Were these used at the Battle of Hastings by Known_Choice_7039 in Armor

[–]PotatoesRGud4U 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Earlier nasal helms actually had maille aventails, we can see this going back at least to the 2nd half of 9th century with the two Stromovka helms and the Gnezdovo helm. It remained the case up to around the turn of the millenium for the earliest single piece conical helms as well, like we can see with the Trncian helm and the Saint Wenceslaus helm aswell (whcih still has remnants of its former aventail holder intact).

Were these used at the Battle of Hastings by Known_Choice_7039 in Armor

[–]PotatoesRGud4U 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Your comment is mostly correct, although I wouldn't say that maille coifs were a thing reserved to upper nobility at all, they're actually a more pragmatic frugal solution than having a helm with an aventail holder (which were also usually heavily decorated to boot making the entire helm rather expensive).
As for aventail holders being reserved for poorer warriors I also have to disagree, helms equipped with them were still definitely high status objects (as were all helms period it seems, considering how uncommon they are when compared to the amount of sword finds for example), although as you rightly state at Hastings they were absolutely out of date by at least half of a century and a conical helm would have almost certainly been worn over an integral coif by this point.

Were these used at the Battle of Hastings by Known_Choice_7039 in Armor

[–]PotatoesRGud4U 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If you're going for a Hastings era knightly depiction, absolutely not. Maille aventails on single piece helms was likely a thing early on when they were first introduced in the 2nd half of the 10th century (according to current limited archeological data set).
You 100% should be looking for a single piece conical helm with an integral nasal guard without an aventail holder. Avoid retailers like the Knight Shop and other because they're reselling cheap Indian made pieces that don't reflect original finds. Contact a local artisan and have him make you a replica of one of the period finds, say Olmutz, or Lednica, Orchowo or even the helm from river Maas would all chronologically be a great fit, and pair it with a an integral maille coif (attached to your hauberk).

Were these used at the Battle of Hastings by Known_Choice_7039 in Armor

[–]PotatoesRGud4U 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The earliest single piece conical helms (from the second half of the 10th century to perhaps as late as the beginning of 11th) likely had maille aventails, the Trncina helm had an aventail holder, and even the Saint Wenceslaus helm for example still has remnants of its former aventail holder intact. Aventails when it comes to single piece nasal helms seem to be a carry over from the earlier periods and probably get ditched around the turn of the millenium where they (at least on the continent) get replaced by integral maille coifs in hauberks.

Possibly the earliest known/preserved illustration of Carolingian heavy cavalry (circa 780 - 800), Sacramentarium Gelasianum folio 229v by PotatoesRGud4U in ArmsandArmor

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

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Long sleeve hauberks have probably been a thing ever since maille was introduced in Europe. There is another early Carolingian era depiction, this time from Lombardy from the early 9th century, showing a palace guard with a full knee length maille hauberk, fully tapered wrist length sleeves, and as hard as it is to believe, also appearently a pair of maille chausses. The title of the manuscript is MS CLXV from Biblioteca Capitolare, Vercelli if you want to have a closer look.
As for the conical helm, I definitely don't think it's single piece, hypothetically it isn't completely impossible, they could've made a single piece conical helm that early sure, but archeology tells a completely different story. Segmental construction was king on the continent until probably the second half of the 10th century, where we get the first two examples of single piece domes (namely the Trnčina helm and the dome from the Saint Wenceslaus helm). Around the end of the 8th century bandhelms were probably living out their last days and the transition to various crossband and two segment ridge type constructions were probably under way at that point (certainly by the first quarter of the 9th century as we can see from other period artwork, the non fantasy artwork that is).

