Nuremberg Chronicle; depictions of edged weapons from the late 15th Century

[shayde78]

The martyrdom of Saints is a frequent Medieval theme. I know we don't typically discuss some of the more ghastly applications of the arms we collect, but this still has value as source material.

[shayde78]

The 9th picture of this set is an image that is used again in a picture in the next set that is identified as an 'Ottoman'. The clothing looks like Robin Hood, to me, but the sword at the waist says otherwise.

[shayde78]

5 images down, we see our Ottoman Robin Hood again. I included the full page of text along with this image in case that holds interest for anyone willing to tackle the Old German translation.

[shayde78]

And that's all of them!

Again, feel free to pull individual images out to discuss, or otherwise, to use freely to support your research.

For my next project, I have been flipping through a book that contains the complete works of Caravaggio, a Renaissance painter active about 100 years after the work above was published. He has some fine paintings that depict rapiers and daggers of the late 16th early 17th century, as well as detailed depictions of armor. Far fewer images that what I posted in this thread, so I'll likely post them one-by-one, with the date of completion. Be on the look out for that in the near future. Arms/armor aside, seeing the advancement in artistic expression in a mere 100 years is stunning, and parallels nicely with what we see in arms development over the same time period.

[Philip]

Originally Posted by shayde78

5 images down, we see our Ottoman Robin Hood again. I included the full page of text along with this image in case that holds interest for anyone willing to tackle the Old German translation.

The Ottoman's costume is not entirely Robin Hood-ish. The artist maybe forgot to depict a proper turban, but the long coat is obviously an Ottoman caftan -- a fashion which became popular in parts of eastern Europe, particularly in Poland where, as the zupan, it remained in vogue among the nobility until the 19th century.

A couple pages down from the first depiction of this fellow, and below the illustration of the Crucifixion, is a page with illustration dealing with Mohammed (spelled Machomet in the German vernacular of the time, you will find it written as Maometto in Italian texts, as in the title of Rossini's opera about Mehmet the Conqueror).

[Philip]

Originally Posted by shayde78

The 9th picture of this set is an image that is used again in a picture in the next set that is identified as an 'Ottoman'. The clothing looks like Robin Hood, to me, but the sword at the waist says otherwise.

Vide supra re: costume. Don't you find it interesting that the depictions of Roman emperors (Severus, Diocletian, et al) in the book mostly show them carrying swords which are quite un-Roman in form, in fact identifiable as falchions of a sort, with blades reminiscent of those "scimitars" seen on the emblem affixed to Shriners' fezzes? I wonder if it could be, in the artistic repertoire of the place and time, a visual stereotype symbolizing the "bad guys" such as the Ottomans, or the pre-Constantine persecutors of Christians in ancient Rome. Much like we still associate the villains with wearing black hats in early Western films.

[Philip]

Originally Posted by shayde78

The martyrdom of Saints is a frequent Medieval theme. I know we don't typically discuss some of the more ghastly applications of the arms we collect, but this still has value as source material.

In the long centuries when books were scarce and literacy rates were low, pictures were an important teaching tool. The clergy could read about saints in hagiographies, their congregations absorbed a lot of the information via sermons and graphics. And we are aware that sensationalism always grabs peoples' attention!

Looking at church art in various Italian cities, I was always impressed by the fact that some martyrdoms were more frequently depicted than others, it perhaps requires inquiry as to whether the lives or achievements of those saints had particular relevance to the problems that people of the era were most concerned with. For instance, one can hardly miss paintings or sculptures of St. Sebastian shot with arrows (someone researching crossbows and their spanners can learn a bit about their development from dated artworks showing them), St. Catherine and the spiked wheel (usually shown broken to illustrate the triumph of right over wrong), St. Barbara (patroness of ordnance workers and cannoneers) holding a model of the tower in which her pagan father imprisoned her before her death).

The association between saints and their particular demises, being a theme in religious art, has affected other aspects of culture. Hence the term "Catherine wheel" as a name for a particular type of pyrotechnic device (and a number of pubs in Britain, including one in Kensington, London). And the gridiron on which St. Lawrence was roasted alive providing the groundplan for the enormous palace/mausoleum complex "El Escorial" built by the Spanish Habsburgs near Madrid.