Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages / Third Edition

by Edward Lewes Cutts

n arriving at the fourteenth century, we have reached the very heart of our subject. For this century was the period of the great national wars with France and Scotland; it was the time when the mercenaries raised in the Italian wars first learnt, and then taught the world, the trade of soldier and trained their captains in the art of war; it was the period when the romantic exploits and picturesque trappings of chivalry were in their greatest vogue; the period when Gothic art was at its highest point of excellence. It was a period, too, of which we have ample knowledge from public records and serious histories, from romance writers in poetry and prose, from Chaucer and Froissart, from MS. illuminations and monumental effigies. Our difficulty amid such a profusion of material is to select that which will be most serviceable to our special purpose.

Let us begin with some detailed account of the different kinds and fashions of armour and equipment. In the preceding period, it has been seen, the most approved knightly armour was of mail. The characteristic feature of the armour of the fourteenth century is the intermixture of mail and plate. We see it first in small supplementary defences of plate introduced to protect the elbow and knee-joints. Probably it was found that the rather heavy and unpliable sleeve and hose of mail pressed inconveniently upon these joints; therefore the armourer adopted the expedient which proved to be the “thin end of the wedge” which gradually brought plate armour into fashion. He cut the mail hose in two; the lower part, which was then like a modern stocking, protected the leg, and the upper part protected the thigh, each being independently fastened below and above the knee, leaving the knee unprotected. Then he hollowed a piece of plate iron so as to form a cap for the knee, called technically a genouillière, within which the joint could work freely without chafing or pressure; perhaps it was padded or stuffed so as to deaden the effect of a blow; and it was fashioned so as effectually to cover all the part left undefended by the mail. The sleeve of the hauberk was cut in the same way, and the elbow was defended by a cap of plate-iron called a coudière. Early examples of these two pieces of plate armour will be seen in the later illustrations of our last chapter, for they were introduced a little before the end of the thirteenth century. The two pieces of plate were introduced simultaneously, and they appear together in the woodcut of David and his men in our last chapter; but we often find the genouillière used while the arm is still defended only by the sleeve of the hauberk, as in the first woodcut in the present chapter, and again in the cut on p. 348. It is easy to see that the pressure of the chausses of mail upon the knee in riding would be constant and considerable, and a much more serious inconvenience than the pressure upon the elbow in the usual attitude of the arm.

Men-at-Arms, Fourteenth Century.

Next, round plates of metal, called placates or roundels, were applied to shield the armpits from a thrust; and sometimes they were used also at the elbow to protect the inner side of the joint where, for the convenience of motion, it was destitute of armour. An example of a roundel at the shoulder will be seen in one of the men-at-arms in the woodcut on p. 339. Another curious fashion which very generally prevailed at this time—that is, at the close of the thirteenth and beginning of the fourteenth century—was the ailette. It was a thin, oblong plate of metal, which was attached behind the shoulder. It would to some extent deaden the force of a blow directed at the neck, but it would afford so inartificial and ineffective a defence, that it is difficult to believe it was intended for anything more than an ornament. It is worn by the foremost knight in the cut on p. 335.

Perhaps the next great improvement was to protect the foot by a shoe made of plates of iron overlapping, like the shell of a lobster, the sole being still of leather. Then plates of iron, made to fit the limb, were applied to the shin and the upper part of the forearm, and sometimes a small plate is applied to the upper part of the arm in the place most exposed to a blow. Then the shin and forearm defences were enlarged so as to enclose the limb completely, opening at the side with a hinge, and closing with straps or rivets. Then the thigh and the upper arm were similarly enclosed in plate.

It is a little difficult to trace exactly the changes which took place in the body defences, because all through this period it was the fashion to wear a surcoat of some kind, which usually conceals all that was worn beneath it. It is however probable that at an early period of the introduction of plate a breastplate was introduced, which was worn over the hauberk, and perhaps fastened to it. Then, it would seem, a back plate was added also, worn over the hauberk. Next, the breast and back plate were made to enclose the whole of the upper part of the body, while only a skirt of mail remained; i.e. a garment of the same shape as the hauberk was worn, unprotected with mail, where the breast and back plate would come upon it, but still having its skirt covered with rings. In an illumination in the MS., is a picture of a knight putting off his jupon, in which the “pair of plates,” as Chaucer calls them in a quotation hereafter given, is seen, tinted blue (steel colour), with a skirt of mail. At this time the helmet had a fringe of mail, called the camail, attached to its lower margin, which fell over the body armour, and defended the neck. It is clearly seen in the hindermost knight of the group in the woodcut on p. 339, and in the effigy of John of Eltham, on p. 342.

