Arms and Armour of the Medieval Joust

Book excerpt: Jousting is the most iconic form of mounted combat. For more than five hundred years, the sport itself, and the chivalric culture that surrounded it, took on almost mythical qualities. Here, Tobias Capwell explains the glitz and glamour of a sport that attracted enormous popular audiences throughout the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Though he deals almost exclusively with weapons and warriors, Capwell tells a story not of war and destruction, but of pageantry and valor. This is the story of the armor of peace.