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 eyes, mouth, and nostrils to enable the wearer to breathe freely, it is likewise embossed with deep wrinkles. The back of the skull-piece is ornamented by alternations of repoussé and indented square spaces. When the paint which formerly covered the helmet was removed the surface was found to be etched and to show remains of gilding. The mask until recently was painted flesh colour and the spectacles gilded. There can be little doubt that when the helmet first received its coats of paint—probably early in the XVIIth century—the crudely fashioned iron spectacles were added to it to make it appear more quaint.

German, about 1530. National Germanic Museum, Nuremberg

German, about 1540, with wings added in the XVIIth century. Tower of London, Class IV, No. 33

In the curious expression given to its grotesque visor, a helmet now in the collection of Prince Ladislaus Odescalchi at Rome bears a great similarity to the Tower helmet just described. It has a skull-piece of superb workmanship with a triple cabled comb bordered by radiated fluting on either side. The helmet has never been taken to pieces, and still possesses its original rivets with decorated washers at the sides. This Odescalchi helmet, a magnificent example of the armourer's craft of about 1520, has now a brown patinated surface (Fig. 1181). In the National Germanic Museum of Nuremberg there is a fine helmet partially fluted, and at the same time etched with bands of ornament. Its visor is embossed as a face, not a fierce face, but one of gentle good humour (Fig. 1182). We will only represent three other helmets to illustrate the element of the grotesque in the Maximilian order of head-pieces—one in the Tower, one in the Wallace Collection, and finally that historical head-piece in the Vienna Armoury made for King, afterwards the Emperor, Ferdinand I. In construction