It is not difficult to see the superiority of defence which plate afforded over mail. The edge of sword or axe would bite upon the mail; if the rings were unbroken, still the blow would be likely to bruise; and in romances it is common enough to hear of huge cantles of mail being hewn out by their blows, and the doughty champions being spent with loss of blood. But many a blow would glance off quite harmless from the curved and polished, and well-tempered surface of plate; so that it would probably require not only a more dexterous blow to make the edge of the weapon bite at all on the plate, but also a harder blow to cut into it so as to wound. In “Prince Arthur” we read of Sir Tristram and Sir Governale—“they avoided their horses, and put their shields before them, and they strake together with bright swords like men that were of might, and either wounded other wondrous sore, so that the blood ran upon the grass, and of their harness they had hewed off many pieces.” And again, in a combat between Sir Tristram and Sir Elias, after a course in which “either smote other so hard that both horses and knights went to the earth,” “they both lightly rose up and dressed their shields on their shoulders, with naked swords in their hands, and they dashed together like as there had been a flaming fire about them. Thus they traced and traversed, and hewed on helms and hauberks, and cut away many pieces and cantles of their shields, and either wounded other passingly sore, so that the hot blood fell fresh upon the earth.”

We have said that a surcoat of some kind was worn throughout this period, but it differed in shape at different times, and had different names applied to it. In the early part of the time of which we are now speaking, i.e. when the innovation of plate armour was beginning, the loose and flowing surcoat of the thirteenth century was still used, and is very clearly seen in the nearest of the group of knights in woodcut on p. 339. It was usually of linen or silk, sleeveless, reached halfway between the knee and ankle, was left unstiffened to fall in loose folds, except that it was girt by a silk cord round the waist, and its skirts flutter behind as the wearer gallops on through the air. The change of taste was in the direction of shortening the skirts of the surcoat, and making it scantier about the body, and stiffening it so as to make it fit the person without folds; at last it was tightly fitted to the breast and back plate, and showed their outline; and it was not uncommonly covered with embroidery, often of the armorial bearings of the wearer. The former garment is properly called a surcoat, and the latter a jupon; the one is characteristic of the greater part of the thirteenth century, the latter of the greater part of the fourteenth. But the fashion did not change suddenly from the one to the other; there was a transitional phase called the cyclas, which may be briefly described. The cyclas opened up the sides instead of in front, and it had this curious peculiarity, that the front skirt was cut much shorter than the hind skirt—behind it reached to the knees, but in front not very much below the hips. The fashion has this advantage for antiquarians, that the shortness of the front skirt allows us to see a whole series of military garments beneath, which are hidden by the long surcoat and even by the shorter jupon, A suit of armour of this period is represented in the Roman d’Alexandre (Bodleian Library), at folio 143 v., and elsewhere in the MS. The remainder of the few examples of the cyclas which remain, and which, so far as our observation extends, are all in sepulchral monuments, range between the years 1325 and 1335, the shortening of the cyclas enables us to see. We have chosen for our illustration the sepulchral effigy in Westminster Abbey of John of Eltham, the second son of King Edward II., who died in 1334. Here we see first and lowest the hacqueton; then the hauberk of chain mail, slightly pointed in front, which was one of the fashions of the time, as we see it also in the monumental brasses of Sir John de Creke, at Westley-Waterless, Cambridgeshire, and of Sir J. D’Aubernoun, the younger, at Stoke D’Abernon, Surrey; over the hauberk we see the ornamented gambeson; and over all the cyclas. It is a question whether knights generally wore this whole series of defences, but the monumental effigies are usually so accurate in their representations of actual costume, that we must conclude that at least on occasions of state solemnity they were all worn. In the illustration it will be seen that the cyclas is confined, not by a silk cord, but by a narrow belt, while the sword-belt of the thirteenth century is still worn in addition. The jupon is seen in the two knights tilting, in the woodcut on p. 348. In the knight on the left will be seen how it fits tightly, and takes the globular shape of the breastplate. It will be noticed that on this knight the skirt of the jupon is scalloped, on the other it is plain. The jupon was not girded with a silk cord or a narrow belt; it was made to fit tight without any such fastening. The sword-belt worn with it differs in two important respects from that worn previously. It does not fall diagonally across the person, but horizontally over the hips; and it is not merely a leather belt ornamented, but the leather foundation is completely concealed by plates of metal in high relief, chased, gilt, and filled with enamels, forming a gorgeous decoration. The general form will be seen in the woodcut on p. 350, but its elaboration and splendour are better understood on an examination of some of the sculptured effigies, in which the forms of the metal plates are preserved in facsimile, with traces of their gilding and colour still remaining.