CategoriesAntiquities, Artifacts, and Religious Objects
Arms and Armor
Swords, helmets, shields, firearms and suits of armour, made for war, tournaments and display, and often decorated by master craftsmen.
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About
Weapons and armour have always been more than tools. Bronze Age swords were buried as treasures, and Greek bronze helmets were shaped to frame the face with menace. In late medieval and Renaissance Europe, armourers in Milan, Augsburg and Nuremberg hammered steel plates into articulated suits that followed the body's joints. Nuremberg masters such as Kunz Lochner and Wilhelm von Worms produced harnesses for princes, and at Greenwich Jacob Halder led the royal workshop in the later 16th century. The finest pieces were etched, blued or gilded for parades and tournaments.
Other traditions prized different virtues. Japanese swordsmiths folded and tempered steel so that a wavy hardening line shows along the blade, and samurai armour combined lacquered plates with silk lacing. Persian and Ottoman smiths inlaid gold on watered steel. Look for makers' marks, signs of use and the balance between fighting function and ornament.