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LEPT A wooden scaffold designed for infantry to allow them to reach the top of a fortified wali, as shown in Guido da Vigevano’s military treatise of 1335. (Ms. Lat. 11015, f. 4w, Bibliothegue Nationale, Paris)

BELOW LEFT Infantry assault a fortification in the Liber de Casibus Troie by Delie Colonne, mid-14th-century. (Biblioteca Ambrosiana. Ms. H. 86 Sup., f. 35v, Milan)

BELOW The datę is unclear of this Piedmontese wall-painting of the ‘The Road to Calvary’, but the arms and armour are typically 14th-century. [In situ, S. Antonio di Ranverso, Turin)

Iancehends, 1,989 axes and 14,599 swords and couleaux daggers to Brugge. According to Neapolitan records from tlie same period, crossbow (juarreli were normally transported in wooden crates. Italian crossbows were also sold in the Balkans.

The most famous arms merchant of the 14th century was an Italian named Datini who canie from Prato. He described Milan as the ‘head of our trade’ in armour thongh most of his swords and daggers came from Florence, Viterbo and Bologna. Datini also traded in sheet-metal for shaping into \ isors and arm-defences. Many items were purchased in an unfinished State and even Datini’s wife was once recorded ‘sewing’ helmets. He hired equipment to those nnable to purchase outright, and sent agents to places where arms and armour were going cheap because fighting had ceased. Successful soldiers would also sell equipment collected on the battlefield and there was a brisk trade in such secondhand arms.

There were large fluctuations in the cost of armaments: considered in isolation the prices mean little, but they can be compared with eacli other and with other items. For example, in 13th-century Yenice a sword was worth 45 crossbow quarreli, and a knife worth 25 quarreli (one quarrel cost around one denarius). In Genoa a mail coif cost between 16 and 32 sous, whereas a mail hanberk cost between 120 and 152 sous, presumably reflecting the effort involved in its manufacture. In 1250 the cost was put at 20 soldi for a coif, 120 to 130 for a hauberk, but only 45 to 60 soldi for a cuirass which was probably of leather, and 40 to 50 for a panceria. By the micl-14th century in Florence 20,000 locally madę niretoni (crossbow bolts) cost 111 gold florins; while 300 crossbows, 200 barbuta helmets, 100 crocchi (hooks) to span crossbows and an un-numbered quantity of niretoni all came to 700 gold florins. During a similar period Datini sold Milanese bocinelti including mail aventails, leather lining and an ‘inner hood’, for between 4 and 21 florins depending on quality, whereas simple ceruelliere helmets for infantrymen cost only a mere 33 soldi.

DRESS, WEAPONS AND ARMOUR

France was the centre of fashion for medieval western Europę and Italian dress only really developed its distinctire features during the 14th century. The most common articles of under-garments were madę of linen or cotton, consisting of an inlerula or camicia for the upper part of the body and a femomle for the lower, plus tight-fitting hose. A suit or indumentum was worn over these, consisting of the tunica or gonnella long shirt to the knees, a pelliccia, renonis or manucca (short coat), or the elegant guamacca and argoctum, with or