German Black and White (Nuremberg or Augsburg) Town Guard Morion from the Armoury, Fortress Hohenwerfen #3146
A Fine Antique German Black-and-White (Nuremberg or Augsburg) Town Guard Morion, circa, 1580-1590. Original brass rosettes all intact. Embossed "fleur-de-lis" form on both sides encircled by stylized acanthus foliage at each side of the comb w/radiating lobes. Two piece construction; crown joined along the medial comb, and integral brim turned down at each side and rising to an acute point front to rear, the edges formed w/a roped edge. Areas of de-lamination. An exceptional example.
PROVENANCE; THE ARMOURY OF ARCHDUKE EUGEN FORTRESS HOHENWERFEN, SALZBURG, AUSTRIA. SOLD ANDERSON GALLERIES, NEW YORK 1ST-5TH OF MARCH 1927.
J.Glueckselig & Sohn, Vienna, 1st December 1936.
EXHIBITED; JOHN WOODMAN HIGGINS ARMORY MUSEUM COLLECTION, WORCESTER, MASS.
(JWHA #2383)
HISTORY - Ever since 1580, when Count Ferdinand of Tyrol became one of the first collectors of arms and armour in the modern sense of the word by assembling at his castle of Ambras, two miles from Innsbruck, the magnificent creations of the early armourer's art, and publishing the first catalog raisonne' of its kind, the reigning princes of Europe have considered the ownership of a fine "Armeria" (Arms & Armor) an indispensable prerogative. Great nobleman, and in due course the modern princes of commerce and industry, have tried to emulate their example; and we thus find, besides the incomparable collections at Vienna, Dresden, Madrid, Windsor, and in the Wallace Collection at Hertford House and the Metropolitan Museum of New York, a number of private collections of singular importance both abroad and in America.
The example of Ambras doubtless had its inspiring influence on the development by another Hapsburg price - the Archduke Eugen - of the Armoury at Hohenwerfen. When Archduke Eugen took possession of the fortress in 1898, he restored and replenished the (3) galleries of the armoury. The castle was placed on an inaccessible peak and dominating some of the vital routes from the Rhineland to the Orient and from the North to the Adriatic from the eleventh century on. Italian architects remodelled the Gothic fortress into the lofty terraced structure in the 16th century that exists today.
