Ethnographic Arms & Armour - View Single Post - Pirate sword-cutlass

Philip · 2nd November 2019, 10:54 PM

Charming period illustrations of Ottoman Janissaries. Elements such as clothing, especially headgear, are pretty true-to-form but anyone who has examined surviving armament from the place and time can see that the depictions of weapons are close but no cigar.

In a pre-photographic age, artists based their depictions on various models. The few who traveled could have observed and drawn first-hand. Others had to rely on second-hand info, either graphic or verbal, from a variety of sources.

It is interesting to note that the scabbards of some of those Janissary sabers are similar in form to those drawn by other artists making pictures of, say palace guards in Peking or Rangoon of the 16th-18th centuries. An examination of complete swords from the cultures of the times indicates something totally different.

I'm sure you've all seen paintings from the Renaissance and thereafter showing Biblical scenes, but with characters dressed in the European mode of the current time, with Gothic and Baroque buildings in the background, and Roman soldiers carrying a variety of weapons not known to anyone serving in an imperial legion. These are understandable, considering that time travel is difficult at best even for us moderns, and archaeological museums as we know them today weren't around.

Caution should also be exercised when trying to use the gorgeous Orientalist paintings by 19th cent. European artists like Gérôme as ethnographic documentation. Though these were typically executed with near-photographic realism, many painters worked in studio, not on-site, and typically maintained accuracy as re dress, equipage, and armaments via artifacts brought back from abroad, and available to them. (actually, the approach was used earlier by painters such as Rembrandt as well). The problem arises when objects from disparate areas were inadvertently combined in a single composition when an artist made his selection of props. This aspersion does not necessarily apply to all works or to any particular painter, but it does serve as a caveat.

Collectors and students of today benefit from the development of field photography with cameras that literally went round the world. But here again, there is the need to discern if an image was "staged" or whether it was really "from life".

2nd November 2019, 10:54 PM	#6
Philip Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: California Posts: 1,036	artistic license Charming period illustrations of Ottoman Janissaries. Elements such as clothing, especially headgear, are pretty true-to-form but anyone who has examined surviving armament from the place and time can see that the depictions of weapons are close but no cigar. In a pre-photographic age, artists based their depictions on various models. The few who traveled could have observed and drawn first-hand. Others had to rely on second-hand info, either graphic or verbal, from a variety of sources. It is interesting to note that the scabbards of some of those Janissary sabers are similar in form to those drawn by other artists making pictures of, say palace guards in Peking or Rangoon of the 16th-18th centuries. An examination of complete swords from the cultures of the times indicates something totally different. I'm sure you've all seen paintings from the Renaissance and thereafter showing Biblical scenes, but with characters dressed in the European mode of the current time, with Gothic and Baroque buildings in the background, and Roman soldiers carrying a variety of weapons not known to anyone serving in an imperial legion. These are understandable, considering that time travel is difficult at best even for us moderns, and archaeological museums as we know them today weren't around. Caution should also be exercised when trying to use the gorgeous Orientalist paintings by 19th cent. European artists like Gérôme as ethnographic documentation. Though these were typically executed with near-photographic realism, many painters worked in studio, not on-site, and typically maintained accuracy as re dress, equipage, and armaments via artifacts brought back from abroad, and available to them. (actually, the approach was used earlier by painters such as Rembrandt as well). The problem arises when objects from disparate areas were inadvertently combined in a single composition when an artist made his selection of props. This aspersion does not necessarily apply to all works or to any particular painter, but it does serve as a caveat. Collectors and students of today benefit from the development of field photography with cameras that literally went round the world. But here again, there is the need to discern if an image was "staged" or whether it was really "from life".