Przedstawienia przyłbic z drugiej połowy XIV i pierwszej ćwierci XV stulecia w ikonografii z terenów państwa krzyżackiego

Abstrakt

The article analyses armament presented in gothic art from the last quarter of 14th cen‑ tury and the beginning of 15th century in Teutonic Prussia, introducing late medieval visored bascinets. Among examined pieces of art are: no longer existing altar panels from the All Saints Chapel in St. Mary’s Basilica in Gdańsk; Poliptych of Grudziądz from the National Museum in Warsaw, lost Retabulum painting from Frombork and also lost Reliquary from Kwidzyn. Furthermore author of the article analyses a piece of gothic silversmithing from Gdańsk area, called ciborium. This particular piece originated from the John the Baptist Church in Chojnice and is currently stored in the treasury of Diocesan Museum in Pelplin. It has not been discussed by the armour experts so far.

Examined images of pig faced bascinets and klappvisiers have quite a few analogies in the iconography of other countries in Central and Western Europe. Comparison with existing artefacts reveals much similarity when it comes to shapes with the helmets from the museum collections. During research author also analysed bascinets on two statues of St. George: first is located in St. Mary’s Basilica in Gdańsk (dated around 1400) and the other one is located in Stara Kościelnica in Malbork County.

Main conclusion of the presented study on helmets is the realism of analysed images (despite some schematism, it also applies to the images from the All Saints Chapel in St. Mary’s Basilica in Gdańsk). Reviewed bascinets should be included to modern type and were commonly worn by the knights in the last quarter of the 14th century. There might be some doubts when it comes to the helmets depicted on the Reliquary from Kwidzyn, however after further research author includes bascinets with aventails to the early type of great bascinets (this also applies to the helmet shown on the statue of St. George in St. Mary’s Basilica in Gdańsk).