Pricked Spur (1200s): Art, History and Details

Pricked Spur (1200s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The spur was an essential part of the knight's equipment. Fastened to his heels by means of straps and buckles, it was used to prod a horse into action. This example represents the oldest type recorded, the "pricked" spur, so-called because its neck terminated in a spike. The pricked spur was replaced during the Middle Ages by the "rowel" spur, with a rotating spiked wheel.

Object facts

• Title: Pricked Spur
• Date: 1200s
• Culture: Spain
• Type: Arms and Armor
• Technique: steel
• Dimensions: Overall: 11.1 x 7.7 cm (4 3/8 x 3 1/16 in.)
• Collection: MED - Arms & Armor
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1916.1611

A detail from the museum

A knight’s status was closely related to his horse; as a result spurs became a symbol of chivalry and could be given as a token during a knighting.

Collection credit

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John L. Severance

Further reading listed by the museum

• Catalogue of Arms and Armour. [Boston, Massachusetts]: [Frank Gair Macomber], 1900.
• Gilchrist, Helen Ives. A Catalogue of the Collection of Arms & Armor Presented to the Cleveland Museum of Art by Mr. and Mrs. John Long Severance; 1916-1923. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1924.
• Fliegel, Stephen N. Arms & Armor: The Cleveland Museum of Art. [Cleveland, Ohio]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2007.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.