The Armour Archive

So I recently came into possession of a piece of riveted mail the perfect size to use for faulds. Now, how do I secure it? I tried using a draw string cheater, but it (naturally) want to sit at my waist, below the line of my breast plate. Is there something I can do to hold it up higher?

A fauld qua fauld would go more with a longer type of breastplate, meseems, one with taces and tassets and that unfortunately is half a century or so beyond the rest of your harness. If you're trying to fake a mailshirt under your seg-breast, you are probably going to have to fasten it to the breast's bottom edge.

Independent faulds of that kind often featured access slits and with those a very strong taper, so once cinched shut they were decidedly conical and disinclined to go drifting down. What's more, at least by the fifteenth century they were lacing the things to the armyng-doublet with points in several pairs just below the beltline as well.

Even with points, looks like the biggest problem to solve is that gaposis between fauld and breast -- and it is already long.

suspenders that go under the bp?

I think your breastplate may be riding higher than medieval examples as well.

Au contraire- it's a good length for period, right to the bottom of the rib cage. The fauld needs to start higher.

And if you don't like saggy mail, I recommend stitching it to a leather belt, making some pairs of eyelets in your coat, and pointing the thing in place. Works wonders for me.

ditch the mail skirt. its not right with the kit. the skirt is more of a 15thc thing. you should be wearing a hauberk under your breastplate. if you try to use that skirt it won't cover your nether regions like its supposed to if you raise it up any higher

I personally would sew the chain to a strip of leather then rivet that leather to the breastplate. from my experience if you attack it to your tunic then your breastplate might gap and then lock onto the leather.

put the mail on a leather belt and point it to the coat. For a correct look you could put it under the arming coat/jupon so that it looked like you were wearing the chain coat underneath. But as it is the others are right, a skirt in that form is from a diferent time frame than the rest of your kit.

Edward

Sorry Eammon, thought what I cut off would work for you. Couldn't cut more off the hauberk without making it useless..

Worse comes to worst -- there's a lot of camail potential in that piece.

Yup, what was said.

Your harness in reality would probably be worn with a maille shirt under the breast plate. The best compromise I could see here is attaching the maille to the bottom of the breastplate (on the inside).

Steve

Yeah, I was trying to fake a mail shirt under the breast plate. I've already put all the money I can into my kit for the year, and was just trying to go that one step farther with what I have. I'll try the belt thing and see how that goes. If it doesn't work out, oh well. I'm still pretty happy with the rest of it, and I can wait to get an actual haubergeon.

Thanks for the advice all!

Eamonn

You can still fake the habergeon if you add a sleeved surcoat/jupon either over or under the breastplate, but just short enough to let the edge of the fauld peek out from underneath. Like a mail petticoat.