Medieval Weaponry - Ancient Armor and Weapons in Europe (Illustrated‪)‬

With the nations of the Stone Period and the Bronze Period we do not purpose to occupy ourselves; not that the relics of their times are of an inferior interest, but that, in commencing with the days of the iron-workers, which for general purposes we assume to be identical with the retirement of the Romans beyond the Alps, and the domination of the northern nations in the centre and west of Europe, we feel that we have a task before us already much greater than we can hope to fulfil, either to the satisfaction of our readers, or our own. If we leave much undone, we shall endeavour, in that we do, to be exact. Modern archæology differs from the old antiquarianism especially in this,—that whatever it contributes to knowledge is required to be scrupulously true. A monkish chronicler of the fourteenth century is no longer held to be an authority for the affairs of the twelfth; an illuminated Froissart of the fifteenth century is no more permitted to supply us with portraits of the Black Prince, or the costume of Duguesclin. Our pictures are no longer copies of copies; neither are they mere versions of old art. We must have line for line, point for point. This is essential, for two reasons: we are freed from the danger of any wrong interpretation of an historic fact, and we keep in view the characteristic art of the period under examination. The importance of this practice admitted, we shall be excused for stating that almost all the illustrations of this work have been drawn by the writer;—when from manuscripts, the collection and folio of the volume have been carefully recorded, so that the truthfulness of the copy may be readily tested;—after the drawings had been transferred to the wood, they were carefully examined before the graver was permitted to commence its work; and if, in spite of every precaution, some unlucky error would at last creep in, the mistake was always rectified with new engraving.