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JOHN DAUNDELYON c.1445
An extract from Armies of the Middle Ages, Volume 1by Ian Heath
11. JOHN DAUNDELYON c.1445
This depicts the Milanese style harness that was widely worn during the closing stages of the Hundred Years’ War (see also figures 37 and 122). The tasses are considerably bigger, and larger shoulder-pieces called pauldrons have now appeared, here largely concealed by reinforcing plates. Pauldrons were a development of the palette and are first recorded in 1397. They were in general use almost everywhere by c. 1410, though in England (where they were more usually known by the name spaudlers) they only began to appear in about 1430. Of the pauldrons worn here, that on the right has been shaped to accommodate the couched lance, while that on the left is noticeably larger, as is the couter on the same arm. The custom of having larger pieces on the left arm first began to appear in England c. 1440, by which time it was already well advanced on the continent, circular reinforcements being added to the pauldrons from c. 1420 (see, for example, figure 37). It resulted from the general abandonment of the shield as mentioned under figure 8, and in later armours both pauldron and couter were to grow to extravagant proportions when worn on the left arm, particularly in the case of jousting armour.
The inside bend of the left arm was also soon to be protected by a wing-shaped piece of plate armour called a garde-de-bras, which first appeared c. 1450. His hands are protected by mitten gauntlets, which appeared in the 1430s and had soon largely displaced the fingered gauntlet. They were still based on an ordinary leather glove, the fingers of which were strapped to the inside of the articulated gauntlet.