Burgonet of Henri II
Giovanni Paolo Negroli (1513-1569) · 1540-1550
A burgonet is an open-faced helmet with a peak and a comb, and this one is a showpiece. Its blued steel is covered with gilded ornament hammered up in strong relief and finished with the chisel. Follow the comb forward to the point above the peak, where it ends in the head of a man whose beard dissolves into the surrounding scrollwork, a witty piece of design that turns armour into sculpture. Blue-black ground and gold ornament were meant to be seen at a royal entry or tournament rather than on a battlefield.
The helmet is attributed to Giovanni Paolo Negroli, a member of the Milanese family whose embossed armour was the most sought after in Europe, and dates from the fifteen forties, the years when Henri was dauphin and then king. It was in the French royal collections until the eighteenth century, when it was sold at auction in Paris in seventeen eighty for ninety-six livres. It passed to the antiquary Nicolas-Xavier Willemin and then the painter Pierre Révoil, whose collection the museum bought in eighteen twenty-eight. Sent to the armoury at Pierrefonds, it came back to the Louvre in eighteen seventy-five.
Did You Know? In 1780 a king's helmet from the royal collections went under the hammer for just ninety-six livres.
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