War Hat (or Kettle Hat) (c. 1475–1500): Art, History and Details

War Hat (or Kettle Hat) (c. 1475–1500) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Antonio Missaglia (Italian, 1416/17–1495/96).

The work and its context

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

Open helmets like this one were in use from the 1200s to the 1400s and are the ancestor of today's common military helmet. Such helmets were worn by foot soldiers as they attempted to scale the walls of an armed town. The slight ridge, or comb, down the center served to improve deflection and increase strength. Antonio Missaglia's workshop created helmets like this for royalty and knights in the region of Milan. Missaglia inherited the workshop from his father, who was also an armorer, and employed craftsmen who specialized in particular types of armor, such as jointed arm defenses or helmets.

Object facts

• Title: War Hat (or Kettle Hat)
• Date: c. 1475–1500
• Creator attribution: Antonio Missaglia (Italian, 1416/17–1495/96)
• Culture: Italy, Milan
• Type: Arms and Armor
• Technique: steel
• Dimensions: Overall: 36 x 22 x 26.6 cm (14 3/16 x 8 11/16 x 10 1/2 in.)
• Collection: MED - Arms & Armor
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1916.1565

A detail from the museum

The rivets along the rim were not only decorative, but a means of attachment for a liner.

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.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.

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.