A NORTH EUROPEAN CLOSE HELMET, CIRCA 1540, POSSIBLY LOW GERMAN formed of a rounded one-piece sku

A NORTH EUROPEAN CLOSE HELMET, CIRCA 1540, POSSIBLY LOW GERMAN formed of a rounded one-piece skull rising to a low medial comb decorated along its crest with a pair of incised lines (small cracks to the rear), visor and bevor attached by common pivots with low domed heads decorated with cross-hatching, prominent 'sparrow's-beak' visor strongly stepped beneath a centrally-divided vision-slit and pierced above the mid-line to either side of the "beak" with a row of five circular ventilation-holes, and a row of three diagonal ventilation-slots on the right below the mid-line, moulded baluster lifting-peg (later), the bevor strongly shaped to the chin and secured to the skull at the right of the neck by a spring-catch with a cross-hatched release-button, and a single gorget-plate front and rear, each with plain inward turn at the lower edge (cleaned overall, areas of pitting, the flanged lower edge of the skull pierced at the centre with a later suspension-hole) 31cm; 121/4 high A very similar helmet is preserved in the Wallace Collection, London, Cat. No. A167 (James G. Mann, Wallace Collection Catalogues: European Arms and Armour, Vol. I, London, 1962, p. 137, pl. 69; and A. V. B. Norman, Wallace Collection Catalogues: European Arms and Armour, Supplement, p. 62). It has no lining-rivets in the bevor, in common with the present example.