The Armour Archive

Adriano

It's good to talk about this stuff. SCA fighting is as much a psychological game as a physical one, and I'm glad that our philosophy is more complex than just "win at any cost". For years I had a hang-up (to use a term from my youth) similar to Otto's. Partly it was that, deep down, part of me felt ...

Adriano

Logan , I can't find a written basis for the three-color rule (separate colors for haft/flat, striking edge, and thrusting tip). It's probably specific to Meridies; I think I heard it directly from the KEM, Sir Artos. The Meridian Marshall's Handbook is annoyingly ambiguous about low-profile thrust...

Adriano

This is from the Meridian Marshall's Handbook: It is legal for either attacker or defender to grasp the shafts of pole weapons, axes, maces, madus, and spears. If this weapon grabbing turns into grappling (i.e., body-to-body contact) it shall be stopped immediately. In a big melee, even if everybody...

Adriano

Also, I think weapons with thrusting tips now have to be three-color jobs: Color A for the haft (or flat of the blade on swords); Color B for the striking edge; Color C for the thrusting tip.

Adriano

Well, according to http://www.foolswar.org , Theatyn's soliciting suggestions for the battle scenarios. This may be our only chance to keep things fairly straightforward. (Or not, depending on your preferences.) Okay, the clacker mace sounds fun. I'll try and have that ready for Fool's War; Pennsic ...

Adriano

True -- I saw Cathal fight at Red Tower, in Duke John's Greybeard Tourney for fighters 50 and over. (Five more years and I'm in!)

Watch out -- Theatyn is in complete charge of the heavy combat for Fool's War.

Adriano

Thanks, Magnus! It'll still be a couple of months before I can fight (hoping to get on the field at Fool's War) so I've got some time to make new stuff.

Adriano

Last year I made a new SCA mace, using a Kong(R) rubber dog toy for the head. I loved it; hit solid (but nobody said it hit too hard), and I found that it's great fun to paste somebody with a mace. Then one day the head just broke off. I was going to remake it -- but then got word that the dog toy m...

Adriano

I stayed home, since a) it was raining; and b) I'm still recovering from leg surgery and not ready to fight yet. Did work on my hauberk at home, though.

Adriano

Chef -- excellent point; it makes sense that there would have been padding. Mordreth -- if I understand you, you're talking about attaching the camail higher up on the helmet, not right at the bottom. Interesting -- that would give the mail more room to flex when I turn my head. Thanks, guys; I'll h...

Adriano

Isn't the first picture here Templar Bob at last year's Pennsic?

Adriano

And there are guys way bigger than Freiman out there . . .

(Edited to correct my misspelling of Freiman's name.)

Adriano

I'm all for strong female characters, and use a lot of them in my own writing, but if Stirling thinks a "strong female" has to be either a Wiccan or a lesbian, he doesn't have much practical experience with women. Are all his characters some kind of stereotype?

Adriano

Thanks for all the input, guys (including you female guys!) Ironically (or stupidly) it wasn't until after I started this thread that I actually started experimenting to see if a camail was really practical for me. I used an old "Bishop's Mantle" that I'd made back around 1982, and found that in com...

Adriano

I'm actually curious now; probably look for it at the second-hand book store. (Or maybe I'll just reread Ariel; man, that could make a killer movie . . . .)

Adriano

Thanks, all! (And Anjouleme, I was using "guys" in the generic sense; I certainly didn't intend to disregard or disrespect female fighters. Your camail looks great.)

Adriano

Dante, that's one beautiful helm! (Mine looks like crap.)

I thought I might hang some heavy leather from the bottom of the bargrill, under the mail.

Adriano

My steel gorget provides good protection, but sometimes my helm bangs against it in the back, and I've never liked having something around my neck. Meridian regs allow me to substitute a heavy camail attached to the helm, so I was thinking of doing that. (I've almost got my hauberk finished, so I'm ...

