Plate VIII (2) depicts a joust at the tilt, run at Augsburg in 1510, between Duke William IV of Bavaria and the Pfalzgraf Friedrich of the Rhine. The illustration is reproduced from a picture in Hans Schwenkh’s Wappenmeisterbuch, the tourney-book of the duke, who is seen jousting; it is a work which has already been referred to in these pages. The tilt itself, of three broad planks, is of massive construction. The harness worn in the earlier form was the Stechzeug, the kind that was used in the German Gestech, with no leg-armour, a style which has been already described and illustrated on Plate IX (1). The cuirass employed is flattened on the lance side, and there is a Rasthaken or queue as well as a lance-rest. Bases are worn by the riders, and a crest of plumes. The trapper of the duke’s horse, dark in colour, is shot with painted rays over the body, and a picture of the Sun in Splendour encircles the horse’s tail, which is further decorated with plumes. A collar of grelots is around the neck of the animal; the head is adorned with plumes, and the chamfron embellished with a picture of the sun. The lances with coronals are well shown; the former are long poles narrowing gently towards the heads, and the latter are in three short prongs.

Plate XI (1) pictures two fine suits at Paris for jousting at the tilt, one of them with the manifer or mainfere, the passe-guard and poldermiton in their places.

Plate X (1) illustrates a German harness, at Dresden, for this form of joust. It dates about 1580. There are three armours for jousting at the tilt in the Wallace Collection of Arms and Armour at London, Catalogue Numbers 484, 495 and 505. The first of these is a harness for Realgestech, as shown by the cross-ribbed shield, a device for affording a grip for the coronal of the lance on impact in order to prevent it from glancing off—another departure in the direction of greater safety for the jouster. This course was a late variety of the joust at the tilt.

No. 505, illustrated on Plate IX (2) is perhaps somewhat earlier in date than the other two suits, for in the right side of the “volante-piece” is a little square door or window, for enabling the wearer to converse freely when open. This aperture is about three inches square in size and freely perforated so as to admit air to the wearer when closed. It is shut, of course, when the jouster is ready for his career. In other respects the three suits are very much alike; and the “peaescod-bellied” breastplates of all of them tend to fix their date within narrow limits. The shields of Nos. 495 and 505 are practically the same in form and size. They fit round the front of the left side of the neck and cover the left shoulder and breast, running nearly straight down to the middle of the breastplate. The grand-guards are screwed to the upper parts of the breastplate and the shields are attached to them in like manner. The other reinforcing pieces are either present with the suits, or the armour is holed for them.

The sad accident which resulted in the death of Henri II, of France, at a fête d’armes held at Paris in 1559, was in a joust at the tilt with the Comte de Montgomeri. It was caused by the Comte failing to drop his splintered lance in good time.

The drawings of Hans Burgmaier in the Triumph of Maximilian afford illustrations of some of the varieties of the German jousting of the period.

Plate 45 illustrates the Welsch Gestech (Italian Joust) or Joust at the Tilt. The head-piece is the jousting-helm and the reinforcing pieces are in their places. The lance, tipped with a coronal, is lighter than that employed in the German Gestech and in Scharfrennen and the vamplate is circular in form. Feather plumes are worn.

Plate 46 pictures the Gestech or German joust (Das gemeine deutsche Gestech). The head-piece is the same as that on Plate 45. A cushion is worn over the horse’s chest, and a Rasthaken, or queue, and a Rüsthaken, or lance-rest, are on the flattened right side of the cuirass. The lance is heavy and tipped with a coronal. The crests shown are very fanciful.

Plate 47 illustrates Hohenzeuggestech. The jousters are seated on the high saddles (im hohen Zeug) peculiar to the course. The jousting-helm is worn. Lances are tipped with coronals, as is the case with all varieties of the Gestech.

Plate 48. Das Gestech im Beinharnisch. This is a variety of Gestech in which leg-armour is worn, as the name implies.

Plates 50 and 55 picture Bundrennen, the peculiarity of the course being that no beaver is worn beneath the disrupting shield. This makes it the most dangerous of all the courses, and injuries to the face were frequent. The vamplate is large and formed like a truncated cone.

Plate 51 depicts Geschifttartscherennen, in which course the shield, when struck by the lance on a certain spot, dissolves in fragments over the jouster’s head.

Plate 52. It pictures Geschiftscheibenrennen, a course similar in principle to the last-named, the difference being that the shield is a disk which, when properly struck, flies into the air, or the shield remains in its place but the plug in the centre flies out.

Plate 53. The cavaliers are here accoutred for the pan joust (Pfannenrennen). There are one or two other varieties of the joust depicted.

