Breastplate
Culture
Italian
Datelate 16th–early 17th century, with decoration from 19th century
Mediumreblued steel, copper, silver and brass with gilding and modern leather and velvet
Dimensions46.2 × 31 × 16 cm (18 3/16 × 12 3/16 × 6 5/16 in.), 4 lb 8 oz (weight)
ClassificationsArms and Armor
Credit LineThe John Woodman Higgins Armory Collection
Object number2014.1160.3
DescriptionProbably Italian, ca. 1600-5 (cf. to 53.200 at Detroit in Boccia, Bulletin and Museum Stibbert ST 3952 in Boccia/Coelho). Of high-necked, rather slab-sided form, without gussets. A medial ridge extends from just below the mid-breast down to a rounded dip slightly below the waistline. The integral basal flange has been cut down and pierced with thirteen holes, some in sets. A restored, single-lame skirt is riveted to the flange, embossed in reverse fashion to the breast, and fitted with seven associated pendant scalloped pteruges, alternately embossed with gilded leaf- or star motifs, both on a circularly-punched ground (cf. to those on a monument alla Romana to Gian Giacomo Medici, 1563, in Boccia/Coelho, fig. 288). Each pendant is secured to the skirt lame with a modern pair of brass domed rivets and square- or circular washers. Below each rivet is a floral rosette of gilded brass or copper. The nadir of each pteruge is finished in a hollow, oblate finial fitted with an even smaller rosette and washer; some retain fragments of a fabric lining. The neck- and armpit openings of the breast are finished with outwardly flared, inwardly rolled edges over wire cores, with chisel roping. The sunken borders filled with the alternating star and floral rivets are formed by embossed bordering ribs, those of the neck terminating in addorsed volutes at the medial region.
Extending downward in chevronic form from the armpits and sides are three raised ribs, the lowest terminating at the waist in a modern brass floral rivet. (Per Boccia, Bulletin, this chevron motif and variants are said to be of French influence, but appear on a number of Italian pieces, such as 53.200 at Detroit and portions of an armor in the Tower. This latter includes a pauldron, vambraces, left gauntlet, parts of leg harness, and a shaffron, all Italian ca 1600; II.85 and VI.52 in Dufty. This latter variation is of etched and gilded bands terminating in voluted crescents, the joins fitted with eight-pointed stars.)
The upper terminals at the shoulders are pierced with three holes each in a nearly vertical line. Two are fitted with short L-shaped pins. The other two of these holes are fitted with arrow-shaped keeper pins. There are no buckles. There is a similar set of keeper pins at either side at the waist.
Centered at the vertical edge slightly above the waist is a horizontal slot, possibly for a slotted tab (turning?) of a backplate, not present on that currently fitted. The vacant holes above the slot may have been for a later strap keeper, or a pivot hook (slotted- and pivot- hooked cuirasses exist at least by 1539; cf. to A.139 at Madrid, on an armor for Charles V by the Negroli, in Boccia/Coelho plts 156/8, fig. XIX, p 331).
The center of the upper half of the breast is decorated with a vertically-aligned set of appliqué, 19th century silvered copper plaques. The uppermost depicts a grotesque bearded male framed within divergent foliate and cusped crown-like device above the brow, and four downward overlapping open scales below. The lower plaque consists of a raised oval boss with acanthus leaves centered above and below, and addorsed recurved volutes scrolling framing the whole. The lower terminus is of intertwined tapering openwork. Beneath the uppermost plaque there are four pairs of vacant holes, suggesting that the current mount replaces an earlier one.
There are closely spaced holes for lining rivets on the front and backplates, retaining traces of an old fabric band, now filled by the star and flower rivets characteristic of the suit. These holes could suggest modification in the 17c or 18c.
ProvenanceEx-collection of prince Peter Soltykoff (St. Petersburg, Russia, ca. 1845) le Chevalier Raoul Richards (Rome, Italy, no later than 3 March 1890) V.R. Bachereau (Paris, France, 1890(?)-1892/4(?)) Lazzarone (Italy, 1892(?)-NLT 10 December 1894) Oliver H.P. Belmont (NYC and Newport, RI, post 1894) Clarence H. Mackay (Roslyn, L.I., NLT 1939) Jacques Seligmann & Co., Inc. (NYC, to 18 July 1939) Purchased by Museum on July 18, 1939 from Jacques Seligmann & Co., Inc (NYC), agents for estate of Clarence H. Mackay. Higgins Armory Museum (Worcester, 18 July 1939-2014) Collection transfer from Higgins Armory, January 2014.
On View
Not on viewCollections
