Pair of rowel spurs second quarter of the seventeenth century
Brass, iron, leather | RCIN 67256
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Pair of rowel spurs each with body of brass having curved slender sides of D-section with swept figure-of-eight terminals, and a downturned, right-angled neck supporting a rowel of five long, evenly tapered points alternating with tiny points. The proximal part of the neck is shaped like a vase with a cross-hatched surface. The top end of the distal part of the neck is chiselled with a highly stylised head of a beast.
The outer surface of each of the sides is punched with a trellis of bands filled with small circles; the spaces between the bands being filled with quatrefoils or half quatrefoils as appropriate, all on a finely matted ground. The remainder of the surface is punched at intervals with small ‘C’s. The upper hole of the outer terminal of each spur is fitted with a buckle having at each end of its straight forward bar a fleur-de-lis, and at its centre a triangular projection flanked by a pair of C-scrolls (damaged on the right spur). The centre of its rear edge has a low triangular promontory flanked by two short comma-like ends. The buckle-plates and pins are both of iron. Each of the attachments has a small dome-headed button to receive a leather. Three of the hooks are of iron with brass buttons. That in the upper hole of the inner terminal of the left spur, which is all brass, is perhaps a working-life replacement. The rowel-pin is of iron.
Measurements: Right Spur: length of body 13.0 cm, width within the sides 7.9 cm, diameter of rowel 6.7 cm; Left Spur: length of body 12.9 cm, width within the sides 7.9 cm; diameter of rowel: 7.0 cm.
Weights: Right Spur: 0.154 kg; Left Spur: 0.170 kg.
Text adapted from Arms and Armour in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen: European Armour, London, 2016Provenance
The spurs were presented to the Prince Regent by ‘Mr Simpson / August 26 1812' with the note that they were 'given to Mr Simpson by Mr Rose – of the Stamp Office – Market Harborough – Leicestershire whose account of them was that they were found in the Tent of Richard The Third at the Battle of Bosworth Field’
The Battle of Bosworth Field, Leicestershire, fought on 22 August 1485, resulted in the replacement of the Plantagenet dynasty by the Tudors. Rowland Rose (1739-1823) or Rouse, as he was more commonly known, was a well-known local antiquarian who worked as a draper and auctioneer in Market Harborough and was latterly sub-distributor of stamps in the town. Nothing is known of anyone called Simpson with antiquarian interests in the area.
The spurs are recorded as item no. 2300 in the Carlton House Catalogue of arms and armour (c. 1790-1820), and as item. no. 2329 in the North Corridor Inventory, which records the arrangement of the Collection the North Corridor at Windsor Castle. -
Creator(s)
Acquirer(s)
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Medium and techniques
Brass, iron, leather
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