Lost and confused ... (14th cent. SCA fighting kit)

[william]

Hi all,

ok, now it happened. I delayed the upgrate of my SCA fighting kit for so long that I'm now starting to get uncertain about the initial plan. This plan consisted of keeping some parts and upgrading others. It consisted of:

• helmet upgrade to stainless klappvisor bascinet w/ aventail (obtained)
• black gambeson (Revival, kept from old kit)
• Corazzina covered in red wool (plastic kit obtained from Sir Gaston, assembly not started yet)
• transitional stainless spaulders (in the mail)
• arms from red cuir bouilli w/ steel elbows (elbows in the mail)
• legs from red cuir bouilli w/ steel knees (knees in the mail, leather done and in use w/ old knees)
• linen doublet to hold legs (in the making)
• dark blue hosen with knee pads covered in the same fabric (to be done)

Now this would not be overly documentable (no maille, no steel limb protection) , but it uses the materials I can work with and doesn't add too much weight (I'm stamina-challenged enough already ... ).

However, the more I look at other 14th century kits the more uncertain I become about this. In the meantime I've had a chance to see Sir Giles' new kit last weekend and found it quite intreaguing. Following this path I would go with

• the doublet, hosen and other period undergarments
• cuir bouilli legs till I can get a steel upgrade
• move back to sports armour (breast, arms) over the doublet and cover it with a fancy wide-sleved jupon.

I do now think that the look of this kit would be better, however, I was happy to replace the foam padding of my body armour with the gambeson. And I'm a little worried about not having shoulder and thigh protection (I'm not only a whimp - I'm a slow whimp).

Finally, I figured out a third way:

• the doublet, hosen and other period undergarments
• cuir bouilli legs as described
• jupon with increased padding for the body area
• Corazzina from the Gaston kit

Now this would solve the hip protection issue. But I've never seen this style in period documents (the corazzina always shown as worn over maille) - and my lady (a tailoring professional) tells me the cloth-on-cloth look will be awful.

What would you recommend to me? For all of the three options described above there's not much shopping left as the steel parts are all ordered and the other materials (leather, hdpe) are in stock. Dropping some of the parts is also not that much of an issue - for some reason I do believe they will find their market in Drachenwald.

Any input will be highly appreciated as I'm getting increasingly frustrated about this project. Thank you!

Cheers,
William

[Alcyoneus]

I like the first and third versions best.

[Konstantin the Red]

Widesleeved would be a fighting houppelande, and be 15th-c., not 14th. For that you want the sleeveless jupon, tailored close over your body armor, decorated in various fashions -- it need not be your heraldic device. Likewise for spaudlers as a separate armor component -- the 14th-c. equivalent, and a pretty close one it is, is to do the spaud as an articulation permanently affixed to the rerebrace. They probably went to separating rerebrace from spaud to give better freedom to swivel the forearm in and out. The fourteenth-century manner of these things was as simple more or less rectangular lames and shoulder cop, or simple shallow-angle chevron shapes to the lames. In the 15th, the lames grew steeper angles, and the whole piece wasgetting more elaborated with fluting, and it got longer, giving a narrower appearance. It might achieve this length by one or two more lames being included, or simply the lames themselves being wider. Plain and short, 14th; fancier and longer, going farther down the arm, 15th.

In a fighting houppelande, if and when, pay attention to not having the sleeves catch on the elbow fans. A short bell sleeve is one way, lower-profile elbow fans another.

The jupon's going to get a bit of, well, not quite padding, more like interlining between outer shell and lining fabric, which should be chosen for armor resistance since it's not going to be touching skin. Probably shell and lining will be the same stuff.

Period-type blanket buskins about the knees have gotten excellent report as knee padding. They say these are more comfortable than elasticized sports kneepads. It's just a strip of blanket wound several times around the knee and secured by tucking the end inside the wrapping.

Linen doublet: yes, doubleted construction is what you want. We've taken to calling these things pourpoints, though they aren't particularly quilted nor thickly padded -- they are built very like a cotehardie somebody left the grands-assiètes sleeves off of. If your corazzina is only a breastplate and not a breast and back, the pourpoint makes a pretty good place to conceal kidney plates.

[william]

Hi,

thanks for the input so far. I'll try to come up with sketches for all three scenarios - maybe that will make things easier. In the meantime, here's one of the inspirational sources I'm using:

[img]http://www.middelaldercentret.dk/dress/dress10.jpg[/img]

This is one of the armours shown at the Middelaldercentret in Denmark. Both version 2 and 3 would look somewhat similar - version two would just be without the breastplate while version 3 would have the breastplate covered in fabric and with faulds added.

Cheers,
William