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Late XVth century Imperial Armoury, Vienna

Italian, early XVIth century Imperial Armoury, Vienna

interpretation of the word, we imagine to be a protective garment in which the metal plates are concealed beneath some textile—these plates taking either the form of rectangular overlapping lames or even of scales. In 1352, according to the description given in Douët-d'Arcq's ''Comptes de l'Argenterie des rois de France'', two suits of armour made for the Dauphin were fashioned in what we should term the brigandine manner. The silversmith, Etienne de la Fontaine, describes them as being covered respectively with blue and green velvet richly embroidered, and mentions the fact that while the corselets alone required six thousand silver rivets for the attachment of the metal plates, the rere- and vambraces, the cuisses, the jambs, and the sollerets