[Jared Lambert]

I am looking at putting together a kit that reflects a soldier at The Siege of Orleans (1428–1429) and am not sure on what the most popular armor would have been as i don't know the years in which the look of breastplates changed from the single breastplate to the Gothic or Milanese style with a placard attached. I also do not know when sallets or barbutes started to become more popular than bascinets and when spaulders were replaced by pauldrons any help would be most appreciated.

--I found the attached pic but i don't know accurate it is.

[Randall Moffett]

Well this picture certainly is not. It is a fairly modern painting showing more or less late 15th century armour.

First question is what type of soldier would you like to be?

Single plate breastplates remain fairly common till this period and if you are lower class you would, if you had one, it'd likely be a single plate one.

I'd look at the Gothic eye web site. If you are a knight a good place to start looking. If non-knightly I'd go 10-20 years earlier and look at what they were wearing.

There is also a fair amount of artwork from this period so check out the British Library Illustrated Manuscripts online for some good ideas of what armour works.

RPM

[Jared Lambert]

Randell Thanks for those websites they were very helpful especially Gothic eye From the effigies i saw that pauldrons and 2 piece breastplates did not come into great popularity until 1450 roughly even though they are on a few such as the earl of warwick but mostly its spaulders and rondels with one piece breastplates. The manuscript site helped me out with the helmets i did not find a single sallet in the time period, instead i found basinets and great basinets both hounskull and klappvisor.

[James Arlen Gillaspie]

The Warwick effigy doesn't count. It was actually made in the 1450's, long after the Earl's death. Why they waited so long is beyond me, but such delays often happened. If you can, check out Harmand's book, Jeanne d'Arc; ses Costumes son Armure. Old, but still by far the best single source on the subject.