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Jean Thibodeau
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 Posted: Sun 18 Feb, 2007 10:37 am Post subject: |
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| Daniel Staberg wrote: | My personal opinion is that it's likely that a lot of Reiters that could aford would have carried more than the required two pistols. Even well into the 17th Century some units were laoded for bear from the looks of it. In 1639 a Scots cavalry regiment took to the field armed with carbine, two pistols in the saddle holsters and a pistol in each boot for good measure.
Cheers
Daniel |
Sort of makes sense from a firepower point of view since this would be close to equal to the firepower of an 1860 Civil war cavalry man armed with a sabre and one percussion revolver.
Reloading 4 single shot pistols and one archebuse would seem somewhat close to loading the six chambers of an early revolver with powder / ball and percussion caps. A bit faster maybe when only one weapon has to be handled.
Firing the 6 shots with the revolver would also be a little faster than having to put away ( or throw away in an emergency ) a pistol to use the next one.
With careful aimed fire or one shot at a time in a fairly short time span i.e. no time or pause long enough to reload any of the pistols or the revolver, I think the comparison may be valid ?
Well, with the early revolvers ( Colts ) one might also carry multiple pistols or sometimes extra pre-loaded revolver cylinders for a relatively quick reload. ( Somewhat tricky on horseback taking one's revolver apart and changing cylinders without fumbling and dropping something important like the barrel or the locking wedge.   ).
You can easily give up your freedom. You have to fight hard to get it back!
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Gordon Frye
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| Posted: Sun 18 Feb, 2007 2:27 pm Post subject: |
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Daniel;
That's an interesting tid-bit about the extra pay for an additional "long firearm" in the Pistolier's weaponry. I hadn't seen that one before, thanks! And speaking of Jost Amman's illustrations, his print showing Pistoliers is quite interesting in that regard (no. 149 in the Dover edition of "293 Woodcuts for Artists and Illustrators"). It shows a Reiter with a cuirass, spaulders, maille sleeves with gauntlets, and a burgonet (the other has a felt hat on rather than the burgonet). It seems to show a maille shirt rather than just sleeves, too since one of the fellows has a skirt of maille below his backplate. The two Reiters are armed with three pistols each (one in each holster, plus one in the waist-belt), and a Carbine to boot (as well of course as a large sword). I was rather surprised to see the carbines, in fact, but your comments make it more clear. What is very noteworthy though is that there are actually extra holsters on the saddle, I would assume for the spare pistol and the carbine. Interesting!
Illustration 150 shows two fellows on horseback with carbines in holsters, and boar spears. Other illustrtions also show carbines carried in saddle holsters slung from the pommel as well, which is quite interesting. Now to find out just when the Carbine Sling came into popular use!  (I know it was prior to 1630, but just how prior?)
It's also interesting to note that all of the pistol holsters are shown in pairs, strapped to the left side of the saddle. Thus the term "Cases of Pistols". And I wouldn't doubt that any Pistolier worth his salt would have had more than the required number, even if they were carried by their Boy on the nag in the rear. Spare shots are always a good thing to have!  Now to ferret out the proof... 
BTW, there's a woodcut from the proposed, but never published book to have been illustrated by Jacob de Gheyn, showing a Cuirassier with pistol and an arm somewhere between pistol and carbine that I have somewhere in my computer. Got to find that and post it for you.
Cheers!
Gordon
"After God, we owe our victory to our Horses"
Gonsalo Jimenez de Quesada
http://www.renaissancesoldier.com/
http://historypundit.blogspot.com/
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Gordon Frye
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| Posted: Sun 18 Feb, 2007 3:07 pm Post subject: |
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Here is one of the woodcuts by de Gheyn for the proposed 1596 drill book for Cavalry. It shows clearly the smaller "puffer" style pistol in the Cuirassier's hand, and the somewhat larger, almost carbine length firearm in the near-side holster. Rather interesting!
Cheers!
Gordon
 Attachment: 37.75 KB
"After God, we owe our victory to our Horses"
Gonsalo Jimenez de Quesada
http://www.renaissancesoldier.com/
http://historypundit.blogspot.com/
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David Evans
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| Posted: Mon 19 Feb, 2007 5:19 am Post subject: |
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| Lafayette C Curtis wrote: | Actually, I wonder if the difference between the arming doublet and the buffcoat had something to do with the evolution of civilian fashion. The arming doublets followed the older lines of doublets with pronounced waists and all, while the buffcoat examples I know look quite similar to the later doublets with higher and less pronounced waistlines, in some cases being simply thick leather versions of such garments. So maybe the arming doublet and the buffcoat were two different lines of doublet evolution branching off at different points from the doublets' evolutionary tree?
(Or was is the arming doublet that formed the inspiration for the first civilian doublets? My memory is a bit rusty here.) |
Arming doublets followed fashion, particulary as armour followed fashion.There's no logical reason for the peascod armours, except that fashion says to show wealth your clothing has a big belly !
I'm leaning towards the arming doublet starts to die out because fashionable clothing is increasingly heavily padded and stuffed with cotton fibres and bombast. The buff coat appears as a means to protect the clothing from rust, oil and damage from armour.
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David Evans
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| Posted: Mon 19 Feb, 2007 5:25 am Post subject: mail sleeves |
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| Lafayette C Curtis wrote: | | Interesting info, Daniel. I wasn't aware that the mail sleeves were supposed to be standard equipment for reiters--I used to think they were supposed to have plate arm defenses instead. |
Oddly enough, there are a fair few mail sleeves in the RA and the Wallace Collection. I suspect that mail "voiders" had disappeared and been replaced by full sleeves, with at least one example covering the upper chest and neck in the Wallace. There's also a picture of one of the Phillip's of Spain in armour with full mail sleeves shown.
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Lafayette C Curtis
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| Posted: Mon 19 Feb, 2007 10:00 am Post subject: |
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The best illustration I have of it is actually modern--not surprisingly, a work of Velimir Vuksic. But it didn't have an explanatory text or caption about the nationality of the "arquebusier" depicted in it so I thought it was just an Eastern European phenomenon, what with the frequent instances of those mail sleeves in that area.
But then, Germany isn't (and wasn't) all that far from Poland and Hungary...
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Lafayette C Curtis
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Gordon Frye
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| Posted: Sat 24 Feb, 2007 7:13 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks for posting those links, Lafayette! Very cool... got to digest them now. I have some minor issues, but I'll address them first with the author. But it's great to see someone tackling this subject with such enthusiasm, as well as a strong historical background for research, too.
Cheers!
Gordon
"After God, we owe our victory to our Horses"
Gonsalo Jimenez de Quesada
http://www.renaissancesoldier.com/
http://historypundit.blogspot.com/
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