Page:A record of European armour and arms through seven centuries (Volume 1).djvu/318

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the rivets. The visor, the "snout" of which is very accentuated, is attached to the skull-piece by a strong hinge riveted to the front of the skull-piece. This hinge could formerly be raised by turning a catch piece. In order to avoid the carrying away of the hinge by a lance blow, it was fixed at its upper surface by a small iron band firmly riveted to the skull-piece, which hinge still exists, and which terminates at the top in a dog's or lion's head. This method of attachment is very characteristic of the German bascinet, and is to be found represented on German monumental effigies of the second half of the XIVth century. The visor has two horizontal ocularia with projecting edges, also round holes on the left side of the "snout" for breathing, and one single slit at the level of the mouth. The skull-piece bears an armourer's mark, rather worn, near the point of attachment of the visor.

This Dino bascinet is of the foremost importance, is probably of German provenance, and may be dated at about 1370. Its chief difference from the Hefner-Alteneck example consists in the strongly marked dome or bell-*shaped formation of its skull-piece. One of the notable examples of bascinets which carry this particular formation to an almost grotesque degree is that to be seen in the Schloss, Coburg (Figs. 284 and 285). It is perhaps one of the finest of its kind extant; for not only is the head-piece, with its curiously snouted visor, in most perfect preservation, and very solid in workmanship, but even its surface retains its original blue colour. Through the courtesy of the Director of the Coburg Museum, a courtesy, we should add, extended to us some years ago, we are able to give excellent pictures of this remarkable head-piece. The late Herr Hefner-Alteneck in his Trachten gives an engraving of the statue of Hartmann von Kroneberg, who is shown wearing a bascinet head-piece much like the Coburg example. Since Hartmann von Kroneberg died in 1372 we may conclude that the Coburg helmet dates from about that time. The helmet is carefully engraved in Heideloff's Ornaments du Moyen Age.

One of the most complete and remarkable bascinet helmets fitted with the lifting visor is that which is shown in the Valeria Museum at Sitten, Canton Wallis, Switzerland (Fig. 286, a, b). Here can be seen the small egg-shaped crown piece, with the cylindrical staples around the border for the attachment of the camail and the elaborate hinge above the forehead for the fitting of the visor, features both of which we have noticed in other such skull-pieces of these times. It is, however, the visor that is remarkable; for though the ocularia are boxed out as they are on the pig-faced visors,