[Jamie Hall]

Hello all. I've seen a few posts there refer people to your excellent book list, but I noticed that all of those books seem to be modern works. What I'm really interested in are primary texts which deal with things like armouring and polishing. I'm from the jewellery industry, and we're lucky to have several excellent primary texts, including Theophilus' "On Divers Arts" and Birringuccio's "Pirotechnia", both of which do touch on ferrous work, but not in any detail; they're concerned mostly with foundry work and decoration.

I've seen various hausbuch images, which are interesting, but I'd like to read something written by a practitioner, rather than a picture made of their work, or a Pliny-style interpretation of their work. In particular, I'd like to know things like what abrasives and mediums they used, how they applied them, and so on. There's also likely to be some cross-over between decorating armour and decorating tableware and other precious items.

Thanks.