Très rare armure anime d'Allemagne du Sud,... - Lot 133 - Pierre Bergé & Associés

Très rare armure anime d'Allemagne du Sud, probabalement Augsbourg vers 1540-50. A very rare South German armour of anime construction, probably Augsburg, circa 1540-50. Comprising burgonet (associated) with one-piece skull elegantly drawn-up at the front to form a sharply pointed peak, the medial ridge over the peak developing into a narrow comb, turned roped edge, fitted with pierced hinged cheek-pieces (hinges replaced), and later necklame, anime cuirass of plates overlapping upwards and made in one with the gorget, spaulders of six lames, articulated arm defences, the lower-cannons unusually formed with a flange beneath each couter, a pair of mitten-gauntlets (associated), tassets of seven plates each, the upper plates attached to the skirt by turning-pins, articulated short cuisses and winged poleyns, detachable single-plate greaves, studded with domed iron rivets throughout, the principal borders narrowly recessed, the edges turned and finely roped throughout, and with later blued finish throughout, the borders and the subsidiary edges all contrasting in the white: on a purpose-built costumed mannequin with sculpted mask. H.: 176 cm. Provenance: Christie's, London, November 13, 1985, lot 74 (sold finished in the white, without gauntlets and with a different burgonet). Armours of anime construction are very rare. This special form of laminated cuirass appears to have been invented in Italy in circa 1530. The construction takes the form of overlapping horizontal lames moving on sliding rivets and internal leathers. The most elaborate examples are those made for Archduke Ferdinand II by Giovanni Batista Serabaglio (in the former Imperial armoury, Vienna) and for Philippe II of Spain by Desiderius Kolman (in the Royal Armoury, Madrid). A small number of vambraces dating from the first 60 years of the 16th century have cup-like projections either riveted to or integral with the lower cannons below the points of the elbows. See, BLAIR, Claude, European Armour, 1947,