almain rivet

English

Alternative forms

• Almain-rivet, Almain rivet, Almaine rivet, almain-rivet

Etymology

Almain +‎ rivet, attested 1530 (as almayne ryvettes). Perhaps named for the overlapping plates' sliding on rivets, although it has also been suggested that rivet meant a suit of armor, related to French revêtir.

Pronunciation

• see Almain, rivet

Noun

almain rivet (plural almain rivets)

1. A kind of light, flexible plate armour first used in Germany around 1450, designed to be manufactured easily, especially en masse.
   • 1904, Somerset Record Society, Publications, page 178, quoting an earlier tithe:

     Two tithing corslets furnished, ij pair of almain rivets furnished. […]

     John Glasse, one almain rivet.

     John Chapman, one almain rivet.

     John Hurforde, with others[,] one almain rivet.

     Heugh Hancoke, a pair of almain rivets.

   • 2012, Martin Windrow, Osprey Men-At-Arms: A Celebration, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 108:

     This archer of the Earl of Northumberland's contingent (centre) is shown without his 'Almain rivet', displaying instead the coat supplied to men of this contingent. His hat and quiver are both of the Percy family livery colours.

   • 2013, Francis M. Kelly, Randolph Schwabe, A Short History of Costume & Armour: Two Volumes Bound as One, Courier Corporation, →ISBN:

     The pikemen wore a corslet or almain rivet with a burgonet, the halberdiers and bill-men the almain rivet, or a corslet with mail-sleeves, the “shot” brigandines, coats of plate, or jacks with tippets (and sometimes sleeves), ...

   • 2018, Steven Gunn, The English People at War in the Age of Henry VIII, Oxford University Press, →ISBN:

     New in Henry's first French war were almain rivets, mass-produced South German plate body armours (see Fig. 3.3). The king himself ordered 2,000 of them in 1512 and his subjects soon began to catch up.

References

• Oxford English Dictionary, 1884–1928, and First Supplement, 1933.

Further reading

• 2008, Charles John Ffoulkes, The Armourer and His Craft, Cosimo, Inc., →ISBN, page 52:

  This contrivance [the sliding rivet] has come to be called the “Almain rivet” in modern catalogues in a sense never found in contemporary documents. In these documents the "Almain rivet" is a light half-suit of German origin, made up of breast, back, and tassets, with sometimes arm-pieces. The word "rivet" was employed in the sixteenth century for a suit of armour, for Hall uses the word frequently in his Chronicles. This word is therefore more probably derived from the same root as the French revêtir, rather than from the rivets which were used in the making of the suit.

Anagrams

• trivial name