There were at that time two kinds of cross-bows—one for discharging bolts, the other for bullets. The bow was slung by means of a moulinet, a kind of hand-winch.
Embossed and fluted armour was not the only kind used in France and in Italy at the end of the fifteenth and the commencement of the following century. The monuments in the former country of the time of Louis XII., and on the other side of the Alps, show how prevalent was a peculiar description of plain armour, whereof the cuirass, which was longer than that of the embossed armour, had a rib or raised line in the middle. This rib, which completely altered the character of the cuirass, in that it served to turn aside the thrust of the lance, became increasingly distinctive as the seventeenth century drew near.
In the reign of Francis I. embossed and ribbed armour were equally
Fig. 61.—Damaskeened Armour of the end of the Sixteenth Century. (Portrait of François, Duc d’Alençon, from Montfaucon’s “La Monarchie Françoise.”)
used ([Fig. 61]). In the Museum of Artillery, in Paris, is preserved the armour which that king wore at the battle of Pavia. The body is longer than in the cuirass of the preceding century, the rib in the centre is more raised, the gusset of the shoulder-piece is made of several movable plates, and of large size. The casque, a generic name given since those times to all descriptions of head-armour, assumed a comfortable and elegant shape, which was maintained as long as the use of armour continued.
Another cuirass of the same date, still longer in the body, was made to turn up towards the lower extremity, and then took an inward bend to fit the hip. It was made with movable plates overlapping from below; this allowed the wearer to stoop, which it was almost impossible to do when the breast-piece and the back-piece were in one. Sometimes these plates were only three or four in number over the stomach, and the others over the breast were only represented, not genuine plates.
The armour called à éclisse, or à écrevisse, worn at a certain period by the halberdiers, must not be passed over; it received this name because the cuirass was made of horizontal plates (éclisses), three or four inches in width, which, though they covered the entire body, did not in any way impede its movements.
We must, however, refer to a peculiarity in this armour which prevented its general adoption; it was that as the movement or “play” of the éclisses made it convenient to wear, so from this flexibility it was found that the plates frequently became disconnected, and thus left a part of the body defenceless. In making the éclisses to overlap from below, regard was had to the usual direction of a sword-cut or dagger-thrust, which usually came from below; but there was all the more danger from blows of the martel[9] and battle-axe, the stroke of which weapon was directed downwards.