Page:A record of European armour and arms through seven centuries (Volume 3).djvu/236

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which assume the form of the briquet or fire steel. It figures in the 1917 catalogue of the Tower under Class VI, Nos. 6-12.

Let us consider the only other horse armour in the Tower of London which has a recorded historical interest, and which we can assign to a date within the first quarter of the XVIth century. We allude to the barding (Fig. 1003) on which is placed the famous suit made for King Henry VIII by Conrad Seusenhofer, to which we have just alluded. Although this full horse armour is engraved with scenes from the lives of St. George and of St. Barbara, like the suit placed upon it, and has the Garter motto, "Dieu et mon Droyt," several times repeated round the lower edge, and although its surface, like that of the suit, is plated with silver once gilt, this actual horse armour does not figure as part of the Emperor Maximilian's gift to the King. The work apparently of an armourer of rather earlier date, it is of Italian make; for the mark it bears, the letter M surmounted by a crescent, is distinctly Milanese in character. Mr. ffoulkes considers it possible that the armourer who enriched this bard may have been Paul van Vreland, whose name occurs in Royal Bills of Payment from 1514 to 1519 (Record Office, Exchr. T. R. Misc. Books 215): "Bardes of Stele; item a stele Barde gilte wt a Trayle of Roses and pomegranates wt the story of saincte George and saincte Barbara wt a crynney [crinet] and a Shawfron [chanfron] like gilte of the same worke wroughte by Powle wt a fringe of gold and crymson silke." As the spelling of these early records is unreliable, we may take it that Paul and Powle are different spellings of the same name.

The 1547 inventory, as quoted on page 191, describes the Henry VIII suit associated with the "Burgundian bard" and not with the one under discussion. It is not until the inventory of 1611-1629 that an allusion occurs which might refer to this horse armour, namely, "one feilde armor of an olde fashion with a base of stele the horses furniture being a barde Crinitt and a shaffron being all silvered and guilte." The more recent inventories do not allude to the horse armour, only mentioning the suit. It figures in the 1917 catalogue of the Tower under Class II, No. 5.

We should also notice in the Tower that connected with the two massive suits made towards the middle of the XVIth century for King Henry VIII, certain of the horse armour still exists in the shape of two complete saddles with their burr and cantle plates, and a small chanfron with its full crinet. To these must be added the remains of the same set which were formerly in the Armoury of Windsor Castle, but which by command of His Majesty King George V were transferred to the Tower in September 1914. These remains