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A Mail Shirt from the Hearst Collection1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 November 2011

E. Martin Burgess
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Extract

This mail shirt, which was in the Hearst Collection and is now in the Armouries of the Tower of London, dates from the fourteenth century. By tradition it was the property of Rudolph IV, Duke of Austria, Carinthia, and Ferrette (1339–65), but, as far as is known, there are no records to prove this. It is, however, a fine, early shirt which is well worth recording.

The shirt is constructed of alternate rows of riveted and whole rings, of rump length, with a wide and rather square neck opening and three-quarter length sleeves. Brass rings are used for decoration, two rows on the rump edge and three on the sleeve edges.

A collar of heavy fifteenth-century mail has been added at the neck, but this is a ‘restorer's’ addition as it has been linked on with cut rings from the collar. This is a type of shirt which would not have had a high collar.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Antiquaries Journal , Volume 38 , Issue 3-4 , July 1958 , pp. 197 - 204
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1958

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References

page 200 note 1 Antiq. Journ. xxxiii (1953), pl. XXIII, e, and fig. 6. The basic structures and methods of production of mail cannot be explained again here and readers who do not fully understand them should turn to Antiq. Journ. xxxiii, where they will find the basic techniques set out in diagrammatic form and described.

page 200 note 2 On the left arm one pair, not shown on pl. XXI, is on the outside of the sleeve near the elbow.

page 201 note 1 Ibid. xxxvii (1957), 203, fig. 4.

page 201 note 2 Ibid. xxxiii (1953), pl. XXIV.

page 201 note 3 Proc. Soc. Ant. Scot, lxxxvii: ‘Three Metalwork Hoards of the Roman Period from Southern Scotland’ by Stuart Piggott, V-P.S.A.

page 201 note 4 Curle, , Newstead, p. 161Google Scholar; pl. XXXVIII, 10.

page 202 note 1 Antiq. Journ. xxxiii (1953), 48–55.