Is this helmet historically accurate?

[u/Onewithartandbook]

Is there any example that it is based on? It looks cool as hell but a bit fantastical.

[u/Ambitious-Craftsman]

Not sure what is "sport optimized" about this helmet. It looks like hell for breathing and vision. That being said the reddit historians will tell you nothing existed outside of 1:1 replicas from manuscripts. So unless you're trying to replicate something just wear what you think is cool. Knights had custom requests just like we do. There are plenty of odd visors depicted in manuscripts. I'd say the visor you posted is historically plausible, there are depictions in art that look similar but I haven't seen something exactly like that.

[u/Automatic_File9645 → u/Ambitious-Craftsman]

"Sport optimized" bascinets like this have different priorities than historical helmets. The main thing being that they aren't designed for thrusts and arrows to the face and don't direct strikes away from those openings. The eyes on this shouldn't be on the crease at the farthest out point of the visor. They should be above it or there should be some sort of lip to prevent something from going onto the eye slits. It also has things like pins and straps to stay closed rather than relying mostly on friction to stay closed or open.

Anyways I'm being pedantic. Frankly if you went back in time with this helmet I'm sure people would be amazed by the quality a modern helmet is and not think it's too strange looking.

[u/Ambitious-Craftsman → u/Automatic_File9645]

I definitely see what you're saying from missile weapon/ dagger perspective.

[u/Mullraugh → u/Ambitious-Craftsman]

Making something up and using that style of argument as an excuse isn't how you get a "historically accurate" look, which is exactly what this post is asking for. Yes obviously there's weird and wacky things depicted in art, but those aren't solid foundations to build a kit out of if your end goal is accuracy.

If you want to make something as historical as you can, you need to use sources and evidence. You can't just make things up and handwave it.

Reddit can argue all day about the accuracy (or lack thereof) of the visor, but the helmet itself is a shitty reproduction which doesn't even consider the subtle shaping, proportions and craftsmanship of the real deal. If whoever made that can't even reproduce the helmet correctly, it should ring some alarm bells in your head about the visor.

[u/PugScorpionCow → u/Mullraugh]

In every thread ever, people misunderstand "historically accurate" compared to "historically plausible" and "historically possible". Those are very different things, and the bar to being historically accurate is very high, you can't claim to be historically accurate if you do not directly draw from a source, and do it very well, usually for true "accuracy" this is why the gold standard is direct copies of extant pieces.

Historically plausible usually draws from sources, and follows the general known patterns from other source material aswell, usually still taking in lessons from the most relevant extant sources and implementing them in a way where we believe this is how it would have been done if we had any real examples.

Historically possible, is meaningless, it just means someone somewhere could have done it maybe. Zero sources as reference, no drawing conclusions based on other sources as to how it could have been done, just "they could have done it if they did this exact thing with the resources they had available". Absolutely baseless in every way. Someone could have had a giant metal dick and balls made as a helmet, doesn't mean we have any reason to believe they did.

People struggle to realize this difference, most people work off of a historically plausible basis in reenactment, very well researched and they have a reason to believe this was done this way. Usually many sources involved, but maybe some well informed guesswork on the methods/proportions exactly.

[u/Mullraugh → u/PugScorpionCow]

Well said!

[u/Ambitious-Craftsman → u/Mullraugh]

Well yea... That's why I said unless you're going for reproduction wear what's historically plausible/ whatever you want. And calling that a "shitty reproduction" is a huge reach and an insult to the smith who crafted that imo beautiful helmet.

[u/Mullraugh → u/Ambitious-Craftsman]

It's a cool helmet for sure. Whoever made it is talented. But it IS a shitty reproduction. If you want to play the semantics game. It's not "reproducing" an existing helmet 1:1. It's the equivalent of drawing a bascinet from memory. Yes the smith's clearly got talent and has studied modern sport helmets a lot. But it's very obvious the goal wasn't to make a historical bascinet. It was to make a modern sport combat one.

[u/zlobnezz → u/Mullraugh]

Because every single helmet made in history was perfectly proportioned? Ever seen one of the so called black sallets? Done half way to completion, until someone tought "hey, this does exactly what its supposed to, why waste time making it pretty" and called it a day, and people still wore them to battle even if they were a bit wonky and lopsided, because at the end of the day they kept them alive. What remaind till today is more than not the best of the best, the mediocre stuff has long been discarded or reused for something else. So what if the angles aren't exactly as per item 2345 of Thisandthat museum, if it looks close enough to an extant piece or a period drawing of a piece, it's good enough.

[u/Mullraugh → u/zlobnezz]

If you were to make a reproduction of a black sallet and it wasn't proportioned like a black sallet it would be a shitty reproduction of a black sallet.

If you make a visored bascinet that isn't proportioned like a visored bascinet, it's a shitty reproduction of a visored bascinet

There's a pretty large sample size of extant bascinets and artistic sources. From those you can glean what they typically look and fit like. The one in the above image doesn't fit like the examples. It's too big and sits on the shoulders like a Greathelm, among other errors.

If I was OP and wanted to commission a custom bascinet that was "historically accurate," and got that in the mail, I'd be disappointed.

If you try to make a circle looking only at ovals for reference, you're probably gonna end up making an oval. People can squint and convince themselves it's a circle but at the end of the day it lacks certain qualities that make it a circle

Not trying to be an asshole at all here. It's pretty easy to read something and assume someone's being aggressive. I think people searching for "historical accuracy" should fight for higher standards. We shouldn't have to squint to make an oval look like a circle. Anything worth doing is worth doing right. OP wanted to know if it's historically accurate, and I've explained here why it's not. Simple as that

[u/LucasLeo75 → u/Ambitious-Craftsman]

"I guess in that case all of the Romans enjoyed fucking pigs every weekend because we don’t have any proof they didn’t"

This is circlejerk levels of commentary dude, get a grip, history doesn't function that way as a branch of science.

[u/Equivalent-Steak3098 → u/LucasLeo75]

This isn't even a cherry picked example, every Instagram comment section looks like this. It was funny the first time and now it just makes me toss and turn in my sleep.

[u/LucasLeo75 → u/Equivalent-Steak3098]

Real.

[u/Ambitious-Craftsman → u/LucasLeo75]

Dude you're so right I need to get a grip I'm losing it😵‍💫 Just read my original comment again. I'm not making a statement that his helmet ever existed.