The most magnificent targets were made solely for parade, and were borne in front of princely personages by their esquires. The broad surfaces they presented for decoration, and the esteem they were held in, induced even very great artists, like Giulio Romano, not only to design them, but actually to work upon them. It is far from rare to find in collections of drawings by old masters, designs for shields, like those signed Polydore and B. Franco hanging in the corridors at Chatsworth. Under the Tudor and later Valois kings they were usually round and of steel, but sometimes elliptical, obovate, vesica-shaped, rectangular, and even heater-shaped, with painted arms. One of the finest ever produced is the Milanese buckler at Windsor, believed to have been in England since the time of Francis I. The repoussé work is of most exquisite finish and the gold damascening of extraordinary delicacy. Others not inferior to it are at Dresden, Turin, and Madrid, the latter by Colman of Augsburg. The shield of Charles IX. in the Louvre is also superbly damascened. Magnificent specimens are known from the hands of the Negrolis and Picinino of Milan, Gasparo Mola of Florence, Giorgio Ghisi of Mantua. A description of one, now lost, by Hieronymus Spacini of Milan, states that it comprised forty-eight engravings in gold upon niello. Hans Mielich has left several designs, some of which were carried out by Colman. The finely-embossed target in the Kensington Museum is signed by Georgius Sigman of Augsburg. The Bernal, Meyrick, Soltykoff, and other collections now dispersed, included examples illustrating the story of Coriolanus, Siege of Troy, Judgment of Paris, etc.
Fig. 31.—Target of Etched Steel. Italian or German, about 1550. Mr. P. Davidson’s Collection.
Those intended to receive the hard knocks of active service must have presented unembossed surfaces, though perhaps richly etched and gilded like the morions. The specimen ([Fig. 30]) belonging to Mr. Currie is rich enough for parade, with its bands of embossing and fine damascening, while the second illustration ([Fig. 31]) might have been the war target of an Italian or Spanish Captain under Philip II. It is remarkable that the first Greenwich inventory only contains eight bucklers, “of steele, seven guilte and wroughte.” They were probably somewhat like [Fig. 31]. Another among the jewels was of silver gilt, with the arms of England, roses, castles, and pomegranates. This, like the quaint little roundel belonging to Lord Kenyon ([Fig. 32]), was probably English. It appears that London bucklers acquired some celebrity in the time of Elizabeth, who limited the length of their steel points to two inches, for the young King of Scots greatly desired to possess one. George Brownfelde, Roger Morgan, Tothill Street, and Richard Hamkyn, King Street, Westminster, were buckler-makers to Henry VIII.; and Peter Lovat, a Frenchman, supplied steel pavices at the sign of the cock in Fleet Street at eight shillings each. They are seldom mentioned as playing a part in actual warfare, though when Lord Grey de Wilton called for forlorn hopes at the siege of Guynes, fifty stept out “with swordes and roondelles to view and essaye the breatches.” The celebrated Jarnac duel, witnessed by Henri II., was fought with sword and target.
Fig. 32.—Roundel with National Badges and Inscription. Belonging to Lord Kenyon.
