Page:A record of European armour and arms through seven centuries (Volume 3).djvu/218

 perspiring hide of a horse or other animal, and also for its non-absorbent quality. It is also important to note that the polished and carved horn, bone, or ivory plaques with which these saddles are enriched are nearly all decorated in the same somewhat primitive but artistically satisfactory fashion—a style of ornamentation never departed from, though varying in fineness of work with the quality of the saddle. In conclusion we may say that we have seen these saddles in various states of completeness—from those in which little of the enrichment remains to examples that are in an almost perfect state of preservation—and that we accept most of them as genuine.

In contemporary records these horn- or ivory-covered saddles are often described as made of whalebone. The explanation seems to be that the Normans first became familiar with ivory in the form of the tusk of the walrus or sea-horse, which in the loose nomenclature characteristic of the period they termed "whale." Consequently their descendants of the Middle Ages continued to call all polished bone or elephant ivory, whalebone. Chaucer, speaking of a knight, says: "His sadel was of rowel boon," meaning that it was made of ivory.

From Monsieur E. Fremiet's famous equestrian statue of the Duc d'Orleans

With the advance of the first half of the XVth century the armour of the war-horse, universally known as the "destrier," becomes more complete and complicated in its parts: we are unable, however, to illustrate a single genuine example of steel horse apparel that could be safely assigned to this period. In the chapter dealing with forgeries we give an illustration of a chanfron of the type that represents those in prevalent use during the first decade of that century. As contemporary paintings show, this particular armament of the horse, which used to be such a cumbersome head defence in the latter years of the XIVth century, is now reduced in size, and is generally shown as but a shell protecting the front of the skull. An admirable illustration of this chanfron is to be seen on the equestrian statue of the Duc d'Orleans by the late Monsieur E. Fremiet. We have no hesitation in giving his reconstructions as an authority; for that artist spared himself no trouble in research to obtain archaeological accuracy (Fig. 986). In Mr. Seymour Lucas's collection there was once a