The Armour Archive

I think he might be implying that it was not European in nature and likely not used or known on the European Continent.

Master Magnus (white mountain armoury),
You were, and are my mentor. And taught me how to research.
Yes, we are both on the same page.

Thank you for pointing out that there are exceptions to the rule.
Thank you for reminding us all to:

Recreate the common, not the uncommon, if you choose the uncommon be honest about it. dont rely on friends and budies for information, look to books and scholarly work as thats where you will get the most accurate information.

Excellent advice.

I'm saying that we have adopted wearing it as a panacea for protection. Which is fine, it works great and is very functional. Everyone can assemble it and it fits all body types.

But we're also trying to justify its use universally. That's the problem. It wasn't universal.

Effingham wrote:

D. Sebastian wrote:Lamellar (plates laced together with no backing or covering) was very much an Eastern European / Eur-Asian 'thing'. What most people do in the SCA with lamellar is a convention of the SCA, and not based historically.

I'm confused...

I understand that by default lamellar is self-laced, self-structuring, with no backing. Is that wrong? So what is it that we are doing in the SCA with it that is wrong?

D. Sebastian wrote:I'm saying that we have adopted wearing it as a panacea for protection. Which is fine, it works great and is very functional. Everyone can assemble it and it fits all body types.

But we're also trying to justify its use universally. That's the problem. It wasn't universal.

Effingham wrote:

D. Sebastian wrote:Lamellar (plates laced together with no backing or covering) was very much an Eastern European / Eur-Asian 'thing'. What most people do in the SCA with lamellar is a convention of the SCA, and not based historically.

I'm confused...

I understand that by default lamellar is self-laced, self-structuring, with no backing. Is that wrong? So what is it that we are doing in the SCA with it that is wrong?

Thats very true, I hear similar things often.
An occasional odd refrence be it art or lit does not mean something was in wide use.

Here is mine as of this weekend.

very nice Christophe

Ah, I gotcha. (And I agree!)

I thought you were talking about how we make it, which was why I was confused.


Effingham

Now for the "occasional odd refrence"....

from "Knights of Jerusalem: The Crusading Order of Hospitallers 1100 - 1565" by David Nicolle

Image 1:Close inspection of this early 12th century carved capital shows that the body armour worn by St. George seems to consist of two different elements. They are a normal long-sleeved mail hauberk with integral coif beneath the helment, plus an apparent lamellar cuirass around the middle of the saint's body. (in situ, cathedral, Aulnay; CESCM, Poitiers, France)

Image 2: The variety and distinctiveness of 13th and 14th century Italian military equipment, and its close technological links with the Islamic world, are epitomized in this effigy of Guido Pallavicino. He is believed to have been a Templar and his effigy dates from around 1301. One of its most remarkable features is the scale or perhaps poorly represented lamellar cuirass that he wears over an otherwise typically European mail hauberk. (in situ, abbey church of San Bernardo, Fontevivo, Italy; Andrea Babuin)

Those are great Christophe, I wish my scanner was up and running as I have some "occasional odd refrences" as well

[img]http://www.dark-horse.ca/magnus2008.jpg[/img]

Still adding some black leather edging to it.

Lamellar and converted-into-COP lamellar plates were found in the Wisby mass graves, which makes 14th century use in the extreme north of Europe documentable, if an anomoly. Thordeman talks about it... I can dig the book out if anyone wants more specifics.

I always thought it'd be neat to do a converted lamellar cop for an early 14th C portrayal...

Bastior, you are correct in assuming that more than anything else the ferric chloride staining is chiefly to hide the fact that it's aluminum.

Henri -- the Wisby lamellar *is* the lamellar plates converted into a CoP. Meaning, it's not an "and", as in two different items, it's a single item.

But true.

Christophe, the captions got cut off, can you post them separately?

-D

This is my begining attempt at an 11cent slavic kit:

[img]http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a127/camric/GermanicCam.jpg[/img]

The helm looks like the early Gjermunbu(sp) helm but is actually an 11th-12th cent. slavic/rus helm. Still looking for my documentation page on it.

Shoes and seax are off but, like I said, it's a begining

Greenshield

Christophe de Frisselle wrote:Here is mine as of this weekend.

Christophe thanks for posting those pictures. Your friends kit is almost exactly what I had in mind. That is the helm I was going to get before I stared leaning more to the Kettle helm. I am also making a tear drop shield strapped just like his. I have never seen anyone use one that was not a center boss so I'm not sure how well it will work.

Thank you again to everyone who has posted pictures.

-Matthew-

When I started this thread I had no idea the level of debate is would cause. Ssince I seem to have attracted the attention of so many people more knowledgeable than my self I shall put it to good use. I have two questions now.

#1 If not Lamellar what armour other than Mail would a Crusader be seen in around 1100 AD? (I do not have the time or money to do Mail well at this time thou I am working in that direction slowly.)

#2 I have seen more than a few pictures now with people wearing Lamellar over Mail. I was wondering if this was common and if so when and where?

I thank you all for your interest and help.

-Matthew-

-Matthew- wrote:If not Lamellar what armour other than Mail would a Crusader be seen in around 1100 AD? (I do not have the time or money to do Mail well at this time thou I am working in that direction slowly.)

If you seriously intend to do a crusader of that era, there *is* no other armour but mail.

You can wear padding (an aketon, whatever), but you have to understand that that is *under* armour wear, and not the actual armour itself. It is a simple point of fact that, in terms of historicity, mail was where it was at at that point in time.

