The Armour Archive

Italian kit,up to the 50s...

you looking for extant or modern repro work?

Must be a post from the dark lord himself. Darth Vaguer..

Ok, so what do you want/need? Just random suits or more specific info and pictures? Is it for a reproduction? Or areyou gonna use the pics for anything else?

Sorry everyone. I would prefer reproductions. The reason for being vague is I really know nothing of this period. I want to get into 15th century rather then the 14th which is a pain in the ass if you ask me. I want to do a 1440-s Serb(probably have Italian armour, but also similar stuff to what the hungarians where wearing, because they were fighting the Turks together.) I love the big elbows of the 15th century, and would prefer floating articulation. Maybe a sallet or something...?

soo what would go with say: http://www.stgeorgearmouryshop.co.uk/me ... G_0318.JPG

what kind of pauldrons, sallet, breastplate and gauntlets? (i'm leaving the legs out for now)

1440s-1450s italian suits... though to be honest, looking at reproductions isn't the way I would go (until you know what they should look like at least). This is a bit later than my area of interest, so I am not sure how much I will be able to help.

You would probably be looking at a barbute or an armet and a harness in the relatively smoothly curving milanese style. Mitten gauntlets (possibly the assymetric gauntlet-manifer combo) would likely be the hand protection. More than likely a 2 piece breast plate and faulds, possibly with tassets (more than likely). One extant suit from that period is the so-called 'avant suit' in Glasgow: http://www.myarmoury.com/images/feature ... gothic.gif
http://www.glasgowmuseums.com/assets/sl ... 5.e_02.jpg


Another place you may want to look for basic info is this special article over at myarmoury.com: http://www.myarmoury.com/feature_gothic_armour.html


Those arms you posted - I am not entirely sure they are very accurate. The mid-late 15th C (heck almost all of it actually) was the time when full articulation was becoming *the* thing in Italian armour. I doubt you would find much floating articulation past the first quarter of the 15th C. The large elbows (to my understanding, limited as it is) were usually attached *over* an articulated elbow, for the joust.

Its not just date and area of manufacture you need to specify I'm afraid. Those arms you've shown are munitions grade arms. As such they would not be worn by anyone over the rank of man at arms. Knights wouldn't be seen dead in them.

BTW, those arms shown are from st georges armoury and he sells them as munitions arms. I'm sure Mark wouldn't want anyone to think otherwise.