Page:A record of European armour and arms through seven centuries (Volume 3).djvu/13



CHAPTER XIX

DAGGERS

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Early brief allusions in this work to the dagger—Its popularity with the armour collector—The previous small interest in the study of its evolution and family groups—The fine examples in the Wallace Collection, and in public collections abroad—Private collections that possess representative series—From the middle of the XIVth to the middle of the XVIth century the six distinctive groups consisting of varieties of the quillon dagger. of the rondel dagger, of the so-called "kidney" dagger, of the so-called "ear pommel" dagger, of the dagger of the transitional XVth-XVIth century types, and of the so-called cinquedea—The quillon dagger of the XIVth century shown on the effigy of Sir Roger de Kerdeston of about 1335—Other representations of the type of dagger of this century—Extant examples—The basilard to be placed in the same category—Some existing examples—The possible evolution of the rondel dagger, the great popularity of that type of hilt—As shown on the brass of Sir Edward Cerne of 1393, and on other brasses and effigies of that century—Extant examples—The rondel dagger of the XVth century, and onwards to its close—Its contemporary representation, and extant examples—Variations in the medium of the hilts—The latest type of the rondel dagger, first half of the XVIth century—The "kidney" dagger, the origin of its name—An early dagger of the type shown on the brass of Sir William de Aldeburgh, about 1360—Others represented on effigy and brass—Some extant examples dating from the end of the XIVth century to the end of the XVth century—Variation in form and media—A family of English made "kidney" daggers that date as late as the second half of the XVIth century—The final evolution of this type of dagger hilt early in the XVIIth century—The borrowed Eastern form of the "ear pommel" dagger; the comparatively late date of the European adaptation of this form—Their introduction in the latter part of the XVth century—Some notable examples extant—Reputed historical dagger of the type: pictorial evidence of the continued use of the "ear pommel" dagger in the first half of the XVIth century—Various daggers of the transitional years of the XVth-XVIth centuries—The Holbein dagger—Other daggers difficult to class into families, but distinctive in type—Those of Italian, and those of German origin—The cinquedea—The cinquedea dagger-sword—The probable origin of the name—The popularity of these daggers in Northern Italy throughout the XVth century, and in the first quarter of the next—The sumptuousness of the weapon—The many forgeries that exist—The Veronese type of the middle of the XVth century: The Venetian type—Some famous enriched examples extant in the public collections of England and on the Continent. 1