View Single Post
Old 5th December 2014, 01:07 PM   #19
Matchlock
(deceased)
 
Matchlock's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: Bavaria, Germany - the center of 15th and 16th century gunmaking
Posts: 4,310
Default

Generally, all items of manufacture, of arts and crafts alike including weapons, convey the basic style of the respective period.

Between ca. 1480 and 1520, Landsknecht's long pikes measured more than 6 meters overall – reflecting the “Hyper Gothic” period sense of style when churches got built with lofty steeples seemingly touching the sky and humans, too, were pictured to be very tall and slender.

While newly made spike heads from the Early Renaissance period, ca. 1520-50, were often decorated with a roped ornament and brass inlays, the complete pikes were about 5 meters long, and the hafts of surviving Late Gothic specimens got cut back to that length.
Consequently, by the mid 16th c. spike heads became rectangular in shape, and the whole pike now measured ca. 4.5 - 4.7 meters. Cf. two samples suspended below the ceiling in The Michael Trömner Collection (see post # ... above).

In the 1620's
, after the beginning of the Thirty Years War, they got cut back again to ca. 3.5-3.7 m, until most surviving specimens finally got reduced in length to about 2 m in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Discussed here is a truly singular South German Landsknecht's long pike still retaining its original length of ca. 6 meters.
The two brass friezes of the iron head, characteristically decorated with a punched roped ornament, together with the notches, all denote that it was made in ca. 1520-30.
Its ash wood haft is decorated in an incredibly profuse manner, with what must be hundreds of knobs.
My skilled friend Armin König copied it. It took him many hours to get that knobbing done effectively on the hard ash wood that he told me he would never submit to such a toil again ..

The attached photos depict the original pike in the collections of the historic armory at the Veste (fortress) Coburg.
Also attached are three similarly early spike heads the author photographed in the reserve collection/depot of the Historisches Museum Luzern, Switzerland.


Best,
Michael

The first three photos copyrighted by Armin König,
the bottom image copyrighted by Michael Trömner.
Attached Images
    

Last edited by Matchlock; 5th December 2014 at 02:42 PM.
Matchlock is offline   Reply With Quote