Whalebone was employed for gauntlets and also for swords used in the tournament. Froissart uses the words ‘gands de baleine’ in describing the equipment of the troops of Philip von Arteveld at the Battle of Rosbecque.

Quilted garments were still worn, either as the sole defence or as a gambeson under the mail. As late as the year 1460 we find regulations of Louis XI of France ordering these coats of defence to be made of from 30 to 36 folds of linen.[13]

Leather, either in its natural state or boiled and beaten till it could be moulded and then allowed to dry hard, was frequently used at this period for all kinds of defensive armour.

In Chaucer’s ‘Rime of Sir Thopas’, from which we have quoted before, occur the words, ‘His jambeux were of quirboilly.’ The jambeaux were coverings for the legs. This quirboilly, cuirbully, or cuirbouilli, when finished was an exceedingly hard substance, and was, on account of its lightness as compared to metal, much used for tournament armour and for the Barding or defence for the horse. In the Roll of Purchases for the Windsor Park Tournament, held in 1278, mention is made of cuirasses supplied by Milo the Currier, who also furnished helms of the same material.[14] In the Inventory of Sir Simon Burley, beheaded in 1338, we find under ‘Armure de guerre’:—‘Un palet (a headpiece) de quierboylle.’ There is a light leather helmet of the ‘morion’ type, dated sixteenth century, in the Zeughaus at Berlin.

Banded mail still appears in drawings or on monuments up to the end of the fourteenth century.

We may now turn to the making up of these varied materials, and will endeavour, step by step, to trace the gradual evolution of the full suit of plate from the first additions of plate defence to mail till we find that the mail practically disappears, or is only worn in small portions where plate cannot be used.

Fig. 11.
From Roy. MS. 16. G. vi,
f. 387, fourteenth century.		 Fig. 12.
Bib. Nat., Paris, Lancelot du Lac,
fourteenth century.

Setting aside the plastron de fer, which, as has been noticed, is seldom shown in representations of armour, we find the first additional defence was the Poleyne or knee-cop. We must suppose that there was good reason for thus reinforcing the mail defence on this part of the body. Probably this was due to the fact that the shield became shorter at this period, and also because the position of the wearer when mounted exposed the knee, a very delicate piece of anatomy, to the attacks of the foot-soldier ([Fig. 11]). Poleynes are mentioned in a wardrobe account of Edward I in 1300. They were frequently made of cuirbouilli, and this material is probably intended in the illustration ([Plate III], 1), as elaborately decorated metal is rarely met with at this period. At the end of the thirteenth century appear those curious appendages known as Ailettes. On [Plate III], 2, the figure is shown wearing the poleynes and also the ailettes. For practical purposes they are represented on recumbent figures as worn at the back, but in pictorial illustrations they are invariably shown on the outside of the shoulder. Some writers consider that they were solely used for ornament, presumably because they are generally shown decorated with heraldic blazons. Against this, however, we may place the fact that they are depicted in representations of battles, and in Queen Mary’s psalter (2. B. vii in the British Museum) the combatants wear plain ailettes. The German name for the ailettes (Tartschen) suggests also that they were intended for shoulder-guards. Fourteenth-century Inventories abound with references to ailettes. In the Roll of Purchases for Windsor Park Tournament are mentioned thirty-eight pair of ailettes to be fastened with silk laces supplied by one Richard Paternoster. In the Piers Gaveston Inventory before quoted are: ‘Les alettes garnis et frettez de perles.’ These, of course, would be only for ceremonial use. The illustration ([Fig. 11]) shows different forms of ailette, and occasionally we find the lozenge-shaped, and once (Brit. Mus. Roy. MS. 2. A. xxii, fol. 219) they assume a cruciform shape. The attachment of the ailettes with the laces referred to in the Windsor Park Inventory is shown on [Fig. 12]. In the Chroniques de Charlemaine, preserved in the Bibliothèque Royale at Brussels, the ailettes appear to be laced to the side of the helmet. This occurs in so many of the miniatures that it must be taken as a correct presentment of this detail in arming. It may be, however, that, as this manuscript was produced in the year 1460, it recorded a later method of using the ailette which, per se, disappears about the middle of the fourteenth century, as far as monumental records exist.

The next addition of plate to the equipment of mail seems to have been on the legs. The only monumental brass that gives this fashion of arming is the Northwode brass at Minster, Sheppey. As the legs are of later date than the rest of the brass, although most probably correct in design, it may be better to trust to a monument which is intact, as is the statue of Gulielmus Berardi, 1289, which is carved in the Cloister of the Annunziata Convent, Florence ([Fig. 13]). Here we find the front of the leg entirely protected by plates which may be intended for metal, but which, from their ornate decoration, seem rather to suggest cuirbouilli. These jambeaux, or, as they are sometimes called, Bainbergs or Beinbergs, of leather have been before referred to as mentioned by Chaucer.