The Armour Archive

Dan Howard

I think that identifying mailles demi cloees as half riveted/half solid is an excellent interpretation. I never liked the "one rivet/ two rivet" thing, but had not gotten past that. Me too. Half riveted/half solid makes much more sense. Regarding wastage. It is fairly clear that iron and steel cost...

Dan Howard

Excellent subject. I'm inclined to agree with Bob. I can't think of anything else that could possibly explain the change.

Dan Howard

The subarmalis is likely to have been worn under Roman segmented plate because nobody can figure how to get it to fit properly without one. The shoulders especially need to be pretty heavily padded. There is nothing to suggest that Romans wore an arming garment under any other type of armour. Even t...

Dan Howard

A lot of armour had integrated padded liners. There was no need for separate arming garments. Armour was worn over regular clothing.

Dan Howard

That tailoring would probably feature pulling the waist in, before re-expanding to fit the hips, and putting expansion zones into each elbow area in a tube sleeve. You may also wish to row-contract the forearm of each sleeve to taper it. It's a clumsier process than column-contracting/expanding, bu...

Dan Howard

You would then have to mechanically reduce the thickness to something more appropriate. It would need frequent annealing, because bronze work hardens very rapidly. I confess, that I don't know if copper/tin bronze can be worked hot... Dan? AFAIK bronze was always cold-worked. It can be annealed by ...

Dan Howard

Jan van Nyenrode wrote:So Phospor Bronze with 10% tin and a small addition of phospor is the wrong material and/or color?

The above alloy is the closest you can get in today's market. It has the right colour and suitable mechanical properties. If you can find a supplier who sells this alloy then go for it.

Dan Howard

Jeff Hildebrandt is currently making a reconstruction of Agamemnon's cuirass for me. He could find smaller sheets of tin bronze but nobody makes a sheet large enough for a cuirass. We settled on a "commercial bronze" with a colour that is close enough for this project (but no tin). There is an ongoi...

Dan Howard

It is a guess based on years of looking for a supplier who DOES sell tin bronze. AFAIK nobody in the world makes any of the products listed on that website from tin bronze.

Dan Howard

Keep in mind that even though it is called "bronze" it doesn't have any tin in it. The colour and mechanical properties aren't even close to historical bronze.

Dan Howard

Just wear it for a while (over old clothing). I'm currently putting together a patch of mail using rings that are covered in surface rust. By the time I've done two or three rows, the above rows are shiny and rust free.

Dan Howard

When Dan Slone first wrote his paper (twelve years ago?) I made a few mock-ups using rivets and the shape he proposed. http://www.armourarchive.org/essays/Shanwenkia.pdf My first mock up used heavy paper and split pins to see how the scales fitted together. He suggests that the armour might be calle...

Dan Howard

Bah. Come to Australia and get some proper snakes. We'd use the venom from your snake as a skin lotion to stop a proper snakebite from stinging so much

Dan Howard

The Ragnar of history sailed up the Seine in 845, defeating a Frankisk force, taking 111 prisoners and hanging them. Then he plundered Paris on Easter Sunday and was paid 7,000 pounds to leave. He then came to England with two ships and was defeated by King Ella and thrown into a snakepit. The only...

Dan Howard

Agreed completely. I think that integrated liners for mail were more common than separate arming garments but don't have enough evidence to build a case yet.

Dan Howard

In some cases scale armour seems to differ between humans and horses. Some scale trappers for horses use individual scales that are larger than typical scales for human armour, but thickness seems to be the same for both.

Dan Howard

As James said above. The weights are meaningless unless we know that they haven't had too much "restoration" done on them. The thickness of most pieces of armour today have no bearing on their thickness when they were being used. Plain field examples that have not been subject to significant abrasiv...

Dan Howard

Good stuff. Bertus is da man.

Dan Howard

Anyways, from what I've heard from those better versed than I, is that the Roman Hamata was untailored. -Ben Ben, I wish someone would bring the evidence to the table so we could all have a look at it. I have a tough time believing that our ancestors did not start tailoring mail almost as soon as t...