I have seen more than a few pictures now with people wearing Lamellar over Mail. I was wondering if this was common and if so when and where?

I've seen it in Eastern Europe in the 1200s and 1300s. It's just a development of armour, as in the transitional period in the west they were wearing pieces of metal (CoPs, globose breastplates, etc.) over mail.


Effingham

Well other than mail?

Since you asked initally about Scotland

There is a garment called a "coutun"

probly a galicized prounouciation of akenton.

But baiscally it's a quilted padded garment i believe of deerskin.

I think it was referenced as being used in stead of mail by some.


I think the reference i am thinking of is on David Teague's(sp) website

Here is my 6th cent. Roman-influenced Briton kit:

I think you'd find lamellar in Britain from 175 AD when the Sarmatians brought it in under Roman rule until the last remnants of the Romano-British culture were driven back into Wales in the 7th century.

For a Scot on crusade, mail or possibly an armoured surcoat seems more appropriate. A padded gambeson (with hidden plates) also seems like a possibility.

Based on examples on a cathedral in Bari, Italy I think you could make a case for lamellar as a rare but possible find among a crusader army. If you are set on doing this I suggest basing your armour on that example. I don't have any pictures of this but I'd be happy to see some.

Magnus of the Dark Wyvern wrote:[img]http://www.dark-horse.ca/magnus2008.jpg[/img]

Still adding some black leather edging to it.

Magnus,

Please go get some more pics of this kit, complete with fur. Please be standing on some dead bodies with your arm around a hot babe or something.

So I can put it in the 'inspire new guys' thread.

Blood dripping from your stick would be cool too.

He inspires this old guy.

-Graedwyn

Matthew:
Make some really, really nice-looking garments. Make them out of the right materials, with the right patterns, and take care of them -- mend them when they tear (that just makes them look more authentic...), wash them, etc. They shouldn't look like they are brand new from a crusader distribution center, but they also shouldn't look like you are the homeless man in an alley. Well-made, well-used, well-cared for.

Wear hidden, low-profile armour underneath.

A nice shield, a nice helmet, the right shoes (!!), and the right outer garments will make you look awesome and fierce.

As you have read on this thread, a whole lot of the knights who went on the first crusade lost their gear, anyway, so it's not inauthentic not to wear the mail.

-D
P.S. Do as I say not as I do.. my garments are trashed at the moment

Wife's kit in progress. I'll get some pics of the Wisby lamellar recreation from the museum at wisby up later.

Made for a friend of mine back in Hungary... his kit being 5,000 miles away, it's just armor, rather than in-action "glamor shots." Mongol lamellar/banded scale, following the blocky style shown in the Shahname. Sadly, I ran out of plates, and need 200 more to do the full tassets. Very flexible, though the blocky design is uncomfortable on the neck in front -- not gakking yourself, but definitely in the "have to get used to this" camp.

my ahistoric use of lamellar

banzaimf wrote:Wife's kit in progress. I'll get some pics of the Wisby lamellar recreation from the museum at wisby up later.

I must say the odd alternative overlapping of the lamellar strikes me as... well, bizarre.

(To say nothing about my eternal frustration with "tombstone" lamellar pointed down. Just weirds me out.)

Effingham

Effingham wrote:I must say the odd alternative overlapping of the lamellar strikes me as... well, bizarre.

(To say nothing about my eternal frustration with "tombstone" lamellar pointed down. Just weirds me out.)

Effingham

She's using the middle guy on this


and these chaps from Nicolle's "Arms and Armour of the Crusading Era" (from a late 12th century Sicilian chapel)

Baron Alejandro wrote:
Please go get some more pics of this kit, complete with fur. Please be standing on some dead bodies with your arm around a hot babe or something.

So I can put it in the 'inspire new guys' thread.

Blood dripping from your stick would be cool too.

Heh, I might be able to swing that just for you.

more of the first

Banzaimf --

Thanks, that's quite interesting. I don't quite agree with the fresco interpretation, but the Nicolle drawings are pretty much spot on with what you have there.

Interesting.



Effingham

Do this:
[img]http://home.armourarchive.org/members/thaddeus/gnew5.jpg[/img]
But just wear a tunic over whatever gear you have instead of a mail shirt. People will mostly not even notice that you arent wearing 'real' armour.
Get good looking boots from revival and spend your money on the helmet you will be happy in the long run.

Look to the maciejowski bible fo rinspiration on padded armors, they are often worn by the common soldiery in combination with kettle hats.

It is a bit late to be used as documentation for the 1st crusade but might do for the 3rd crusade and certainly for the northern baltic crusades and the decline of Outremere.

Thaddeus wrote:Do this:
[img]http://home.armourarchive.org/members/thaddeus/gnew5.jpg[/img]
But just wear a tunic over whatever gear you have instead of a mail shirt. People will mostly not even notice that you arent wearing 'real' armour.
Get good looking boots from revival and spend your money on the helmet you will be happy in the long run.

What he said !!

Effingham wrote:Banzaimf --

Thanks, that's quite interesting. I don't quite agree with the fresco interpretation, but the Nicolle drawings are pretty much spot on with what you have there.

Interesting.



Effingham

The fresco was used mostly for the lines at the bottom of each level of the plates. She used leather straps to test the theory that they were there to provide some measure of impact protection (good for our game).

She also plans on using the scale shoulders/upper arms that the fresco is using.

Paparrazzi shots of the wisby lamellar. No cameras were allowed.... so... well, you get the point.

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v89/banzaimf/sca/P1010306crop.jpg[/img]