Plated mail has an untypical design. It consists of small steel plates overlapping and forming horizontal stripes, joined with chain mail. The plated mail from the National Museum in Krakow has 1010 such plates, densely packed one over the other in 13 horizontal stripes. The Krakow armour is also exceptional due to the shape, which resembles the doublet, fashionable in the 1580s in Europe.

"There is the grand portal, with its pointed arch, from whose shadowy re- cesses we may presently expect to hear the organ pealing, and the anthem of chanting priests. There is the heaven-piercing spire, with its pinnacles, finials, turrets, traceries, and all the requisite architectural enrichments, from which anon will ring out the sweet and solemn chimes, calling the world to prayer. There too, sharply traced by sunlight and shadow, are the Gothic oriels and double-arched windows, suggestive of stained-glass pictures, only visible from the interior.

Cathedral Rock. note the details, and comprehend the general effect of the mass, we are troubled with a strange sense of incredulity, a distrust of our senses, even a certain flushing of resent-ment, as if some imposition were practised upon us. All that we have heretoforeseen and wondered at has not quite prepared us to accept this literally. Can this bereality, or is it only a stony nightmare superinduced by a surfeit of rocks ? Yet, thereit stands, in motionless and silent majesty, a vast minster of the Gothic ages, growingmore and more marvellous as we scrutinize its carven details, and estimate its sublime IN WEST VIRGINIA"

This coffret illustrated with scenes from Arthurian and other courtly literature of the Middle Ages is one of the most imposing examples to survive. The lid represents the assault on the metaphorical fortress, Castle of Love, with a tournament and knights catapulting roses. The left end depicts Tristan and Isolde spied upon by King Mark, and a hunter killing a unicorn trapped by a virgin. The right end shows a knight rescuing a lady from the Wildman (Wodehouse), and Galahad receiving the key to the castle of maidens. At the back are Lancelot and the lion, Lancelot crossing the sword bridge, Gawain asleep on the magic bed, and the maidens welcoming their deliverer. The newly discovered front panel, lost since before 1800, is a poignant depiction of the love tragedy of Pyramus and Thisbe and Aristotle teaching Alexander the Great and Phyllis riding on the back of Aristotle.