The instigator's trumpet sends a haughty challenge, And the knight's trumpet sings in response, The glade echoes them and the firmament, The riders lowered the pick, And the shafts are attached to the shells;
Here the horses rushed, and at last
The fighter came close to the fighter.
("Palamon and Arsit")
Helmet decorations (pictured on the left) designed for mace fighting, presented at the Dresden Armory. As you can see, in this case, they differ in helmet decorations for tophelm helmets, first of all, in that they are small in size and are attached to the very top of the helmet, where there is a metal pin for this.
By the beginning of the 15th century, a completely new form of a spear duel between two horsemen was born in Germany, which immediately gained great popularity - rennen or "horse racing". Vendalen Beheim reports that he invented the duel Albrecht-Augustus, Margrave of Brandenburg, and he also became its popularizer. The essence of the competition was to knock down the tarch from his opponent with an accurate blow, which immediately showed the success or failure of the bout. But the main innovation of the battle was that its participants really had to gallop around the lists. In the previous Geshtech competition, the riders immediately after the collision took their horses down and then returned to the place of the "start", where they adjusted their ammunition and received new spears. That is, there was a pause between the collisions. Now the riders, having collided, continued to move, changed places, new spears were handed to them "on the move", after which they again attacked each other, and all this happened at a fast pace. At the same time, there could be several such clashes, which, of course, increased the entertainment of such a tournament.
Gothic armor that served as the basis for the Rennzoig armor. Gilles da Bove's "Herbal Book". (National Library of France, Paris)
Accordingly, a special armor of Rennzoig was created for it, borrowing its shape from the Gothic armor of the 15th century. The helmet for this competition was a salad without a visor, but with a viewing slot. Since it was inconvenient to fix helmet decorations on the salad, they limited themselves to the sultan of feathers. The protective cap for the salad remained the same as that of the “toad's head”. The breastplate of the cuirass, like that of the shteichzog armor, was equipped with a spear hook, and at the back had a spear bracket. But the cuirass received an additional metal chin screwed to it, which covered the entire lower part of the face. Plate armor served as protection for the hips; the "skirt" attached to the cuirass was used only at the very beginning.
Breastplate with a chin from the Rennzoig armor. (Dresden Armory)
Rennzoig also demanded a special tarch, called the renntarch. It was also made of wood and covered in black-painted leather with iron fittings around the edges. This shield fit snugly to the cuirass, repeating its shape and the shape of the left shoulder pad. The size of the renntarch depended on what kind of tournament this tarch was intended for. For "accurate" rennen and bundrennen, he had a height from the waist to the neck, and in the so-called "hard" rennen - from the very middle of the thigh to the viewing slit on the helmet. That is, it was a fairly thick wooden plate, profiled under the armor of a knight. The top of the painted tree was covered with a cloth with painted or embroidered heraldic emblems of its owner.
Sharp tips for rennen. (Dresden Armory)
The horse attack spear in Rennen also became different - it is lighter than the spears used in the tournament before. It had a length of about 380 cm, a diameter of 7 cm and a weight of about 14 kg. But the tip was put on it sharp, not crown! True, the length of the tip was short, that is, it could not penetrate deep into the target. The shape of the protective disk on the spear shaft has also changed. It was now a funnel-shaped flap. Moreover, his size all the time increased so that over time he not only covered the entire right arm of the rider from shoulder to wrist, but also part of the chest.
Spear guards 1570 Weight 1023.4 Italy. (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)
Spear shield for armor rennzoig. (Imperial Hunting and Armory Chamber of Vienna)
In the XV and XVI centuries. so-called "field tournaments" were also held, imitating a real battle. The rules were simple: the equestrian knights were divided into two units of equal size and fought on the lists, lining up in two lines. When participating in this type of competition, knights, as a rule, wore the same armor as in war. The difference between the tournament and the combat version was only in the fact that plates with chins were attached to them, which reached the very viewing slot of the salade helmet.