Dan Howard

LdEskel wrote:As in a basically effective armor cobbled from various smaller, unmatching pieces?

Effective against what - rubber spear heads? Gravel rash?

Can we say that such armor was ever not extant in its period?"

We can say this till someone provides some evidence to the contrary.

Dan Howard

Start with Blair. Read it cover to cover and memorise as much as possible. Then start looking for other books.

Dan Howard

Yep. "Corn" is just a general term for any kind of grain. American corn should be called "maize" to avoid unnecessary confusion.

Dan Howard

The only sample of Medieval/Renaissance butted mail that I'm aware of isn't a full garment, it's a patch of mail with something like 1/2" ID rings made of 1/8" thick wire. It's in the Guy Francis Laking book and he thinks it's some kind of horse armour, but IMHO it could easily be some kind of adve...

Dan Howard

I think it is resting on a board of some kind and the top of the shirt folds back over the top edge. The area inside the neckline looks like three separate rivets. The empty rivet holes support this too. So it probably didn't use staples. The estimated price is 40,000-60,000 pounds. Does anyone know...

Dan Howard

The late 12th century (c. 1160-1190) chanson Aliscans has both gambison and auketon in L.LXIII. Could this simply be a mechanism to help maintain the meter of the poem rather than referring to a typological distinction? The Iliad does this - uses different words to describe the same item so as not ...

Dan Howard

Is there evidence for wedge-riveting outside of Germany? I'd bet that it uses a staple shaped like the number 3. Makes more sense to do the riveting in one operation with a single peening tool.

Dan Howard

Well said Bob. Those sorts of comments are grossly offensive to the people who have spent years trying to work out how to replicate the museum examples.

Dan Howard

A better analogy would be asking whether the Red Baron needs to have a Fokker triplane and suggesting that nobody would care if it was painted blue. If you can't even get basics right then who cares about trivialities?

Dan Howard

How much does it weigh?

Dan Howard

Here is a closeup of the collar from the Wallace A9

Dan Howard

Holy Braveheart

Dan Howard

Todd Feinman wrote:You fully articulated your vision.

Dan Howard

Thanks. Why do you say that? I think that it is a shame that you had to make it look like metal. Leather is a beautiful material and it would have been nice if it could have been revealed in all its glory with a subtle stain. That doesn't mean that I don't admire the craftsmanship that went into th...

Dan Howard

Beautiful work. Seems a shame to have to hide the leather with paint.

Dan Howard

Could be anything that isn't mail. Scale is the most likely contender but it could be lamellar or an early COP. I'm guessing that it is the same armour that Gerald of Wales said was worn by the Danes during their attack on Dublin castle.

Re: Disappearance of half-solid mail?

Re: Disappearance of half-solid mail?

Re: Ancient Padding

Re: Ancient Padding

Re: High quality maile

Re: spring bronze lamellar scales

Re: spring bronze lamellar scales

Re: spring bronze lamellar scales

Re: spring bronze lamellar scales

Re: spring bronze lamellar scales

Re: Chainmaile Maintenance?

Re: Theory & development of Mountain Pattern armour

Re: "Viking" Clothing from History Channel's New Series

Re: "Viking" Clothing from History Channel's New Series

Re: Barding thickness?

Re: Barding thickness?

Re: Barding thickness?

Re: Late Fourteenth Century Arming Garments II: The Upper Bo

Re: Tailoring a mail sleeve

Re: "Viking" Clothing from History Channel's New Series

Re: Which books about mediaeval arms and armour do you advis

Re: Vikings...and corn?

Re: Some Quick Questions!

Re: Eastern Maille

Re: Late Fourteenth Century Arming Garments II: The Upper Bo

Re: Eastern Maille

Re: Extra fine/dense mail

Re: "Viking" Clothing from History Channel's New Series

Re: existent 14c gambeson?

Re: Extra fine/dense mail

Re: Armored Battle Skirt

Re: Leather Elven Knight Full Suit

Re: Leather Elven Knight Full Suit

Re: Leather Elven Knight Full Suit

Re: Platemaille and Gambesons in King Sverre's Saga