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193 A SOUTH GERMAN HALF-MITTEN GAUNTLET FOR THE LEFT HAND, CIRCA 1500-5 formed of a short flaring gutter-shaped cuff decorated at its straight upper edge with a plain inward turn accompanied by a recessed border, and at its centre with a spray of five flutes enclosed in each case by a pair of incised lines, five metacarpal plates, the lowest longer than the rest and each decorated at the centre of its upper edge with a V-shaped nick, a knuckle-plate and three finger-plates (the last restored), each formed like the lower end of the lowest metacarpal-plate with V-shaped flutes between the fingers, and an associated thumb-defence of five scales attached by a hinge to the inner end of the last metacarpal-plate 24.8cm; 9 3/4in
Provenance The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, sold Christies 223 November 1960, lot 357 Literature Prof. P. L. Pratt, ‘Some Facets of Crystal Physics’, Inaugural Lecture, Imperial College, London, 21 January 1964, p. 161, pls IV & V Exhibition Arms & Armour Society, The Art of the Armourer, Victoria & Albert Museum, London, April to May 1963, cat. No. 12 (ill.) The gauntlet can be seen as transitional in character between the so-called ‘Gothic’ and ‘Maximilian’ fashions. It invites comparison with that shown hanging on a hook, together with a crossbow bolt and partridge, in a still-life picture painted by Jacopo de Barbari in 1504, and now in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich (Reverseau 1982, p. 52, fig. 4). £2000-2500
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