"Painted helmets" Topic

I'm working on a Dark Ages project and had a question for the collective here on TMP.

In my reading I've found several references and illustrations of Dark Ages troops with painted helmets. So, here are my questions:

1. How wide spread was this practice? I've found illustrations of Bretons at Hastings and Normans in the Mediterranean. Does anyone know of anyone else who did this?

2. What illustrations, modern or period, are out there? I'd like to have some references so my troops look realistic.

3. Any idea how widespread it was within an army? Was this something done by one in ten men, or one in a hundred, or only the king?

I appreciate any help you can offer. I've tried Google with no luck, and while I have a large library of my own, I don't have too much on this rather esoteric topic.

I'm not sure how much reference there is. When I was painting my Normans, it was probably a 1 out of 4 or 5 for the mounted. Less for the infantry. I typically tied the colors into a theme with the shield. Not sure how accurate it is but it looked right to my eye.

As 21st Century people, we have grown up with the concept of the 'knight in shining armour'. Modern pictures in books, film, TV etc almost always show bare-metal armour.

But there are contemporary images which certainly suggest painted helmets.

My opinion is that paint was probably more common than we think. Quite apart from the fact that Dark Age/Medieval people had a taste for leerily bright decoration, iron and steel rust like crazy if not protected. Of course, you could apply some sort of wax or polish every couple of days. Or just whack some paint on and be done with it…

There are certainly plenty of manuscript illustrations showing helmets which are obviously supposed to be bare metal; this would suggest that there wasn't necessarily a _need_ to paint the helmets.

FWIW, the illustrations at Manuscript Miniatures (my current fave source) show(probably) no painted helmets before about 1100 and quite a lot subsequent to that. There are earlier ones in colour, but they seem to have the mail in the same colour. After about 1100 you can see figures in metal coloured mail but colourful helmets – eventually simple proto-heraldry starts to be applied as well.

I doubt that there was really such a sudden change in fashion, but I would make them sparse for any time before 1100.

I can aso highly recommend Manuscript Miniatures
Painted Helmets
link
Nasal Helmet
link

Regarding the link to painted helms, for the picture with the caption "1194-1196 Italy", does anyone know anything about why there are crosses on the helms?

Also, there is mention of Frederic in the caption at top of manuscript, although Frederic I died in 1190, and Federic the II was born in 1196. Can anyone explain and interpet the caption?

1194-96 is the date the manuscript was made. It is Fred Barbarossa off on the crusades. The same page has a picture which shows him being drowned and his ascension to heaven.
link has the whole thing. You can find a summary of each page too.

Thanks guys. This helps a lot.

An interesting thing about those manuscripts is the amount of bare armour, nasal helmets, and 'kite' shields quite late in the 12th Century. They suggest that maybe the 'surcoat and helm' look only became common in the 13th Century.

That'll mean a bit of a rethink for Richard the Lionheart era armies! But you can use your Norman Conquest era figures for quite a long timespan…

Yes – quite a lot of 'late Crusade' figures are suitable for the mid-13th century – like St Louis' crusades – but not for the iconic 3rd Crusade.

Normans do look better, though various things like leg armour do start appearing soon after the conquest.

If you look at the later crusade manuscripts seems there are a lot of painted helmets.

I have started a article for my blog on the very subject!

cheers
Matt