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 CHAPTER VI

CONTINUED GENERAL HISTORY OF ARMOUR, A.D. 1400-1500

With the advent of the XVth century our subject becomes more complicated, and proportionately more difficult to deal with. Many and various types of defensive and offensive armour and weapons crowd one upon the other, all of which should be alluded to. As in the case of the preceding century we look to the monumental effigies as the principal source from which to draw our illustrations of the body armour; for it is not until we are in the second half of the century that we can show a reproduction of an actual and homogeneous suit of armour of the time.

Very little difference can be noted in the development of plate armour between the years 1390 and 1410; but towards the termination of the first quarter of the century we note certain additional leg, foot, arm and hand defences, as shown in the effigy of Michael de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk (about 1415) in Wingfield Church, Suffolk (Fig. 195). This valiant knight died at the siege of Harfleur, belonging to that flower of English chivalry which followed the redoubtable Henry V and his "Band of Brothers" on that memorable day. In his effigy the armour, although very complete, is of the simplest possible kind and entirely free from decoration. Upon the head is a bascinet with the double laminated gorget, as in the case of the Musée d'Artillerie example (see Chapter VIII). Around the skull-piece is the orle, which may possibly cover the rivet hole by which the visor was attached; for there are no visible means for its attachment to the skull-piece. It can with fair certainty be claimed that the breastplate is slightly globose and has deep taces attached to it; but neither is actually visible, as they are covered with a surcoat. The arm defences consist in simple espalliers of five plates, almost identical with those seen upon the suit in the Wallace Collection (Chapter XXIV), though the latter are a hundred years later in date. The elbow-cops of three plates are again of the simplest construction, and are almost the counterpart of an example that is now in the collection of Dr. Bashford Dean (Fig. 196). The rere and vambraces, more particularly the former, are of considerable length, and almost tubular. The gauntlets are