The Armour Archive

The full title is Warriors of the Himalayas, Rediscovering the Arms and Armor of Tibet by Donald J. LaRocca put out by The Met. As a study in a pretty much undocumented arena of arma and armor its really good as a source book for lamellar its great. Granted there are some regional tastes to some pieces as far as construction, but it is filled with excellent examples of of full lamellar armours ( including a variety of helmets made from plates laced together ), horse armours, weapons and spectacular examples of Tibetan iron work. As a resource for lamellar theres really not much like it in print.

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Don't know how to take a pic with a digital camera and post it ( my 14 year old kid does but I don't ) but heres the Amazon listing http://www.amazon.com/Warriors-Himalaya ... 933&sr=8-1

Thanks for the tip. I just ordered a copy

This is a very fascinating book. I had the opportunity to see the exhibit when it was there and the book does a good job of capturing it.

Best book on lamellar out there!

Is there a picture of a helmet in the book (perhaps on a mounted Tibetan) that is lamellar, sort of gourd shaped, and laced together?

Mine arrived today. (Yes, your excellency, there is)

Could you post a good pic of it? I think I found it online once, but never again.

If it is what I think it is, you will find it very interesting....

I was at the library last night looking at some old books on Tibet.

There was a row of militiamen in one photo wearing old mail (there is no iron industry in Tibet), helmets, etc.

Another early 20thC photo showed about a dozen horsemen wearing old captured Mongol arms&armor...

There was a row of militiamen in one photo wearing old mail (there is no iron industry in Tibet), helmets, etc.

Those are probably pics from The Great Pray Festival. Several European expeditions took pics of this from the late 19th century to the mid 20th. Pick up the book if you can, there was most definitely an iron industry and they were making amazing things with it.

Another early 20thC photo showed about a dozen horsemen wearing old captured Mongol arms&armor...

This again is probably pics taken from The Great Prayer Festival and the armour is probably Tibetan rather than Mongol. From what i've gathered from the book alot of foreign armour went into temples rather than being used. Are they wearing maille shirts, four mirrors ( Tibetan char aina are like Bhutanese char aina, round rather than rectangular like Indo Persian four mirrors) and armoured belts ( broad belts made of many vertical lames overlapping covering the midrif ) ?

I had the luxury of spending last weekend with Dr. Lee Jones ( friend of Ewart Oakshotts, five of Lee's swords are in Records of the Medieval Sword, author of The Sword in the Viking Age and avid collector of original weapons) and he said this text is pretty much state of the art regarding Tibetan arms and armour.

NYT video review:
http://video.nytimes.com/video/2006/05/ ... layas.html

Baron Alcyoneus wrote:Could you post a good pic of it? I think I found it online once, but never again.

If it is what I think it is, you will find it very interesting....

I was wrong about it being gourd shaped. They are hemispherical. The one you sent me in the PM looks more Late/Roman or Merovingian.