Ancient Armour and Weapons in Europe: From the Iron Period of the Northern Nations to the End of the Thirteenth CenturyHewitt, John
History
Ancient Armour and Weapons in Europe: From the Iron Period of the Northern Nations to the End of the Thirteenth Century
Hewitt, John
Armor; Weapons
To the chausses, whether of chain-mail or of banded-mail, are sometimes
added Poleyns (or knee-pieces) of plate. It is often, however,
difficult to determine whether the poleyns are fixed to the chausses or
the chausson, from the upper edge of them being covered by the hauberk.
A good example of the chausses armed with the knee-piece is offered
by the knightly statue in Salisbury Cathedral (Stothard, Pl. XXX.),
circa 1260. See also our woodcuts, No. 75 and 77: the first from Add.
MS. 11,639, fol. 520; the latter from a glass-painting in the north
transept of Oxford Cathedral. A German example given by Hefner (Pt. i.
Pl. LXXVII.), from a manuscript illuminated at Metz c. 1280, is copied
in our woodcut, No. 68. Poleyns are named in the Wardrobe Account
of 28 Ed. I. (1300): "factura diversorum armorum, vexillorum, et
penocellorum, pro Domino Edwardo filio Regis, et Johanne de Lancastria,
jamberis, poleyns, platis, uno capello ferri, una cresta cum clavis
argenti pro eodem capello," &c.
[Illustration: No. 57.]
Towards the close of the thirteenth century the Chausses are most
commonly accompanied with a Chausson of leather or quilted-work, the
purpose of which was probably to obviate the inconvenience of the
long chausses of metal in riding. It is found plain, gamboised in
vertical lines, and sometimes richly diapered. The plain chausson
is well shewn in Stothard's Plates XXII. and XXVI., effigies at
Gloucester and in the Temple Church, London. The gamboised chausson
is seen in this drawing of an ivory chess-piece preserved in the
Ashmolean Museum. See also the effigy of a De Vere at Hatfield
Broadoak, (Stothard, Pl. XXXVI.) An excellent example of the
pourpointed chausson worked in a rich diaper is offered by the brass
of De Bures, 1302 (Waller, Pt. 2, and Boutell's "Brasses and Slabs").
A curious variety of the chausson and chausses is found in the figure
of a knight from Roy. MS. 2, A. xxii. fol. 219, given in our woodcut,
No. 62; the chausson here being of chain-mail, while the chausses
appear to be of rivetted plates. A chausson of chain-mail again
appears in our cut, No. 86, from the Painted Chamber. To the chausson
were usually attached knee-pieces of some rigid material: metal,
_cuir bouilli_, or a mixture of both. See our woodcuts, Nos. 59 and
63; an effigy in Ash Church near Sandwich, and an illumination from a
German manuscript, Add. MS. 17,687, both of the end of this century.
Compare also the effigy at Gosberton (Stothard, Pl. XXXVII.), and
those of De Vere and De Bures cited above. Among the embellishments
of these poleyns are sometimes found little shields of arms; as in
our woodcut, No. 70, the effigy of an unknown knight in Norton
Church, Durham, c. 1300[335], and in the statue of Brian Fitz Alan,
in Bedale Church, Yorkshire, engraved in Hollis's Effigies, Pt. 4,
and in Blore's Monuments.
[Illustration: No. 58.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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