THE 600th anniversary of the Battle of Agincourt will be marked at the Wallace Collection in London this autumn with a display of weapons and armour from the early 15th century. The exhibition – The Sinews of War – goes on display from September 1 and will include rare books from the archive of the collection, which encompasses old master oil paintings from the 14th to the late 19th century including works by Titian, Velazquez, Rubens and Van Dyck, princely arms and armour, and one of the finest collections of French 18th century art.
Agincourt has been celebrated as a great victory for the common man over haughty aristocrats, for the heroic King Henry V, and as and the culmination of Shakespeare’s famous play Henry V. All of the most popular interpretations of this event resonate with the image of the plucky and vastly outnumbered English defeating their apparently insurmountable French enemies. Sources in this exhibition show that Henry’s campaign and subsequent battle was more complicated than the myth. Here are some of the objects to be displayed.
Pair of gauntlets, Italian c1390. Copyright, Wallace Collection.
St. George and the Dragon (French or German), copyright Wallace Collection.
Visored bascinet, late 14th-early 15th century. Copyright The Wallace Collection.
