Page:A record of European armour and arms through seven centuries (Volume 2).djvu/123

 helmet has been subjected to clumsy alterations and poorly executed repairs that greatly mar its present appearance. The second armet with large visor supplies better evidence, and has been the means of inclining the Baron de Cosson to a belief in our theory as to the earliest form of armet visor. This is an extremely interesting helmet quite recently brought to light in Italy; it fortunately fell into the Baron's hands, in whose collection it is now to be seen. The armet must be of a very early date, indeed of as early a date as that of the Farnham Burke example; for its visor possesses all the characteristics of the heavily constructed ample visors to which we have just referred (Figs. 433 and 434) and is of the complete kind, solidly fashioned, and furnished with ocularia slits. This helmet, which is perfect in all its details, even to its original detached reinforcing buffe, was found to be sadly battered and knocked about when it came into the possession of its present owner, who has, however, most skilfully remedied the damage incurred by the ill-usage of the past.

Possibly Polish, late XVth century

Collection: Sir Farnham Burke, K.C.V.O.

To leave theorizing on this subject of what may have been the form of the earliest armet visors, we will mention here two extraordinary and early armets forming part of the Graf G. Trapp collection in the Schloss Churburg, which have visors unique of their kind. We have never had the good fortune to see these armets or even to obtain a photograph of them; but the following is their description given to us by one who has handled them. The section of their combs and the formation of their skull-pieces present no great variation from those of most helmets of the armet type; but they are undoubtedly of very early date, probably coming within the first quarter of the XVth century. It is, however, the form of their face defence that makes this pair of armets so remarkable. It is contrived by having the lower edge of the visor and the upper edge of the cheek-plates cut out in regular castellations, the two edges being so arranged that the rectangular projections on the one fit into the corresponding indentations on the other; so that when the visor is closed there are no apertures to look through other than those cracks between the edges of the plates.

We should also like to mention amongst curious armets that have