mark of Antonio Bolchega, who was most probably one of the twelve companion armourers sent to the King of France by the Duke of Milan, and in the mark Rom Rom that of a third armourer who has remained anonymous. Thus we should find ourselves confronted by one of the suits made at Tours for the Court of Louis XI. But to return to a less speculative method of criticism, let us notice that the small salade with the short protective covering for the back of the neck, has by no means the character of the German salades. It rather resembles another salade in the Metropolitan Museum of New York which is stamped with a mark of French character. In shape these two salades recall those that one may see in so many paintings of French manuscripts dating from the second half of the XVth century, and in the carved woodwork of the same provenance and of the same period. If, however, our theory is correct, this suit is all the more interesting from the fact that with the exception of one suit in the Musée d'Artillerie (G 4), the next but one to be described (page 209, Fig. 243), which, if it was made in France, is equally the work of an Italian armourer, it must be reckoned the only entire French suit of armour from the reign of Louis XI that is extant.
The suit (Fig. 240) is of great elegance in form and at the same time of very high finish in respect of workmanship. All the parts are ornamented with channels which form flutings together, some diverging from a centre, others parallel, others again placed zigzagwise. All the edges of the plates are dentated and pierced à jour with a series of small trefoils, a scheme of ornamentation which imparts a marvellously light appearance to the general impression without diminishing the strength of the steel.
The salade is fitted with a visor, whilst the skull-piece is reinforced. It is completed by a bevor, the gorget of which is attached to the top of the breastplate. The breastplate has the detached plate and taces of three plates. The back-piece is formed of several articulated lames and has a garde de rein of four plates.
As in the case of many other suits of this type, and notably in that of the two superb suits of Sigismund of the Tyrol at Vienna, of which we shall speak later, the tassets are lacking. These pieces, being simply attached by thongs and buckles, were easily lost when the leather for their detachment perished. The espalier pauldrons are augmented with rondels. The elbow cops terminate in very slightly curved and extravagantly long points. The gauntlets are neither mittens nor fingered, but the first and second
