[Adam D. Kent-Isaac]

This same armour came up some time ago in another thread when I first saw it and noted its similarity to the Greenwich armour of George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland. The suit is of blued steel and decorated with a gold pattern of Tudor roses and loops which is superficially similar to Cumberland's armour, though it lacks Fleurs-de-Lis and the proportions are different. The armour was commissioned by Prince Henry Frederick, son of King James I - it was made as a gift to his cousin, Duke Christian of Braunschweig-Luneberg:



It was made when Christian was young and apparently he did not wear it until he was in his twenties (in that portrait, he is missing an arm, which means that it was painted after the Battle of Fleurus in 1622, in which the Duke was injured. He died several years later after a hard life of battle.

Now here is something interesting - fast forward a few decades, and one of the next Dukes of Braunschweig-Luneberg, Augustus, is painted in his portrait wearing the very same armour in 1666:



Now - more interesting still: about 100 years later, the Duke of Brunswick-Wulfenbuttel - Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand, father of Caroline of Brunswick (who was the wife of King George IV of England) - can be seen in his portrait with Duke Christian's blue and gold Greenwich helm sitting on the table to his right. Imagine that! The year is 1766 and the old helmet handed down by Duke Christian, made in England at the Greenwich armoury, is still in the family - and still important enough to be shown in the painting!



That suit of armour is now in the personal collection of Ronald Lauder, by the way.