketch would probably create a gap.

I wonder if Cleveland helmet may have had longer cheeks originally... like the Pisanello sketches or the guys in the fresco, but they got trimmed down when the owner got tired of them hitting his collar bones.

Without the aventail, there will be gaps at the chin, but that may have been an acceptable compromise in its day.

Armorer-- "Sure, I can cut the points off the cheeks, but your chin will be exposed"

Soldier-- "Just cut 'em. I'll take my chances"

Mac

If you look at that bottom painting, the guy on the far left doesn't seem to have any points near his chin either. Mac's explanation makes sense to me.

One thing which is really remarkable about the Cleveland helmet, and this is more obvious seen in person, is how narrow the face opening is. The helmets in the fresco seem to have ample face openings, but on the helmet in Cleveland it seems like the opening would barely expose the width of the wearer's eyeballs. I think some of the surviving "keyhole" visors are similarly very narrow, and it shows how this form of helmet really takes a different approach to face protection compared to the "typical" bascinet with aventail and visor. I think these helmets were primarily designed to be worn without aventail, although the option was provided for.

a few more guys further down the line

click to open much higher resolution version

I agree, the points could have been cut. There is a similar helmet at the Met museum(but without the typical bacinet holes and visor bracket). But I think they come from the same place, so the points could have been cut by the same people and for the same reason. EDIT: I was wrong, the helmet at the Met museum do not have the same cut:

http://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/22772

It's strange that they should have provisions for an aventail, but then not install one. But, as Francois said, the shape of the back of the helmet would not really work well with an aventail.

larcheveque wrote:In my opinion, because of its back shaped like a sallet, an aventail would look a little bit weird on the Cleveland helmet.

It reminds me of how the English continued to put fancy "vervelle covers" on their great bascinets. The decorative aspect had taken on a life of its own and they continued to exist even though they no longer did anything.





It's like the atavistic "exhaust ports" on the fenders of Buicks...



... or the fake spur straps on those cool boots we used to wear in the '70s



Mac

I think another example are the shield boss of some 12th century shields. Am I right to think they are also more a tradition rather than a necessity?

Another interesting helmet from the met museum:

http://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/23238

Once again, a tail very similar to those of some later barbute/sallets but everything is there for an aventail. Not sure for the visor bracket, the top seems to be reconstructed.

And about the bracket pieces still on the helmet, I guess we should see some holes to fix the aventail to the brackets? But it looks more like a decorative pattern. Unless the aventail was stitched to a leather band and the leather band was covered by this metal bracket.

In the past when we have discussed that example from the Met most of us have concluded that the metal strip was a decorative cover for a leather strip to which the mail would have been attached.
Now I am not so sure, given some of the images in this post it could easily be seemingly nonfunctional decoration.

Tom B. wrote:In the past when we have discussed that example from the Met most of us have concluded that the metal strip was a decorative cover for a leather strip to which the mail would have been attached.
Now I am not so sure, given some of the images in this post it could easily be seemingly nonfunctional decoration.

My thoughts, exactly.

Mac

The decorative pierced bands can be an anacronism to hold on the old design with the leather from the aventail. The paintings above show the bands but the aventail is under the helmet like a mailgorget.

R.Kohlstruck wrote:The decorative pierced bands can be an anacronism to hold on the old design with the leather from the aventail. The paintings above show the bands but the aventail is under the helmet like a mailgorget.

In my opinion, this is exactly what they are, mail gorgets. Personally, I would only put decorative bands(no aventail) on the helmet if I had to make a replicas of the Cleveland helmet for myself.