Churburg Arm Armour

Description of the Product

Churburg Castle, built in 1253, is one of South Tyrol’s best-preserved castles, and particularly well known for its armoury, which contains 50 fully preserved suits of armour, all made for members of the Matsch family (from 1541 the Trapp family). This dynastic collection is of incomparable artistic and historic value. The collection is famous, among other treasures, for one of the oldest surviving transitional plate armours, the #13, as well as other gems of Milanese origin.

Transitional armour is somewhere between mail and full plate, where vulnerable areas are reinforced with plate pieces. During the 13th C. first the knees and shins of horsemen got double protection, later arms and other parts. Manufacturing plate armour required capital, for mining as well as for the furnaces and the workshops. An industry was born, and in Lombardy, around Milan, this new industry flourished.

The Churburg #13 was made by the Missiglia and various Milanese armourers around 1360-1390, and is the oldest in the Churburg collection (or anywhere for that matter). The matching arm armour date to approx 1360.

In the Churburg Arms the vambrace protects the forearm, the couter the elbow, and the rerebrace the upper arm. These parts are joined together so that the hand is fully mobile; an obvious must for the armour to be functional. This style was initially characteristic of germanic and north-italian men-at-arms, spreading to the rest of Europe during the late 1300’s. The original brass decorations have been replaced with steel reinforcements. The closed vambraces have been sized so that they will fit over a gambeson.

• Made of 1.6 mm thick steel. Steel thickness may vary due to the handcrafted methods used in manufacturing
• The armor arms are attached to a mail shirt or to an arming jack at the top using separate arming laces
• The Churburg arm armor weighs approx. 3,55 kg per pair
• Includes armor for both hands
• Made by Marshall Historical