A RARE NORTH ITALIAN HALF ARMOUR, LATE 16TH / LATE 17TH CENTURY, FOR USE BY THE SWISS PAPAL GUAR

A RARE NORTH ITALIAN HALF ARMOUR, LATE 16TH / LATE 17TH CENTURY, FOR USE BY THE SWISS PAPAL GUARD comprising associated morion formed in one piece with a rounded crown rising to a high roped medial comb decorated to either side of its crest and base with incised lines, and a 'swept' integral brim turned down at each side and rising to an acute point at the front and the rear (the left of the brim cracked, each point damaged), the base of the crown pierced at the nape with a pair of holes for the attachment of a missing plume-holder and encircled by eleven (originally eighteen) round-headed lining-rivets with brass rosette-washers, collar formed of a single plate front and rear (the former with a small riveted patch at the left shoulder), each flanged upwards at the neck-opening to receive one or more additional lames (now missing), their roped lower edges originally ribbed but subsequently flattened, breastplate and backplate each with an outward-flanged lower edge, the former of 'peascod' form fitted to either sides of its main plate and at the inner edges of the movable gussets of its arm-openings with working-life extensions, the latter struck at the centre of its neck-opening with the mark of a crowned escutcheon charged with three pheons(?), and large symmetrical pauldrons each formed of six lames overlapping outwards from the third and connected by a turner to a tubular upper cannon cut away diagonally at the inside of its lower edge, the main edges of the armour decorated with roped inward turns, accompanied on the cuirass and the morion by recessed borders, the subsidiary edges the pauldrons decorated with incised lines, all surfaces except those of the morion decorated with deeply incised acanthus scrolls, for the most part arranged symmetrically and involving at the top of the breastplate a grotesque mask embossed in relief, the decoration originally gilt on a blackened ground (now extensively pitted, patinated and worn), on a fabric-covered stand Provenance: The Hon. Rose Talbot, sold Christies, London, 14 April 1976, lot 75, pl. 5. The armour can be recognised from its distinctive decoration as one of a series made for the use of the Swiss Papal Guard. Other armours of the series are to be found in the Museo Civico L. Marzoli, Brescia, Inv. Nos 860, 927-8, 941 & 947 (Rossi & Carpegna 1969, Cat. Nos 22-5 & 44, pp. 22-3 & 30), the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, Acc. No. Hen.M.1.2.a-c-1933 (Eaves 2002, pp. 123-5, ill), the J. W.Higgins Armoury Museum, Worcester, Mass. Inv. No. 1137 (Grancsay 1961, p. 82, ill), and the Art Institute, Chicago (Karcheski 1995, p. 68, ill). Their decoration has in all cases been applied in the late 17th century to elements of late 16th and early 17th century North Italian make. The mark struck on the backplate is probably that of its owner. It is also to be found on the examples in the Fitzwilliam and the Higgins Museum's . The associated morion is one of a series obtained by the London dealer W. H. Fenton in Ireland at some time before 1933. Others of the series are now to be seen in the Royal Armouries Museum, Leeds, Inv. No. IV. 449 (Dufty & Reid 1968, pl. CII, c), the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, Acc. Nos Hen.M.32, 33 & 34-1933 (Eaves 2002, pp. 153-5, ill), and the Glasgow Museum and Art Gallery.