Grand Garda 1551 Weight 737.1 Austria, Innsbruck. (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York)
In addition, the tournament participant had the right to attach other additional protective plates to his armor. For example - a one-piece forged plate on the entire left shoulder of the shoulder pad at the same time as the chin, or a grand guard. Tournament armor externally differed from combat armor only by the presence of a hole for fastening screws. The rider's armament was a traditional tournament spear, very similar to a combat spear, but only slightly shorter in length and more in diameter, and with an elongated tip.
"Blind" horse forehead 1490 Weight 2638 (Metropolitan Museum, New York)
Naturally, horse equipment for tournaments also had its own characteristics. For example, the difference was observed in the shape of the saddles. Many saddles, in addition to being richly decorated, had high front bows, which made the rider no longer required armor to protect the stomach and legs. The reins could be the simplest, of ordinary raw hemp ropes, but at the same time they were trimmed with various ribbons of the same color as the horse blanket. If during the battle the bit was torn, then the rider controlled the horse with a spear.
Headband with protective eyecups. (Imperial Hunting and Armory Chamber of Vienna)
Horses were covered with two-layer blankets of leather, the first layer, and linen cloth - the second. The muzzle was usually covered with a metal forehead, and very often such a forehead was "blind", that is, it did not have slits for the eyes. In the same cases, if any, they were protected by convex eyecups. Interestingly, the earliest depiction of such a blind forehead dates back to 1367.
Saddle approx. 1570 - 1580 Weight 10 kg. Milan. (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).
Saddle and stirrups from the Dresden Armory. As you can see, the front bow of this saddle, by the way, like the back one, is reinforced with metal plates with engraving and blackening. It is clear that it is beautiful, but such a plate was also a good additional protection for the rider.
But about this saddle it is known that it was made by the famous German gunsmith Anton Peffenhauser from Augsburg after 1591. (Dresden Armory)
Well, now let's try to delve into tournament science even more and consider different types of the same tournament battle, as well as the characteristic features of the armor that were intended for them. The same Geshtech, for example, had a number of interesting varieties - well, for example, hockey is divided into ice hockey, ball hockey and field hockey. This is how the so-called Geshtech of “high saddles”, “General German Geshtech” and, finally, “Geshtech encased in armor” appeared.
Another saddle made by Peffenhauser. (Dresden Armory)
For example, the high saddle tournament. This name alone suggests that the rider had to sit in a high saddle, similar to that used in fights with clubs. At the same time, the wooden front bows not only protected the rider's legs in front, but also covered his stomach to the very chest. The saddle seemed to embrace the rider, so that he could not fall out of it. However, they fought in it with spears, not with maces, while it was necessary to break your spear on the enemy's shield. This was the safest variant of a tournament duel, since the rider could not fall from the horse.
Participants of the "field tournament" in the so-called "Saxon tournament armor". They differed from all others in their simple polishing and lack of decorations, as well as the characteristic fastening of the salade helmet to the back of the cuirass. (Dresden Armory)
On the contrary, in the "general German Geshtech" the saddle was arranged in such a way that it had no back bow at all. It was necessary to hit the enemy with a spear so that he flew out of the saddle. In this case, the knight's legs were unprotected, but a huge bib made of rough linen, stuffed with straw, was fixed on the horse's chest. Why was this necessary? But why: these fights did not provide for a separation barrier, so a head-to-head collision of two horses could have the most catastrophic consequences.
Knight in "Saxon tournament armor" (Armory of Dresden)
Geshtech “clad in armor” differed from previous types of competitions only in that the legs of the riders were, as before, covered with metal, that is, it was closer to the “good old days” than the two previous ones.
The safer in all respects was the Italian Geshtech with a barrier. Therefore, by the way, deaf foreheads were not used in this case, but were used with lattice or "perforated" convex eyecups.
The varieties of rennen were just as varied …