Adriano

Part of the wish-fulfillment aspect of stories like these is that characters with no leadership background (such as the Wiccan cafe singer who says "By the Goddess" every ten seconds) get to be leaders because they read a book about historical archery. (And I believe the main villain was a medievali...

Adriano

I first bought rattan back in 1981 (at a dollar a foot). Even then, I heard things like "Well, there's always the chance that the supply from the Philippines will dry up or get too expensive; we'll probably have some kind of synthetic version before long."

Adriano

I seem to remember seeing a picture of a Bohemian short-sleeved overtunic with an attached hood, maybe late 14th Century.

Adriano

DS -- you mentioned you were thinking of adding a padded skirt. Seems to me that such a skirt in combination with the tassets might take care of the CYA problem. Also wanted to mention that while I've seen a lot of lamellar, I've seldom seen such a great overall presentation. Thanks for setting a go...

Adriano

It looks good, and I know a lot of skilled work went into it -- but it sounds all wrong when somebody wearing it walks by. One of my favorite sounds at Pennsic is that of a large group of armoured fighters heading out to the field or woods -- the clank of articulated plate, the soft ching of mail an...

Adriano

Of course you could weld half the links ahead of time (before knitting). I'd love to see pictures of the finished rings.

Adriano

To fight with glaive against S&S, it probably does help to be at least medium-sized. (In normal life I'm large, in the SCA only medium.) But last time I fought glaive-on-glaive, I was handed my butt by a very small woman named Ionka (hope I'm spelling that right). For some reason I kept rushing in a...

Adriano

Posted by Freiman: Some kingdoms have a rule that the weapon cannot move in more than a 90 degree arc without stopping, but many just say "excessive force is prohibited". That's the case in Meridies; the "90 degree rule" was for both polearms and greatswords, and lemme tell ya, it really limits wha...

Adriano

Wow; that's some clumsy writing. (Also, it sounds like almost the same plot as the book Ariel by Stephen Boyett, in which the world changed so that electricity and explosives didn't work, and one of the main characters was an SCA knight . . . .) Technically the scene is feasible, if: a) that SOB Arm...

Adriano

I don't actually do a lot of backstepping when I use my glaive. Lot of circling and passes, but if somebody steps in I'm ready. Agreed, we don't get to use them in the SCA the way the real thing was used in real battle; what else is new? If we started doing ankle sweeps, we'd definitely get some ser...

Adriano

So I always hear that there is no period example of the 'sword on a stick' glaives we use in the SCA (European) Naginatas yes, but glaives were really just a D&D invention etc. Who's been saying that? One of the most easily refuted misconceptions; pretty much any book I've ever seen on medieval war...

Adriano

As a practical question, has anybody here tried strapping a sizeable shield so that your forearm was vertical? Maybe that would work well for a static shield wall -- though your arm might cramp up.

Adriano

Andrew -- you'll probably need a Dremel (or equivalent rotary tool) rather than a drill, to get the RPMs you need for cutting. One thing I've been doing lately is that when I've closed a ring (with the Dremel-cut ends of the wire flush together) I give that section of the ring a good squeeze with th...

Adriano

Yeah; it looks like the shield would pretty much cover your face if held upright. Maybe they were meant to be held slantwise. (And what's the deal with that big knobby club?)

Adriano

The "Siege Machines" show was pretty good. It made me decide to visit Caerphilly Castle next time I'm in Wales; they have a working trebuchet, mangonel, ballista and torsion trebuchet.

Adriano

Interesting; in the first picture it looks like the shield is strapped so as to have forearm vertical (unless the whole shield is held slanted).

Great thread; now I think I'll look for birch plywood for my new shield.

Adriano

Louis: okay, I guess I can do positive vibes. Glad to hear it's not your heart! As for the cholesterol -- I'm sure your doctor has told you this, but watch out for those transfats, and eat some oatmeal. It's the right thing to do.

"Clacker" mace head (SCA)

Using a camail (SCA)