Page:A record of European armour and arms through seven centuries (Volume 3).djvu/14

 CHAPTER XX

HAFTED WEAPONS IN GENERAL USE FROM THE MIDDLE OF THE XIVth CENTURY TO THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE XVI CENTURY

The lance—Chaucer's description—An extant war lance of the early years of the XVth century—Contemporary mention of the proportions of the lance—Late XVth century lances—The coronel, the boëte, the bourdon, the Swedish-feather—The lance attributed to Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk—The vamplate, the war-hammer, the pole-axe, and battle-axe—The great antiquity of these weapons—The similarity in combat of the use of all such weapons—Some war-hammers of distinction—The true pole-axe and hammer as a double-handed weapon, its use on foot as a knightly fighting weapon, and its popularity in those fights—Some pictorial illustrations of its practice—Arguments on the class of infantry weapons which go by the name of glaive, voulge, partisan, ranseur, spetum, bill, and guisarme—Illustrations and extant examples—What is termed the battle-axe—The Austrian bardische—The Lochaber axe and the Jedburgh axe—The halberd class of weapon—The probable derivation of its name, and its reputed age as a hafted infantry arm—The various types and extant examples—The knightly mace—Allusions to it—Extant examples of the XIVth and XVth centuries, and early years of the XVIth century—Weapons originally of peasant origin—Examples of comparatively late date—The war flail—The "holy water sprinkler," and the "morning star"—Some historical references—Secret hafted weapons                                              81

CHAPTER XXI

THE CROSSBOW

Continuation from pages 4, 5, 65, 123, 124 in vol. i of our brief history of the long and crossbow—The crossbow of the XIVth century, with both horn and steel bow—The age and probable origin of the horn bow—Peter the Saracen, crossbow maker to King John, one of the makers of the so-called horn bow—A remarkable crossbow of the middle of the XVth century, with a description of its media—The description of the XVth century crossbow—The range of its bolts—The arbalestes ribaudequins—The windlass à tour—An historical example—The windlass à cranequin—An historical example—The windlass pied de chèvre—An historical example—Other windlasses of possibly individual construction—The small graffle charging tackle—The crossbow called the "latch"—The pellet crossbow, arbalète à jalet—A sumptuous late example—The various types of bolts discharged from the crossbow—The long bow, the Englishman's droit mesurer—The Morris or short bow—An existing long bow of the early part of the XVIth century—The constant endeavour made by the King and his Council to encourage the use of the long bow     127

CHAPTER XXII

HORSE ARMOUR, THE BIT, SADDLE, AND SPUR FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE XIV CENTURY TO THE END OF THE XVII CENTURY

The possible date of the first protective apparel for the horse—An unsubstantiated suggestion of its use in the XIth century—A quotation from Matthew Paris referring to an armed horse early in the XIIIth century—The chanfron of cuir bouilli, mentioned in the