the XVIth century. On the other face in Lombardic capitals is the inscription: ESPOIR CONFORTE LE GOEVAL (GENERAL?): (Hope encourages the general). As regards the form of the hilt, it presents a characteristic English falcon head shaped pommel, a single upturned quillon, and a strongly developed pas-d'âne with large single rings on either side of it. Ornaments much perished are to be seen at intervals in circular panels on the guards and pommel, surrounded by silver incrusted dots, with the field roughly engraved with foliage. The sword and dagger were presented to the College of Arms in November 1681 by Henry, Duke of Norfolk, Earl Marshal. No more can be said in favour of these two famous examples save that the sword is just a good English fighting sword of the closing years of the XVIth century, with its accompanying dagger, and that in the passage of centuries both sword and dagger have somehow or other become accepted as the famous pair of weapons which Dukes of Norfolk may possibly have once possessed.
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Fig. 1385. The sword-hilt in the portrait of Sir Francis Leigh (circa 1620)
Another type of early XVIIth century English sword which merits attention is that which, in the arrangement of its counter-guards and the now common addition of shells, shows the advance that is being made towards the cup-hilt of the second half of the century. We illustrate an example formerly contained in the Spitzer Collection, which in the catalogue
