DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.31962#0030
12
INTRODUCTION.
St. George has been the English badge ever since Edward's time.* This appears still more likely,
when it is considered that Edward the Third founded the Order of the Garter.
" Knights being represented cross-legged was certainly allusive to Templars, or Knights of the
Holy Voyage; as after Edward the Thirds reign (in which the order was dissolved) we find no
monuments in that fashion.
" At the earlier period, when the mail covered the head, it appears not to have been detached
from, but to have been one piece with, that which covered the body; but in the early part of the
reign of Henry the Third, to which period our earliest effigies belong, we see the mail on the top
of the head, and laced or tied above the left ear. Of this description are the effigies of many of the
knights in the Temple church, William Longespee, Earl of Salisbury, the Knight in Malvern abbey
church, Robert Courthose, &c. An early specimen differs considerably from these, as the mail appears
to go over the surcoat, not to have any kind of lacing or fastening much above the ears, nor to be
attached to the shirt of mail, as in the former—onty, like them, characterized by this flatness.
" The last alteration we find, is the mail as before, but of one entire piece, sometimes with and
sometimes without a fillet; but resembling the hood, a part of the civil dress, to be drawn over the
head, and thrown back upon the shoulders, at pleasure.
" The basinet was worn in the fourteenth century, and part of the thirteenth, sometimes with or
without a vizor, but always finished with other appendages, as The camail, and what was
called by the French a AoM?*soM, to which may be added a strap, was to attach the whole, by means of
a buckle, to the haubergeon, or plates.
" The was originally a covering of mail for the head, and was called cayyMtMV, the basinet
being worn over it; but about 1330 its form was materially altered : it no longer extended as a cover-
ing for the head; or staples, were introduced on the basinet, and the camail fastened outside,
by means of these and a lace. We have some few instances, about the period that this change took
place, where the ends of the mail, at its junction with the basinet, are left folding over the lacing,
and depending on each side in an ornamental form. The camail was often called the or
the gorgerette, after the changes took place; but as there is more consistency in Froissart, in his
descriptions of armour, I have preferred that name by which he invariably distinguishes this ap-
pendage to the basinet. The lacing of the helmet to the cerueJ/aere appears to have been first dis-
used in all those monuments of the time of Henry the Fourth, and was never afterwards resumed.^
Speaking of the fanciful diaper-work introduced in the first and fourth quarters of the shield of
on the second and
third, Mr. Stothard, with his usual discrimination, says he does not see that any herald is justified in
calling the deu-de-lys ornament a quarter of France.^
On circlets, chaplets or wreaths, and coronets, so often occurring on our monumental figures, Mr.
Stothard makes the following notes:
* This is a judicious observation of Mr. Stothard; for we hnd by Matthew Paris that, in the year 1188, the French
cusaders were distinguished by red crosses, the Engiish by white, the Flemings by green. We may therefore infer
that the rec% cross was not then one of our national ensigns. " Crucem animosius susceperunt. Provisum est etiam
inter eos, ut omnes de regno, Francorum cruces rubeas, de terris regis Anglorum albas, de terra comitis Flandrensis
virides haberent cruces." Matt. Paris, Hist. Angl. edit. Watts, p. 146.
t Memoir, p. 335. + Ibid. p. 332.
§ Ibid. 126.
INTRODUCTION.
St. George has been the English badge ever since Edward's time.* This appears still more likely,
when it is considered that Edward the Third founded the Order of the Garter.
" Knights being represented cross-legged was certainly allusive to Templars, or Knights of the
Holy Voyage; as after Edward the Thirds reign (in which the order was dissolved) we find no
monuments in that fashion.
" At the earlier period, when the mail covered the head, it appears not to have been detached
from, but to have been one piece with, that which covered the body; but in the early part of the
reign of Henry the Third, to which period our earliest effigies belong, we see the mail on the top
of the head, and laced or tied above the left ear. Of this description are the effigies of many of the
knights in the Temple church, William Longespee, Earl of Salisbury, the Knight in Malvern abbey
church, Robert Courthose, &c. An early specimen differs considerably from these, as the mail appears
to go over the surcoat, not to have any kind of lacing or fastening much above the ears, nor to be
attached to the shirt of mail, as in the former—onty, like them, characterized by this flatness.
" The last alteration we find, is the mail as before, but of one entire piece, sometimes with and
sometimes without a fillet; but resembling the hood, a part of the civil dress, to be drawn over the
head, and thrown back upon the shoulders, at pleasure.
" The basinet was worn in the fourteenth century, and part of the thirteenth, sometimes with or
without a vizor, but always finished with other appendages, as The camail, and what was
called by the French a AoM?*soM, to which may be added a strap, was to attach the whole, by means of
a buckle, to the haubergeon, or plates.
" The was originally a covering of mail for the head, and was called cayyMtMV, the basinet
being worn over it; but about 1330 its form was materially altered : it no longer extended as a cover-
ing for the head; or staples, were introduced on the basinet, and the camail fastened outside,
by means of these and a lace. We have some few instances, about the period that this change took
place, where the ends of the mail, at its junction with the basinet, are left folding over the lacing,
and depending on each side in an ornamental form. The camail was often called the or
the gorgerette, after the changes took place; but as there is more consistency in Froissart, in his
descriptions of armour, I have preferred that name by which he invariably distinguishes this ap-
pendage to the basinet. The lacing of the helmet to the cerueJ/aere appears to have been first dis-
used in all those monuments of the time of Henry the Fourth, and was never afterwards resumed.^
Speaking of the fanciful diaper-work introduced in the first and fourth quarters of the shield of
on the second and
third, Mr. Stothard, with his usual discrimination, says he does not see that any herald is justified in
calling the deu-de-lys ornament a quarter of France.^
On circlets, chaplets or wreaths, and coronets, so often occurring on our monumental figures, Mr.
Stothard makes the following notes:
* This is a judicious observation of Mr. Stothard; for we hnd by Matthew Paris that, in the year 1188, the French
cusaders were distinguished by red crosses, the Engiish by white, the Flemings by green. We may therefore infer
that the rec% cross was not then one of our national ensigns. " Crucem animosius susceperunt. Provisum est etiam
inter eos, ut omnes de regno, Francorum cruces rubeas, de terris regis Anglorum albas, de terra comitis Flandrensis
virides haberent cruces." Matt. Paris, Hist. Angl. edit. Watts, p. 146.
t Memoir, p. 335. + Ibid. p. 332.
§ Ibid. 126.