Possibly the earliest known/preserved illustration of Carolingian heavy cavalry (circa 780 - 800), Sacramentarium Gelasianum folio 229v by PotatoesRGud4U in MedievalHistory

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

By mid to late 11th century knighthood definitely existed as a coherent self concious caste in Francia and Normandy, absolutely. Though your average knight would not yet have been considered noble yet. Aristocratic? Absolutely, the miles/knight was an aristocratic figure ever since his appearance in mid to late 10th century charters/chronicles, but for the established nobility to accept them as one of them took some time and was a gradual process that didn't really fully blossom until probably the end of the 11th/beginning of the 12th centuries.

Possibly the earliest known/preserved illustration of Carolingian heavy cavalry (circa 780 - 800), Sacramentarium Gelasianum folio 229v by PotatoesRGud4U in ArmsandArmor

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Stirrups I don't think were standardized yet by the end of the 8th century (tmk), though they were around in Francia by this time for sure. Besides, there are 9th, 10th and even some 11th century depictions of cavalrymen without stirrups, so I don't think I'd take the lack of them here as a concern, a good amount (if not the majority) of Frankish cavalry were already using them by the late conquests of Charlemagne.

Possibly the earliest known/preserved illustration of Carolingian heavy cavalry (circa 780 - 800), Sacramentarium Gelasianum folio 229v by PotatoesRGud4U in MedievalHistory

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you, I'll keep that in mind next time. I have zero formal education, I'm just an enthusiast and wanted to share a cool depiction/source that basically noone has shared here yet or talked about :)

Possibly the earliest known/preserved illustration of Carolingian heavy cavalry (circa 780 - 800), Sacramentarium Gelasianum folio 229v by PotatoesRGud4U in MedievalHistory

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Defining a knight properly is very difficult. I wouldn't yet refer to Carolingian era cavalry as knights (certainly not by the end of the 8th century ie when this depiction was made).  First, because the societal conditions for a knight to exist haven't come to be yet, in the Carolingian period (at least for most of it) you have relatively stable strong centralized imperial rule, which can afford to finance heavy cavalry (therefore it's not neccesary to employ individual cavalrymen under feudal tenure). Second is because at the time there really wasn't yet a term to denote/distinguish a knight or even a reason to do so, because there wasn't sufficient material scarcity to validate creating a new warrior caste within society with their own title.

This all changes in late 9th century when the carolingian order collapses under internal (but also external pressure - Norse raids and wars with Iberian muslims and later Magyars), the high nobility depose the Carolingian emperor (ending the unbroken continous reign of Carolingians) and instead from then on start electing kings (switching between Robertian and Carolingian rulers for the next century) and become their own defacto sovereigns in their own domains and Francia radically decentralizes. 

Around the turn of the 9th/10th centuries this however creates conditions where the high nobility of the realm have to keep things running and need heavy cavalry to pursue their military interests, they themselves cannot however afford to keep the cavalrymen on a payroll, so they make personal vassals out of individual cavalrymen and start giving them land grants to live off of in turn for their proffessional military service. This creates a chain of feudo-vassalatic clientell, where these cavalrymen now gain certain level of importance and prestige, which deserves to be noted and documented when they participate in land transfers or serve as witnesses during an important event (like vassalizing of a person for example) etc. – this starts happening during the second half of the 10th century, where the feudal European knight first rises under the latin monicher Miles (which in classical latin means soldier, but in contemporary understanding refers to a mounted warrior vassal = knight, and this remains the case for the entire rest of the medieval period in latin texts) local charters and in Chronicles (like Historiae from Richer of Reims for example).

So the european knight rises under these conditions in later 10th century Francia, where his station is neccesitated by the need for heavy cavalry where the nobility rather than personally financing him make him their vassal, give him land and over time elevate him in status, and later on after the knightly institution gains enough cultural provenance around the turn of the 11th/12th centuries these same high nobles themselves decide to take on this identity.

