Military History Photo Friday: Decorative Shields in the Uffizi Gallery

Medusa on shield, painted by Caravaggio c. 1595-98. It brings to mind the Classical tale of how Perseus beheaded Medusa and later gave the head to the goddess Athena, who put it on her shield. This piece was a gift from Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte to Grand Duke Ferdinando I in 1598.

Shortly after my last trip to Tangier, I got to spend a few days in Florence. Besides brushing off a pickpocket and admiring some grotesque art, I also spent a wonderful day in the famous Uffizi Gallery. They have a fine collection of Classical and Renaissance art. Of interest to military historians are two decorative shields. Of course these would have never seen a battle, but were rather for parades or simply hanging on the wall.

The back of the Medusa shield.

A buckler (small shield) with spike and etched decoration. Made c. 1570-80 by an unknown artist, it was kept in the Medici Armory together with the Medusa shield.

Military History Photo Friday: Roman Crocodile Armor

Yes, it's been almost a month since I posted. Sorry about that! I was on a research trip to Oxford and London, plus I was slammed with a ghostwriting deadline. Hopefully I'm now back on track for more regular blog posts.

I spotted this lovely suit of armor in the British Museum. It's from Manfalout, Egypt, from the 3rd or 4th century AD. This town is in Middle Egypt where there were many sacred grottoes to the crocodile-headed god Sobek, god of the Nile. These grottoes had sacred crocodiles that were often mummified after death. Roman soldiers often took on local religions and the troops in Manfalout were no exception. They would hold religious processions in honor of Sobek while wearing crocodile armor.

Photo copyright Sean McLachlan. Sorry for the reflection in the middle of the shot. I twisted and turned every which way and this was the best I could get. They really needed to invent artifact cases that don't reflect at all!

Military History Photo Friday: Armor in the Museo Cerralbo, Madrid

This week over at Black Gate I blogged about the amazing collection at the Museo Cerralbo, Madrid. Enrique de Aguilera y Gamboa (1845-1922), 17th Marquis of Cerralbo, gathered together a vast collection of art and antiquities in his mansion in Spain's capital. He had everything from old books and Roman intaglios to ornate brass lamps and suits of armor. It's now a fun museum.

Sadly, there isn't much signage in the museum and I'm not much of an expert, so I won't be able to tell you much about these pieces. If you can identify any, please drop me a line in the comments section! Hit the link above to see the full article!

Photos copyright Sean McLachlan.

A lovely suit of samurai armor.

A German zweihander (two-handed sword), plus bits of barding (horse armor), and two types of polearm--a halberd (left) and a corseque (right)

Military History Photo Friday: Luxury Armor in Vienna

I've posted here before about visiting the lovely city of Vienna, which feels like a museum with all its palaces, elegant nineteenth-century cafes, and fine squares. While I wouldn't want to live in a museum for very long, I certainly enjoyed my visit.

One interesting spot was the Royal Armory, housed like many Viennese museums in an old Hapsburg palace. It has one of the best collections of luxury arms and armor made for nobility in Europe.

Above are three suits of blued steel made in Augsburg around 1570. Blued steel is created by heating the metal to 300°C, polishing it, and reheating it to 300°C again. It creates an attractive finish but doesn't make the steel stronger.

Below are two other blued steel harnesses with gold inlay, and a shield that you wouldn't want to use in battle. They were made around 1575 for Don Juan de Austria, the illegitimate son of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, back when the empire included Spain. He led the Spanish to victory over the Ottomans in the naval battle of Lepanto in 1571, the same battle where Cervantes got wounded.

For more on this amazing collection, check out my post on Black Gate about The Royal Armory of Vienna.


Photos copyright Sean McLachlan.

Military History Photo Friday: Filipino Weapons and Armor of the Nineteenth Century

The Museo Naval in Madrid has a fine collection of artifacts from Spain's Golden Age of Sail. One of hte more unusual collections is this set of Filipino weapons and armor. The Philippines were a Spanish colony for many years, and the Filipino people fought against the Spanish for their independence. The Americans inherited this war when they took the Philippines from Spain in the Spanish-American war of 1898.

Military History Photo Friday: German Armor from the Sixteenth Century

These two lovely suits of armor are in the Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and of Military History, in Brussels, Belgium. They have a splendid collection of medieval arms and armor that will be the subject of an upcoming post on the Black Gate blog. I'll give you the link when it goes live next week.

The suit on the left was made in Germany in the third quarter of the 16th century, while the one on the right was made in the famous workshop of Michael Witz of Innsbruck around 1555. The helmet in between is also German from the mid-16th century.

Sadly I can't tell you more because the signage was all in French and Dutch. I puzzled out as much as I could and came to the odd discovery that while I studied both French and German many years ago, I had an easier time reading the Dutch because it was close to German and my German was always better than my French!

Oh, and what's that gauntlet on the lower right getting up to?

Guest Post: Leather armour

Today I'm trading blogs with A.J. Walker, a medievalist and novelist who's just starting a virtual book tour for his first fantasy novel, Roots Run Deep, epublished by Double Dragon. He has a series called Medieval Mondays over at his blog and today I'm blogging over there about Medieval handgonnes. So without further ado. . .


In the first chapter of my fantasy novel Roots Run Deep, a team of goblinkin are preparing for a raid on a human city.

Kip was as prepared as she could be. Like anyone who lived on the Reservation, she went armed at all times. Not that she had much. Her tattered leather jerkin gave scant protection, and for weapons she carried a flint knife and a tfaa, a traditional goblin fighting stick. A balanced, two foot-long rod carved from ironwood, the tfaa didn’t look like much, but in skilled hands it could disarm and cripple a swordsman. Prenta had gotten rid of her showy clothes and dressed in a more practical leather jerkin similar to Kip’s.

These impoverished goblinkin are wearing leather armour because they can't afford anything better and their human rulers forbid them from bearing metal weapons and armor. (This ban doesn't last, but that comes later in the story. . .) Leather armour is a staple of fantasy fiction and roleplaying games, yet many people don't realize just how common it was in medieval warfare. Even knights wore it.

Leather armour goes back to ancient times and continued in use through the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance. This picture shows the shoulder and upper arm portions of an elegant suit of leather dating to the Italian Renaissance, courtesy of the Schola Forum. As you can see, it looks much like regular metal armour, and many historians believe that it was worn as much as or even more than metal armour. A suit of plate was hot and heavy, so on the march or during a friendly tournament the knight may choose to weather cooler leather. The rank and file would also be fitted with leather and perhaps some portions of metal armour for vulnerable places such as the head and chest.

While leather was much cheaper, it provided pretty good protection. Regular soft leather wasn't much help, but combined with quilted padding provided some protection, especially against blunt weapons such as maces.

More effective was cuir bouilli--boiled leather. If you soak leather in water and then place it in boiling water, it becomes elastic and pliable. It soon begins to shrink, thicken, and harden. As it's hardening the leather is hammered onto shaped blocks to create breastplates, greaves, vambraces, and anything else. A full suit of armour could be made in this way. The 14th century French chronicler Jean Froissart claimed that it was "leather that no iron can pierce" and while that may be overstating the case, leather armour certainly gave good protection. Games such as D&D probably undervalue its effectiveness. Modern experiments show that the average sword blow wouldn't get through, although a good English longbow would make short work of a leather breastplate! This basic article (PDF) explains the technique. Also check out this thread from Schola Forum for some more insights and pictures.

The picture below from The Historians' History of the World shows some improvements on leather armour, with overlapping metal scales, discs, and rings. These were all cheaper yet pretty effective alternatives to full plate and variants of these were used from ancient times into the Renaissance.