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Francisco García




Location: Madrid
Joined: 05 May 2007

Posts: 1

PostPosted: Sat 05 May, 2007 5:23 pm    Post subject: Help with an Islamic helmet         Reply with quote

I'm doing a research paper for a college class on the helmet in the photo, displayed in the Naval Museum of Madrid. I would like to know your opinion about it, because I am not a specialist in the subject and the bibliography that I can consult is rather little. It is catalogued as an indo-persian helmet of the XVII century, but it has not been studied in depth. I will be very grateful for all the remarks that I can receive.


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Hisham Gaballa





Joined: 27 Jan 2005
Reading list: 7 books

Posts: 508

PostPosted: Sun 06 May, 2007 9:31 am    Post subject: Re: Help with an Islamic helmet         Reply with quote

Francisco García wrote:
I'm doing a research paper for a college class on the helmet in the photo, displayed in the Naval Museum of Madrid. I would like to know your opinion about it, because I am not a specialist in the subject and the bibliography that I can consult is rather little. It is catalogued as an indo-persian helmet of the XVII century, but it has not been studied in depth. I will be very grateful for all the remarks that I can receive.


A good referrence for Islamic armour is Robinson's "Oriental Armour", a bit dated now, but AFAIK there is nothing else as comprehensive. And it's still available as a Dover edition. Another very good book is Manouchehr Khorasani's "Arms and Armour From Iran". Manouchehr is a member of this forum and you'll find a link to his book in his signature. If you want something small and simple but with good pictures, try "An Introduction to Indian Arms and Armour" by Thom Richardson. It's published by the Royal Armouries Museum and I think you can buy it on their website.

That style of helmet is often called a "kulah khud", sometimes spelled kolah khod, a Farsi (Persian) word which AFAIK simply means "hat helmet". It seems to have been invented in Iran in the Early 16th century, although a similar helmet was also used by the mamluks of Egypt and Syria from the 14th to the 16th century. Kulah khuds contunued to be used as battle helmets right until the 18th century and as part of parade armour until the 19th century.

In the late 19th century European collectors became very fond of using Persian and Indian armour as decor and many surviving late 19th century Persian helmets were probably made for the European market.

Kulah khuds were also used in India and the Ottoman Empire, although the Indian versions were slightly different. The one you've got there looks Indian BTW. Indian kulah khuds had a shallower bowl and shorter spikes. The Indian version also had a different name, it was called a top. Iranian kulah khuds have a taller more hemispherical bowl witl a longer spike.

Kulah khuds were usually worn as part of a matching set consisting of a mail shirt over which was worn a cuirass made of 4 rectangular steel plates called a chahar ayna, mail-and-plate vambraces called bazubands, a shield (separ) and sometimes mail trousers or mail-and-plate trousers.

There are quite a few pictures of kulah khuds at oriental-arms.com, Hermann Historica and Czerny's auctions:
http://www.oriental-arms.com/search.php?q=hel...&s.y=5
http://www.hermann-historica.de/auktion/hhm51...at51_p.txt
http://www.hermann-historica.de/auktion/hhm51...at51_p.txt
http://www.hermann-historica.de/auktion/hhm51...at51_p.txt
http://www.hermann-historica.de/auktion/hhm51...at51_p.txt
http://server.thetisweb.com/czernysasp/elenco...amp;ris=10

These pictures are scanned from some of my books:
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y110/Nephtys...d_Iran.jpg
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y110/Nephtys...udIran.jpg
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y110/Nephtys...na_003.jpg
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y110/Nephtys...na_002.jpg
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y110/Nephtys...na_004.jpg

And some of my photos:
http://www.myArmoury.com/albums/displayimage.php?pos=-12463
http://www.myArmoury.com/albums/displayimage.php?pos=-12437
http://www.myArmoury.com/albums/displayimage.php?pos=-12409
http://www.myArmoury.com/albums/displayimage.php?pos=-12403
http://www.myArmoury.com/albums/displayimage.php?pos=-12349



I have realised that I failed to credit the books I got the scans from.
The first is from "THE ARTS OF WAR. Arms and Armour of the 7th to 19th centuries (The Nasser D. Khalili Collection of Islamic Art, VOL XXI)" by David Alexander.
The remainder come from 2 Polish books; which I bought off ebay from another member of this forum. One of the books is "Stara Bron w poskich zbiorach" (Old weapons in Polish collections) by Zdzislaw Zygulski, the other is "Bron Wschodnia", also by Zdzislaw Zygulski.
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