Several combats on foot of the fifteenth century, perhaps the most dangerous items of the articles of a pas d’armes of that period, have been fully described in Chapters III, IV and V, in the narrations by contemporary chroniclers of actual encounters. The character of these contests underwent a great change in the sixteenth century, through the introduction of barriers over which the combatants fought. These bars or barriers reached up to the breasts of the fighters, and prevented their grappling with each other or getting out of bounds. They made their appearance probably in the last decade of the fifteenth century. As the tilt had been conceived with a view towards mitigating the danger of the joust, so barriers were adopted towards minimizing the risk of serious injuries in fighting on foot, and, indeed, the new style was hardly more dangerous than the game of football as played to-day. This latest phase is well described by Viscount Dillon in “Barriers and Foot Combats,” a paper published in the Archæological Journal of 1904.[188] The special features of the armour for combats of this kind are its massive character, the presence of an apron (Kampfschurtz, a sort of continuation of the taces), and the large, thick, globose bascinet. A fine armour for foot-fighting in the lists may be seen in the Tower of London. It is a grand piece of work, weighing about 93 lbs., sent by Maximilian of Austria to our Henry VIII. The Vienna Collection possesses seven complete armours for fighting on foot, which vary considerably, both in form and weight. The weapons employed in these contests in Germany and Austria, as given in Freydal, are the sword in different forms, including the “bastard” (a hand and a half sword), the dussack, the Kurisschwert or armying-sword, and even the two-handed sword (Zweihänder or Schlachtschwert), the dagger, battle-axe (including the bec de faucon), mace, halbard, ranseur, guisarme, Aalspiesse (a short-shafted spear with rondel-guard), Langspiess (a short lance), Würfspiess (a javelin), Stange (a quarter-staff), and Drischel (the military flail).

The Fussturnier, which originated in the sixteenth century, was a fighting in groups on foot over a barrier, and in it and some other courses the challengers were termed “Maintenators” and their opponents “Aventuriers.” Each combatant had to deliver three thrusts with the lance and four strokes with the sword. Dr. Cornelius Curlitt gives the following extract from Acten des Dresdener Oberhofmarshallamtes of the year 1614:—“The one who shivers the greatest number of lances in the most adroit manner shall have the lance prize; and he who in five strokes strikes the bravest and strongest with the sword shall have the second prize.” The locking gauntlet was forbidden, and the lower limbs were without armour. A harness for this kind of fighting, by Anton Peffenhaüser, worn by the Kurfürst Johan George of Saxony in 1613, is now in the Dresden Museum. The head-piece is a burgonet.

An important later form of joust is the Freiturnier, or Free Course, which grew out of the old German Gestech, and, like it, was run “at the large,” that is without a tilt. There is a harness for this course at Dresden, reproduced on Plate X (2). The passguard is much larger than that worn in jousting at the tilt, reaching nearly to the left shoulder. Leg-armour was worn. The harness illustrated in Boeheim’s Waffenkunde (Fig. 655) as being for the Welsch Gestech, or joust at the tilt, is really for Freiturnier, a form of joust which does not appear before the second half of the sixteenth century.

As already stated, the suit in the Wallace Collection, numbered 484 in the catalogue of that institution, is for Realgestech or Plankengestech, a variety of joust at the tilt. It first appeared about 1540, and did not differ materially from the main course; nor did the armour employed differ except for the cross-ribbing on the shield. This course, like the others, fell into disuse in the seventeenth century, though it was the last to survive except the one called Scharmützel, often a sort of general siege or skirmish, with a view to practice for actual warfare. A Scharmützel was held at Dresden in 1553, when four bands of horsemen attacked a mock fortress, defended by a garrison armed with Aalspiesse and military forks, and supplied with four hundred earthenware pots for missiles, to be thrown empty. Cannon were employed on both sides, presumably fired in blank, though this is not stated.

The foregoing comprise the most distinctive forms of the tourney.

There were permanent lists in Germany, as also at Calais; and in England, at Westminster, Hampton Court, and Greenwich.

The quintain and running at the ring have been described in Chapter I, and there only remains the Karoussel, or Carrousel, to be mentioned. The name is derived from carosello, a ball of clay, which was hollow. The game was a favourite one at the court of Louis XIV, where it gave rise to handsome dresses and costly display. The players, arranged in opposing bands or sides, were mounted and threw these missiles at one another, catching them on their shields. There were several varieties of the game.

Harness for the tiltyard was usually made thicker than that for field purposes and was thus somewhat heavier. Much taste and labour were expended on its ornamentation.

Though the best armour was imported from Italy and Germany, a large proportion of that in use in England was made at home, and, indeed, there is plenty of evidence that this is so. Henry VIII, like Maximilian, took a strong personal interest in all that related to arms and armour, and was very desirous that the form and quality of harness made in England should be improved. With this object in view, he arranged with the emperor for German smiths to be sent to Greenwich, and some really fine armours were made there during his reign and later, many of which have been preserved, though the iron billets used in forging them were imported from Innsbruck, English iron not having been found to be of a sufficient tensile strength for the best purposes. Whether this inferiority lay in the process of puddling the iron or to the presence of any considerable proportion of deleterious elements, such as sulphur and phosphorous, is another matter. Henry VIII established his “Almain Armouries” at Greenwich about the year 1514.[189]

The form of “Hoasting” armour underwent several important changes during the course of the sixteenth century and to the time when body-armour fell into general disuse. The changes had their origin, mainly, in new departures in the fashion of the civil dress; indeed, the shape of the doublet of each period is faithfully reflected in that of the cuirass of steel. This following of the modes of the day by the smith sometimes resulted in the production of harness which, however effective from a spectacular point of view, proved most unsuitable for service in the field. This was greatly owing to the abandonment of the principle of a glancing surface on the armour, thus tending to effect lodgment for strokes from weapons of attack, instead of deflecting them.

