Breastplate

Dateabout 1490

MediumSteel and iron

Dimensions29 × 34 × 16 cm (11 7/16 × 13 3/8 × 6 5/16 in.), 16 lb 2 oz (weight with waistlame)

ClassificationsArms and Armor

MarkingsBordering the neck opening are the incised letters “R;T M (?)—superimposed; and “L” or “B”, the spaces between each of which is filled with a trilobated design with stem. The whole grouping is framed within a flowering, scrolled band. On the breast below this, near the medial region, is the 'table and legs' mark. Helm and cuirass have chiseled, chevronic marks within.

Credit LineThe John Woodman Higgins Armory Collection

Terms

Object number2014.1164.2

DescriptionThe breastplate is heavy and well-made, of asymmetrical form, flattened in the chest and slightly rounded below, with a shallow beveled curve at the neck, and plain at the left armpit. The right side of the breast is strongly boxed, with the deep curve at the armpit nearly at a right angle to the chest. The sides are fitted with hinges, squarish plates pierced with a horizontal row of adjustment holes for the backplate. These plates are marked with three nicks on the outside edges, and with ellipses and chevrons within – two on the left, three on the right. Each plate is crescent-cut on the dentated rear edge, and is decorated with transverse and oblique incised pairs of lines. The presence of a partly-obscured large hole forward of each hinge suggests that the latter are later replacements installed during the working life of the breastplate.

The left armpit is fitted with an appliqué, curved stop-rib of half-round stock, which is almost certainly a later replacement. It is cut at broad intervals with close-spaced pairs of oblique lines. At the right anterior corner is a similar rib mounted vertically. This is probably that as originally fitted, and has a more spiraled form of incised decoration, the intervals between which are filled with addorsed, berry-like groupings. The whole is reminiscent of Lorenz Helmschmied’s work.

There is a small, old patched repair at mid-height interior.

At the shoulders, the breastplate is fitted with two hinged heavy, curved steel straps. These are faceted, with strong angular flanges at the outer edges. These are slotted near the front for the leather straps of the pauldrons. The posterior terminals of the straps are rounded, cut in a petalled fashion generally similar to that of the turnbuckle base, and pierced with three adjustment holes each. It should be noted that the right strap is old, but somewhat later than the left, which has had the hinge side of the strap replaced. Both straps have the chevron mark on the inside face.

In order to secure and adjust the helm, the upper part of the breastplate is pierced with three vertical rows of five threaded holes each, of which the uppermost in the two outer rows are apparently cut later in the working life (the helm bolts do not fit this set). To either side of the outer rows is a single threaded hole which was probably for the internal straps which passed over the shoulders and engaged the tongued slots on the backplate.

At mid-height of the left side of the breastplate, at the armpit, is a transverse set of holes for the Stechtartsche.

The boxed right lower corner is pierced on the front with nine holes in two rows of which only the inner group is threaded. This arrangement permits adjustment of the lance-rest.

On the adjacent side is formed a group of five threaded holes in two rows, to the rear of which is a single threaded hole (enlarged in modern times). These holes are for the restored Rasthaken (queue).
ProvenanceCounts Erbach-Erbach (Erbach in Odenwald) E. Kahlert und Sohn (Berlin) Clarence H. Mackay (Roslyn, L.I) Purchased by the Armory from Jacques Seligmann & Co., Inc. (NYC), agents for the Mackay estate, on 1 April 1940, as #A-43/120. Collection transfer from Higgins Armory, January 2014.

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