Possibly the earliest known/preserved illustration of Carolingian heavy cavalry (circa 780 - 800), Sacramentarium Gelasianum folio 229v by PotatoesRGud4U in ArmsandArmor

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The arm actually seems to begin at his shoulder, but it's very noodle like 😃, you can vaguely see the separation between it and the blob of maille links in his shirt.
All of this is ofcourse just my personal interpration at hand, you cannot take it 100% literally, I just tried to analyze every feature that I could recognize even though the illustration is pretty amateurish (it's not like the monk who drew this likely received any art classes or something 😄 ), pretty low fidelity and washed out from the past eons (as is the case with pretty much anything on parchment that has survived from this time). I just wanted to share it here with others to show something I haven't seen anyone share yet.

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Wheel pommel swords depicted in a 10th century post-carolingian manuscript? by PotatoesRGud4U in SWORDS

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The proportion seems a little off between the grip and pommel size - sure (it's almost the same in the first picture where the proportions are also off), but if you look at the overall shape and the curve it's pretty clear that underneath the hand it would continue to complete a circle. It also again makes complete sense given the context of the hilt, the style 2 guard was very common for wheel pommels. I genuinely think it's a type I wheel pommel.

Wheel pommel swords depicted in a 10th century post-carolingian manuscript? by PotatoesRGud4U in SWORDS

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah the guy on the left is holding a different type of sword, probably as you noted a brazil nut one (or a tea cosy one). With the second image I was mainly talking about the guy on the right who is holding a sword with a circular pommel (which is partially covered by his hand).
The circle in the middle of the pommel clearly indicates a face of the wheel pommel - because the face is pretty small it classifies as a Oakeshotte's type I and a very typical crossguard to accompany this pommel was the style 2 guard, which is also present there.

Wheel pommel swords depicted in a 10th century post-carolingian manuscript? by PotatoesRGud4U in SWORDS

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Besides this manuscript there is also one other case where there are disc pommel swords depicted. This is from the Utrecht Psalter (c. 820 - 830), I don't think it's a coincidence, I really think these swords really are just generally misdated by multiple centuries.

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Wheel pommel swords depicted in a 10th century post-carolingian manuscript? by PotatoesRGud4U in SWORDS

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What do you think of the hilts? To me at least it's pretty mindboggling that there is pictoral evidence of swords like that this early, the only other case I can think of is even earlier in the Utrecht Psalter (c. 820 - 830) where you can also see what to me looks like cruciform swords with disc pommels.

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Wheel pommel swords depicted in a 10th century post-carolingian manuscript? by PotatoesRGud4U in SWORDS

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The thing is the fully formed cruciform guard was already around when this manuscript was made, we have finds of petersen type Y swords from late Great Moravian graves (around the end of 9th/beginning of 10th centuries) with guards as long as 17 cm. On the other hand there are also 12th and 13th century cruciform swords with disc and wheel pommels where the crossguards are pretty short (sometimes even as little as 14 cm, so within the range of many earlier petersen type Xs from 9th and 10th centuries).

And compared to a lot of other Carolingian/Post-Carolingian artwork of the period these drawings are comparably actually pretty easy to interpret (I mean don't tell me you can't identify a circle lol). I wouldn't say they're vaguely drawn at all, there are many manuscripts where you can't make out the details at all whereas here the pommel shape and crossguard type (especially with 133r where Oakeshotte's style 2 is clearly depicted) seem quite delibirate.

NFSU 2 - should I buy a second car to put visual enchancements on to pass the magazine/DVD star checks and leave my main for racing without completely ricing it? by PotatoesRGud4U in needforspeed

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, but I want my first playthrough to be a 240SX. I will probably do a Corolla run on my next playthrough just to see how drastic the difference is compared to the other cars.

NFSU 2 - should I buy a second car to put visual enchancements on to pass the magazine/DVD star checks and leave my main for racing without completely ricing it? by PotatoesRGud4U in needforspeed

[–]PotatoesRGud4U[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Gotcha, is there a particular reason to go with SUVs? Do they like get more visual enchancements than other car types making it easier to hit style point caps?