It had the advantage of being easily procured, easily worked, and also of being much lighter than the metal. For this reason it was used largely for jousts and tourneys, which up to the fifteenth century were more of the nature of mimic fights than was the case at a later date, when the onset was more earnest and the armour was made correspondingly heavy to withstand it. [Illustration: _PLATE XXIV_ PARADE SHIELD BY DESIDERIUS COLMAN, 1554 THE DETAIL IS GIVEN ON PAGE 135] The best leather seems to have come from Spain and especially from Cordova. Among the _Ordonnances des rois_ in the Bib. Nat. Français (T. II, 357) we find it distinctly stated that Cordova leather was far better than that of France or Flanders. This may have been due to the breed of horses or cattle found there, but it is more likely that the tanners of that town had made a speciality of treating the hides. On the sculptured effigies and monumental brasses of the fourteenth century we find the jambs and poleynes often richly decorated and moulded with more skill than the other parts of the armour,[113] and these were probably of cuir-bouilli. The d’Aubernon, Setvans, and Gorleston brasses are good examples of this. Chaucer in his _Rime of Sir Thopas_ mentions jambs of cuir-bouilli as being part of the ordinary equipment of the knight (see page 100). [Illustration: FIG. 49. Brassard of leather and cord for the tourney (from René’s _Traité d’un Tournoi_).] Both King Rene and Antoine de la Salle prescribe cuir-bouilli as the material for the brassards used in the tourney (Fig. 49), and this fashion seems to have lasted from the last quarter of the thirteenth century, at which date we have cuir-bouilli armour mentioned in the roll of purchases for the tournament at Windsor Park, held by Edward I, down to the last quarter of the fifteenth century. Oliver de la Marche, writing at the end of the same century, describes the armour of Mahiot and Jacotin Plouvier fighting in a duel as being of cuir-bouilli sewn on the body, legs, and arms.[114] In his _Advis de gaige de battaile_ the same author mentions leather armour as being only fit for the man who is “point gentilhomme.” As late as the year 1500 cuir-bouilli was much used for horse-armour on account of its lightness. Of this we have two specimens remaining to us in the full suit at Turin (G, 2) and the crupper at the Tower (VI, 89). The horse on Plate XVII is apparently armed with mail which is covered with trappers of leather. The original, which was an ivory chessman in the possession of Rev. Eagles, has disappeared. It was figured by Hewitt in _Ancient Armour_, Vol. I, and was cast. The photograph given here is from the cast. Among the few specimens of leather armour for the man may be noted a morion in the Zeughaus, Berlin (60_b_), and a pair of seventeenth-century leather “lobster-tail” cuisses at Goodrich Court, Herefordshire.