Five centuries ago, the harness played a seminal role in European culture and warfare. But this archetypal piece of steel protective clothing continues to impact our language:

someone has to earn his spurs. I break a lance for someone. You host a sports tournament.

A harness played different roles in the lives of men – and of some women – it was fashion and fancy dress, and everything from a boy’s armour to his funeral helm.

These figurines are the only extant complete set of jousting toys from the late Middle Ages. Only the lances are modern replacements.

Ribbons or a piece of string could be threaded into their bases, allowing the players to pull the knights towards each other. If the lance of one hit his opponent, the latter was unhorsed.

The young players were clearly familiar with all the rules and tricks of the then-popular sport of jousting.

On the left is armour for a joust of peace, with the tilt. Here, the mounted jousters are separated by the tilt, a wooden barrier. They aimed their lances at their opponent’s shield, which was screwed onto his harness.

On the right is a harness for a foot tournament. Participants faced off on foot armed with swords or maces. Their waists and thighs were protected by a wide armoured skirt.

The idea that a harness is incredibly heavy and greatly restricts the wearer’s mobility is modern nonsense. A harness was designed to move in and with it.

A harness comprises countless individual pieces, often as many as 200. These pieces were carefully but not rigidly joined together. It was therefore not a problem to walk, run or jump in a harness, or to climb stairs, lie on the ground and get up again.

‘But I blush to record, upon how infamously frivolous causes the world has been roused to arms by Christian kings.’

‘Kings! to you I make my first appeal. On your nod, such is the constitution of human affairs, the happiness of mortals is made to depend … hear the voice of your Sovereign Lord, commanding you, upon your duty, to seek peace and abolish war. Be persuaded that the world, wearied with its long-continued calamities, demands this.’

Quoted from: Desiderius Erasmus, The Complaint of Peace, Open Court, 1521

From this evolved the custom of displaying helmets – sometimes even full armours – to commemorate a deceased knight in the church where he was buried.

These helmets are called ‘funeral helms’.

There are two types of funeral helms. One option was to use real steel helmets, many of which came from the deceased’s estate. Or such helmets were especially produced for a funeral, in which case they were made of painted wood and would have been useless on a battlefield.

Most funeral helms were decorated with a crest. The latter could be read as heraldic or political symbols. But they also functioned as fantastic decorations.

A funeral helm symbolised that the deceased had returned all temporal powers to God, as well as his martial achievements and his chivalrous life.

Most of the extant funeral helms are in churches in England. One of them is the funeral helm of Edward the Black Prince (1330-1376), which is still displayed at Canterbury Cathedral.

Many armourers produced thousands of identical breast- and backplates for foot soldiers. But famous master-craftsmen like Lorenz Helmschmid (c.1445–1516) and Filippo Negroli (c.1510–1579) created unique artworks.

An armourer commissioned to produce a made-to-measure harness was faced with a problem: the harness had to fit its wearer like a glove. But he often lived far away. As often as not it was almost impossible to take his measurements.

Armourers frequently used the future wearer’s doublet and hose to gauge his size. Or they made paper cut-outs that the client could place against his body. And for the most important clients like kings and emperors, armourers might even travel across Europe to measure a royal paunch or a pair of princely legs.

Those worn over his harness were costly and for display.

They were made of expensive fabrics, often emblazoned with the wearer’s coat of arms, and they emphasised his elite status.

Those worn under the harness were functional and offered additional protection.

They were made of simple materials, prevented chaffing, and alleviated the effects of heat, cold and wet conditions.

Crests were attached using the holes we find in the crowns of many extant helmets.

Originally, a crest functioned as a heraldic symbol. It identified the wearer. But in late-mediaeval tournaments crests mainly served as fantastic, symbolic and spectacular helmet décor.

The motifs chosen for crests often referenced the wearer’s valour and strength. Others celebrated courtly love. But many were merely witty and humourous, intended to catch the spectators’ eye.

But armour also reflects the aesthetic tastes of the period and culture in which it was produced.

For example, the slimline proportions of southern-German harnesses produced around 1480/90 are graceful and elegant. English harnesses from 1570/80, however, are much plumper and have wide hips.

In 1579, Lucas van Valckenborch portrayed Archduke (later Emperor) Matthias (1557–1619) twice. In both portraits Matthias wears tight, colourful hose, blue in one painting, red in the other. With one he wears a gilt breastplate, with the other a textile doublet of a similar carapace-like style.

In the early sixteenth century, fashionable gentlemen wore long, pleated skirts, especially in southern Germany. Only very few harnesses with steel imitations of such textile skirts have survived.

In 1512, Emperor Maximilian I commissioned a harness for his grandson, the then twelve-year-old Archduke (later Emperor) Charles V. The cut-outs on the front and back of the skirt made it easier to walk in the harness.

In the Renaissance, landsknechts were mercenary troops from southern Germany. Their prominent role in contemporary warfare gave them privileges expressed in the clothes they sported.

The clothes favoured by landknechts were often extravagant – colourful, puffed, flared, and slashed. Their striking appearance even informed the clothes worn by members of the elite.

Some armourers imitated elements of landsknecht fashion in steel. They produced harnesses that appear to be slashed. Some have puffed sleeves that play with the illusion that they are made not of hard metal but of some soft, pliable textile.

Armourers produced helmets with fantastic visors in the shape of human or animal faces, or mythological grimaces. These works document both their creativity and their virtuosity.

When they were devised in the Renaissance these helmets were surely meant to elicit the reaction they still evoke today – we find them playful, weird and wonderful.

In the lists, jousters often sported female accessories such as headdresses or a bridal veil. They functioned as symbolic references to love or a particular dynastic alliance.

In the fifteenth and sixteenth century, the Ottomans expanded their empire to include large tracts of the Middle East, Asia, North Africa, and Europe. This is why Europeans found them rather terrifying. But their power and culture also elicited respect and interest.

European princes collected and exchanged Turkish arms. Armourers produced Turkish-inspired harnesses and weapons. Turkish and Turkish-inspired objects were also highly-esteemed gifts.

Alla turca arms and armour played a role, too, at fancy-dress parties held at court. But they were also used to arm troops that for tactical reasons needed equipment similar to that of their Ottoman enemies.

The Renaissance witnessed a revival of interest in ancient Greece and Rome. This is reflected in contemporary all’antica – classicizing - harnesses.

This fashion was presumably born of Italy’s fascination with ancient Roman triumphs. Requests for depictions of these literary feasts fired up artists’ imagination.

In the sixteenth century, all’antica harnesses were very much en vogue. By donning such an extravagant harness, the wearer transformed himself into an ancient hero. The artists who produced these masterpieces were celebrated, highly-paid specialists.

Princes and generals wore these sculpted harnesses to pageants and other courtly festivities. By donning a helmet with lion-visor or a muscle cuirass, the wearer transformed himself into a modern Hercules or Caesar.

instead, armourers began to decorate contemporary harnesses with classical motifs. They illustrated, for example, the heroic exploits of Hercules or grotesque ornaments in highly-detailed repoussé work or gold and silver inlays.

Female characters from classical mythology were also depicted in all’antica harnesses. Rembrandt, for instance, shows us Bellona, the Roman goddess of war (Lat: bellum = war), wearing such a harness. Note the head of Medusa on her shield. Her helmet is shaped like an ancient mythological creature.