IWTB a Italian Condottierri 1390's

[Luca Sogliano]

Welcome Joshua!

Unfortunately, you're going to need to be a little more specific on the time within the 15th century. It's a period of extraordinary change in fashion.

For instance, if you decide to do 1410, like I do, you're going to want a pourpont (pronounced poor-pon, it's a french term that the Italians would not have used) and joined hose (an English term the Italians would not have used). By the end of the 15th century, you might be wearing something more like this:



Note that this is from a German artist. This is no accident, as fashion in northern Italy often followed that of the germanies, whereas fashion in Naples might be totally different. So place, too, is important.

If you decide you're interested in the very beginning of the 15th century, I can help you further, otherwise, there are many other people on this board who can help with a late 15th century impression, but it might be a better fit on it's own thread.

[Joshua S]

Buon Notte Luca!


I thank you for your input which is most helpful.

The time period in the 15th Century that I am focused on would be the 1450's to 1460, Northern Italy. I am looking at either Milan or Venezia (Venice) in terms of the fashions. By the way, the picture you have posted is really helpful. I will look into other sources, my other question is in what time period where doublets in fashion?


Apart from this, the harness is set in terms of style and exact pieces.

I will request the board to split this to a new thread.

Thank you very much, this is most helpful.

Joshua Santana
Condottieri in Training

[greyedge]

I'm not sure if what I'm looking for would constitute a new thread or if would be added on this.

I'm trying to pinpoint a time/location that matches some armor that I'm interested in wearing, then developing a persona around that time/location and match my armor and garb to recreate it the best I can. I've narrowed it down to about 14th century Italian, which is why I've posted in this thread. The breastplate might push me into 15th century, but I'm not sure.

I want to match a t-face barbute with a Churburg #13 breastplate. I think that's the correct Churburg breastplate, I'm looking for the one that has different sections overlapping each other. Here are some examples:

Barbute Helm
Churburg Breastplate

These are the two pieces that I'm interested in the most. Once I've isolated a time/location for these, I'm interested in ensuring the arms, legs, pauldrons, pourpoint, arming coat/gambeson, and perhaps even a surcoat. Since I want to re-create this as closely as possible, references would be a great help. My goal is to try and make my appearance, both on and off the field, to look like it literally was transported from history.

[Galfrid atte grene]

The barbute is a 15th century helm, so wouldn't be suitable for a late 14th century impression.

[d-farrell2]

As said above, the barbute would place you pretty solidly into the 15th C (though apparently the first use comes up in an inventory in 1407 according to wikipedia). You'd be in the age where the uncovered breastplate and fauld are common.

Also, while the Churburg 13 is cool looking (and very, very, very popular in the SCA)... it's kind of an anomaly amongst globose breastplates. Most are not segmented, IIRC. Those two pieces (the helmet and the breastplate) basically sit on opposite sides of 1400.

So if you want your armor to drive your timeframe, you sort of have to chose which look you want: globose breastplate with no fauld or barbute. The globose has a pretty wide range of use in the late 14th C, and as such a variety of helmets (commonly the bascinet, or even a kettle hat depending on use, less commonly an early armet).

[d-farrell2]

Now the good part is that your undergarments for wearing with the armor are not going to change too terribly much. You'll still have an arming jacket (length and cut will echo the doublet of the day) to which your harness (and potentially mail voiders as well, in the 15th C) will be attached. Padding levels will vary.

In the 15th C, you'll generally dispense with over-armor garments chosing to show off all that shiny metal. In the late 14th C, you'll probably have a garment over your globose and mail though right around 1400 you could probably get away with wearing it either way.

The mail will transition from full shirt to voiders and skirt in the 15th C for sure, though you can kind of get away with the full shirt for a while because of the Italian style of wearing the sleeves over the arms which seems to stick around for a while in the 15th C.

I don't have the references handy at the moment... I'll have to dig them up later. Claude Blair's old book European Armor 1066-1600 (I think) had a nice bit of discussion on some of the specifically italian trends, including a nice set of line drawings of various harness bits.