European and Japanese Suits of Armor

choi

Charles McGrath, Dressed to Kill, From Head to Toe. New York Times, Oct 5, 2012.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/0 ... -armor-curator.html
(“Bashford Dean and the Creation of the Arms and Armor Department” runs through Sept. 29, 2013, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Note:
(1) The exhibition review observed, "William Randolph Hearst, one of the most enthusiastic collectors, had an entire armory in his Riverside Drive penthouse: enough pikes, halberds, helms, hauberks, greaves, gauntlets, cuisses and cuirasses to outfit a crusade."
(a) halberd
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halberd
(b) hauberk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hauberk

(c) greave
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greave
(d) cuisses
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuisses
(Cuisses are a form of medieval armour worn to protect the thigh. The word is the plural of the French word cuisse meaning 'thigh')

The singular form of the English noun is "cuisse."
(e) cuirass
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuirass

Compare
(i) The cuirass seems to describe Greek and Roman piece, while "full plate armour developed in Europe during the Late Middle Ages, especially in the context of the Hundred Years' War [1337-1453]."
plate armour
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_armour
(ii) breastplate
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breastplate
(In medieval weaponry, the breastplate is the front portion of 'plate armour' covering the torso)

(2) The review mentioned "the four mounted knights cantering down the middle of the Bloomberg Court."

canter
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canter
("a controlled, three-beat gait performed by a horse. It is a natural gait possessed by all horses, faster than most horses' trot but slower than the gallop")
(3)
(a) The review talked about "the two side-by-side, before-and-after suits of armor made for Henry VIII, one when he was young and slender and another when he was fat and gouty."
(b) An armor set in the online slide show belonged to Henry VIII around 1544.
(c) Henry VIII of England (1491-1547; reign 1509-1547)
(4) Henry II of France
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_II_of_France
(1519-1559; reign 1547-1559)

(5) The review said of Mr dean: "He was also the first curator of fish at the Museum of Natural History (where his specialties included placoderms, or armored fish)."
(a) American Museum of Natural History
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Museum_of_Natural_History
(at Manhattan)
(b) For placoderms, see placodermi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placodermi
(from the Greek for plate and for skin, literally "plate-skinned")

Both are plural form of "plcoderm," but the "s" ending is English (grammar) and the "i" ending is Latin.
(6) Wave Hill
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill
(7) For lantern-jawed, see
(a) lantern. Online Etymology Dictionary.
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=lantern-jawed
("Lantern-jaws 'hollow, long cheeks' is from a resemblance noted since at least mid-14c")
(b) lantern jaw. Collins dictionary.
http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/american/lantern-jaw
("long, thin jaws, with sunken cheeks, that give the face a lean, gaunt appearance")

Check images.google.com to see for yourself.

(8) For Duc de Dino (there is a page in French Wikipedia under this title, which I can not read), see
Princess Dorothea of Courland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princess_Dorothea_of_Courland
(Duchess of Dino; 1793-1862; born near Berlin [as Baltic German], the fourth and last daughter of Duchess Dorothea of Courland; her uncle [was] Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord[, a French diplomat]; her husband was Talleyrand's nephew; In 1817 Talleyrand "was also granted the duchy of Dino (a 1.5 km by 1.2 km Calabrian island) by the king of Sicily in recognition of his services at Vienna. The duchy of Dino was immediately handed down to his nephew and his wife and so Dorothea also became duchess of Dino")

The French nouns for duke and duchess are "duc" and "duchesse," respectively.

(9) The panoply in "knightly panoply"
(10) The review stated that "even an ordinary foot soldier’s helmet in the Dean exhibition is decorated with fluting and metal studs."

fluting (architecture)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluting_(architecture)
(11) George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Clifford,_3rd_Earl_of_Cumberland
(1558-1605)

(12) Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_I,_Holy_Roman_Emperor
(1503-1564; Holy Roman Emperor 1558-1564)

(13) The review describes a helmet this way: "This is especially true in the case of the 16th-century steel-and-gold helmet made by Filippo Negroli, probably the greatest of his generation of armorers, in which a mermaid arches backward over the top holding a gorgon above her head and over the visor while her tail, in the back, turns into acanthus branches with little putti peeking out."
(a) Filippo Negroli
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filippo_Negroli
(ca 1510-1579; an armourer from Milan)
(b) gorgon
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorgon
(d) acanthus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acanthus
(referring to Acanthus plant; section 1 Architecture)
(e) putto
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putto
(plural putti)

(14) Benvenuto Cellini
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benvenuto_Cellini
(1500-1571)
(15) The review at last said, "Some of them [suits of armor] left very little to the imagination. The Ferdinand armor, the set with the Madonna in front, also includes a hard-to-miss banana-shaped codpiece.
(a) codpiece
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codpiece
(b) codpiece (n; Middle English codpese, from cod bag, scrotum (from Old English codd) + pese piece; First Known Use: 15th century):
"a flap or bag concealing an opening in the front of men's breeches especially in the 15th and 16th centuries"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/codpiece

(16) A photo caption referred to
Gothic plate armour
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gothic_plate_armour
(a type of plate armour of steel made in the regions of Germany and the Holy Roman Empire during the late Middle Ages (15th century); provided full-body protection)