REINFORCING PIECES FOR THE TILT-YARD.
These may be divided into two classes, viz., those extra pieces appertaining to purely tilting armour, made specially for the lists, and those used to augment the strength of ordinary fighting suits donned for the lists. The former class comprises the grand-guard and volant-piece, often in one plate, but sometimes screwed together, the latter piece being provided with an ocularium on the right side only. These plates defend the breast and face. A small wooden shield, plated and covered with leather for the left shoulder, screwed or tied on. This piece is in some courses the objective of the lance. The heavy elbow-guard which protects the elbow, and half-way up and down the arm. The German tilting arm-guard and gauntlet was often in one piece from the shoulder. The right side is further protected by an enormous vamplate, which in the German form covered half the arm on both sides of the elbow. There is also a large knee-plate, the Germans call a “diechlinge,” which is sometimes fastened to the saddle, the leg passing between it. This piece is more especially used in “Sharfrennen.” Suits for “rennen” and “stechen” were usually made so that they could be worn by any man of anything like medium height, and it was quite common for one knight to borrow the harness of another.
Fig. 10. Reinforcing Pieces.
No. 1 is the Breastplate for Tilting, and on it are the holes for the insertion of the screws of the Lance rest. It differs but little from the ordinary Fighting Breastplate with the suit.
No. 2 is an extra protection for the left breast and shoulder. This is the Grandguard.
No. 3 is the Volant-piece, a protection for breast, neck, and face.[24]
No. 4 is the Cabasset for the suit.
Fig. 11.—Reinforcing Pieces.
No. 5, the Chanfrein for the horse’s head.
No. 6, the Extra Shoulder-guard.
No. 7, the Manifer or Tournament Gauntlet for the bridle hand.
No. 8, the Elbow-guard, or Pass-guard.[25]
As to the reinforcing pieces for screwing on to ordinary armour, drawings are given of a series of these plates, belonging to a splendid suit at Munich that was worn by the Prince-Bishop of Salzburg (Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau), illustrated in [Fig. 35]. The pieces are numbered on the drawings for reference, one and upwards in Figs. 10 and 11.
A projection called the queue, screwed on to the back plate, supports the butt-end of the lance. The suit and all the pieces are richly inlaid with gold, with the Bishop’s arms engraved on the breastplate. There is a suit very similar in form and details of the pieces in the Töjhus, Copenhagen, but the ornamentation of that suit is much bolder, having the thistle for its theme throughout. It is of French make. As in the Alnwick suit ([Fig. 33]), the cuisses are in two parts, the upper being detachable, and the tassets bear evidence of missing detachable portions. An interesting feature of this suit is that the lance-rest is so adapted as to be capable of being either raised or lowered. Boeheim states that he has not seen any examples of these reinforcing pieces of an earlier date than about 1510. These pieces, with interchangeable plates, were very numerous in some cases where expense was no object. A suite made for the Archduke Ferdinand of Tyrol, by Jörg Seusenhofer, consisting of a field-harness and a suit for foot-fighting, had appertaining to the two suits as many as thirty-four interchangeable and reinforcing pieces. They were made in 1547, and are now at Vienna.