The elegant form of “Gothic” armour of the connoisseur had been modelled, as we have seen, after the shapely Florentine dress of the fifteenth century: but a radical and far-reaching change took place at the commencement of the sixteenth, following on a new departure in civil costume. This style, armatura spigolata, is usually known as “Maximilian,” named after the emperor, and would seem to have been introduced by him in his extensive dominions from Italy, after his Italian campaign in 1496. That “Maximilian” armour was of Italian origin is clear by the very name it bore in Germany at the time, viz. “Mailander Harnisch.” The leading features of this type are:—the globose form of the breastplate; the abnormally wide-toed solerets, following the new fashion in shoes, “bear-paw” or “cow-mouthed” as they were commonly called; the heightening of the shoulder or neck guards (pieces often, though erroneously, termed pass-guards, a mistake pointed out by Viscount Dillon in one of his valuable and suggestive papers on armour); and the substitution of laminated tassets in place of the solid, tile-formed tuilles. The head-piece is the armet, the most perfect as well as the most familiar form of helmet—of which, however, there are several varieties. This armour was usually made fluted, though sometimes plain. When fluted, the whole surface down to the jambs, which are always smooth, is covered with narrow, regular radiating flutings, differing in that respect from “Gothic” armour, with its broad, sweeping flutings and ridgings.

Tonlet armour (à tonne) has a deep skirt of hoops called “jambers,” standing out all round like a more modern crinoline, and moving up and down like the laths of a Venetian blind. It also had its origin in Italy, and was copied from the civil skirts of the doublet of the period, called “bases”; which when reproduced in steel were clumsy and unwieldy. We have here an apt illustration of the lengths people will sometimes go in slavishly following a particular fashion, however clumsy or unsuitable it might be. This style of armour was greatly employed in fighting on foot, though a variety was adapted for use on horseback. A fine and historic armour for fighting on foot, made by Conrad Seusenhofer of Innsbruck, may be seen in the Tower of London.

Bards probably had their origin in the twelfth century, though there is little mention of them in English records before the close of the thirteenth, but in the fourteenth they would appear to have become fairly common. The chamfron, crinet and peytral are observable in engravings of the fourteenth century, when they were probably of cuir-bouille. In the Histoire de Charles VII it is stated that a combat, à outrance, took place in the year 1446, between the Seigneurs de Ternant and Galiot de Balthasin,[190] in which the latter was mounted “sur un puissant cheval, liquil selon la costume de Lombardie estoit tout convert de fer.” A complete equipment of steel plate for the horse was attained in the second half of the fifteenth century, when, according to a picture in the arsenal at Vienna, painted in 1480, “Der Ritter sitz auf seinem bis auf die Hufe verdecten Hengst.” A fine bard which had belonged to Henry VIII, weighing 92½ lbs., may be seen in the Tower of London. Bards for the tourney were usually of leather.

The expression “trapped and barded,” so frequently met with in records, is often misunderstood. The bard is a defence for the horse, while the trapper is its outside textile covering.

The importance of lightly-armed troops in warfare became steadily greater, and even as early as the beginning of the sixteenth century a large proportion of the armour for the field was made lighter, and demi-harnesses were employed for light cavalry.

The imitation in steel of the civil costume was carried to absurd lengths, as is glaringly shown in the so-called “Pfeifenharnis” (pipe-harness), forged after the picturesque dress of the period, with its pipings, puffs or rolls, points and slashes. Illustrations of it may be seen in the Triumph of Maximilian. In a suit in the Wallace Collection (catalogue No. 555) the details of the dress have been faithfully and minutely reproduced in metal. The very fabric of the civil costume has been imitated and the slashes are gilded. Harness was freely and delicately etched, engraved, damascened, and decorated with repoussé work; and some of the ornamentation did away altogether with the glancing surface of the armour, thus greatly militating against its efficiency for military purposes.

A fine armour in the Zeughaus, at Berlin, affords an excellent example of the best work of about the middle of the sixteenth century. It is by Peter von Speyer, of Annaberg, made for the Kurfürst Joachim II, of Brandenburg, whose arms decorate the breastplate. The helm is of the type of armet without collar. The peak in the cuirass tends to be placed lower down as the century advances, until at length the “peascod” form is reached, as shown on Plate IX (2). Here the breastplate is of the true Elizabethan “peascod” form, converging to a retreating point at the bottom. You have this shape exactly in portraits of the Earl of Leicester, and, indeed, of the queen herself. The tassets swell out over the hips, another feature observable in the portraits. This form continued, with some modifications, up to nearly the end of the century.