Beschreibung:

THREE ELEMENTS OF A SOUTH GERMAN ARMOUR GARNITURE WITH FINELY ETCHED AND GILT DECORATION, BY WOLFGANG AND FRANZ GROßSCHEDEL OF LANDSHUT, CIRCA 1555 comprising the detachable upper section of a right cuisse for tilt use, formed of two upward-overlapping lames, each increasing in height to its outside, the uppermost fitted at the centre of its upper edge with a semi-circular buff-leather suspension-tab (replaced) pierced with a pair of lace-holes, and the lowest and tallest fitted at each end of its lower edge with a turning-pin (the outer one missing) and between them with a plain locating-stud to attach it to the main plate of the cuisse; a right cuisse for heavy field use, formed of five upward overlapping lames (the lowest originally forming part of the lower section of a pauldron of the same garniture) and terminating in a poleyn of four lames overlapping outward from the second which is shaped to the point of the knee and formed at its outer end with a small oval side-wing, and the lowest lame pierced at it lower edge with a pair of keyhole-slots to attach it to the turning-pins of a greave; and the upper four lames of a left cuisse for heavy field use, forming the pair to the last (its lowest lame originally forming part of another element of the same garniture); all three elements embossed in low relief and finely etched with bands of an undulating ribbon-design representing stylised clouds, blackened against a gilt ground in each case filled with fine foliate scrolls and stippling, and enclosed to either side by a narrower version of the ribbon-design on a plain black ground, repeated around the main edges of the armour which are formed with inward turns, roped except at the lower end of the poleyn which is additionally decorated on its wing and to either side of the point of the knee with stylised acanthus giving issue to fine blackened scrolls (all three elements showing pitting and wear in parts) The first 13.0 cm; 5⅛ in: the second 29.0 cm; 7½ in; the third 16.5 cm ; 6½ in (3) The fine decoration of these pieces closely resembles that of the extensive "cloud-band" garniture made for the future King Philip II of Spain by Wolfgang and Franz Großschedel of Landshut in 1554. Now largely preserved in the Real Armeria, Madrid, Inv. Nos A263-73 (J. G. Mann, Exhibition of Spanish Royal Armour in the Tower of London, London, 1960, pp. 12-13, pls IV -VII) it was commissioned by the King to wear when he went to England to marry Queen Mary I at Winchester Cathedral on 25 July of that year. The first pieces of the garniture were urgently transported from Landshut to England by the armourers themselves. It was probably for this armour that Franz, the son and partner of Wolfgang, received payment in 1555. The elements offered here differ from those of the Spanish king's garniture in that their narrow bands and borders of ribbon-ornament are white on a blackened ground, rather than gilt overall as on the latter, and that they are decorated with acanthus foliage to either side of the point of the knee. Showing the same features are a pair of gauntlets formerly in the collection of William Meyrick and a cuisse and a pair of toe-caps formerly in the collections of Sir Guy Laking and R.T. Gwynn (F. H. Cripps-Day, A Record of Armour Sales 18981-1924, London, 1925, pp. 181 & 232, fig. 92 & 145). It can nevertheless be taken as certain that these pieces are products of the same distinguished workshop as the armour of Philip II. The earliest record of Wolfgang Großschedel dates from 1517/18 when he was listed among the 'Almain' or German armourers employed by King Henry VIII in his recently established royal armour workshop in Greenwich. By February 1520/1, however, he has returned to his native land and been admitted a citizen of Landshut, Bavaria. From 1549 he was recorded as the owner of a house in the city's New Town which, on his death in 1562, was inherited by his son Franz who had been working with him since at least 1555. The latte