On the Rowel Spur 53 



scroll-work, and, as is rightly stated in the catalogue, require 

 the assistance of a magnifying glass for their full appreciation. 

 At the British Museum there are a few good examples of this 

 period, one of which, shown on Plate 31, is a brass spur, 

 bearing every indication of having lain for a long time in 

 the water, and is believed to have been dredged up from the 

 Thames. It possesses all the usual characteristics, and the 

 rather large rowel of five points, two inches in diameter, shows 

 a considerable amount of ornament. The five-pointed rowel 

 is almost universal at this period. Sir Samuel Meyrick says 

 that " it is certain that spur rowels were never of six points 

 before Henry VI., nor of five till Charles I." He is certainly 

 wrong about the six points, as there are numbers of specimens 

 now in existence that were made long before Henry VI. But 

 I have never seen a five-pointed rowel before the time of 

 James I. or Charles I. The skill and ingenuity of the artificer 

 was frequently directed at this period to the buckle. 



The spur in the British Museum, just mentioned, has a 

 very handsome buckle attached to one of its upper rings, and 

 the very beautiful spur at the Tower, shown on Plate 32, has 

 a still more elaborate buckle. The spurs of this period in 

 continental museums all bear the closest resemblance to those 

 in our own. In the Stibbert Collection at Florence there are 

 a great number of spurs of this period, all more or less ornate, 

 and at other museums that I have seen there are numerous 

 examples. It is at this period that we see the first attempt 

 at a universal shape. Not that there was any regulation pattern 

 — that did not come for a long time — but the spurs of this 



