PROJECT LEWES

A happy coincidence is Jason Kingsley's latest posting on YouTube of his experiment with the proto-great helm. This constitutes another valuable piece of experimental analysis  in broadening our understanding of armour in the high middle ages. A take-away for me is an appreciation of how mounted commanders of foot soldiers are more likely to have been armoured. Leading a body of spearmen (for example) a commander has an advantage on horse back - to gain a greater view and appreciation of the tactical environment from the height advantage. The soldiers would be looking to the leader for commands and direction and he is more easily seen - his gestures and voice being elevated above the ranks. Conversely, a commander of foot cannot see nearly as well from behind or within a great helm. He also cannot hear or be heard as well. The sensory deprivation and impact on communication seems likely to me to have seen adoption of a great helm in this role as a last resort under extreme circumst...

  I'm soon to commence building and painting a bodyguard unit of knights for my Rebel army and for this I have a beautiful selection of 28mm mounted figures and their dismounted equivalents from Crusader Miniatures . The interesting feature of the dismounted knight sculpts is that all of them are depicted fighting on foot and wearing the iconic great helm. These figures look fantastic but I do not believe they are accurately portraying how knights fought on foot, so I thought to put up a short discussion on a subject you won't often find. It really cuts to the purpose and use of the great helm in this period. Perhaps one of the reasons for a lack of discussion on the subject and likely one of the contributing factors in motivating figure sculptors is the scant evidence we have specifically for the mid-thirteenth century. Nevertheless, there are consistencies in development of helmet design preceding, following and cutting through the period which enables a clear and logical ana...

One of the several difficulties I face in returning after so long to my research is my own lack of notes on the subject. I have several books on Lewes and they are all boxed and in storage (unhelpful). I have created documents in the past but they are often thin on citations - which of course is my own fault - requiring me to go over ground I must have covered before. This is very much like genealogy except I'm not related to anyone. I have to be certain the names refer to the men actually at the battle on the day. This can be tricky as men had a habit of naming their sons after themselves for several generations - so I need to make sure I am including the right Robert or John and not their father, uncle, nephew or son. The spelling varied greatly in this period which affects search engines and when it comes to discovering blazons in armorial rolls and the like I may need to go further afield than just England. I had also made mistakes in my previous list for the knights I decided ...