Byzantine Armour

[Ulricus von Geusa]

This is a Cross-post to a question I asked in the "I Want to Be" section, I've seen a picture floating around that someone drew of a pair of Varangian Guardsmen, and I'm curious as to the historical veracity of the drawing, specifically the individual on the right. I love the look of the kit and would love to base mine on it, but I'd rather not start anything until I find out if it's documentable. The pieces I'm most interested in are the Kilbanion and the helm, and if I remember correctly, a guardsman would have been using a round top kite in the 13th century right?

[Dan Howard]

How much primary evidence is there really for the Byzantine combination of lamellar over mail? I've seen evidence for one or the other in a Byzantine context but little supporting the combination of both types of armour.

[Ulricus von Geusa]

I know I've seen evidence of mail coifs/aventails in various effigies, but you're right, I haven't seen much in the way of mail beneath Lamellar. I'm mostly concerned with the helm and the lamellar in the picture. I like the helm, and I prefer this style of lamellar (Which I believe I have seen elsewhere) to some of the others I have seen.

[Ingvarr]

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=129646&hilit=byzantine

[Ingvarr]

Also, someone recently had this helmet made. It is one of the prettiest things I have seen ever. Can't find the thread right now, or spend any more time looking for it.

[Ulricus von Geusa]

I saw the helm, that's one of the reasons I was attracted to this kit in the first place.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=140835

It's gorgeous, and I'd love to have one.

[TakedaSanjuichiro]

Ok, going to glom on to this one since the thread topic is not specifically Varangian...

Very late Byzantium... 1450's at the very end, what would the armors in use have been?
Depictions of Constantine XI, typically show the mail/lamalar arrangement; is there evidence of this being what they were still using at that time? Had they not kept up with continental practice?

[Dan Howard]

Depictions of Constantine XI, typically show the mail/lamalar arrangement

Do you have any examples?

[Dan Howard]

Does anyone have any examples? There are some illiustrations that can be interpreted a dozen different ways but I can find little solid evidence of Byzantines wearing lamellar over mail from Constantine XI or any other period. I'd love to be pointed in a direction that doesn't lead to a dead end.

[Ulricus von Geusa]

You can try looking at some of the resources on www.levantia.com.au Dr. Dawson's examples show soldiers wearing mail beneath their kilbanions.

[Dan Howard]

Nothing on Levantia. He makes the claim is his Osprey book but he doesn't have anything to support it. The passages he cites from Comnena don't exist.

[Egfroth]

There are three contemporary representations I know of that show lamellar over mail, but it doesn't occur very commonly. In the Osprey book "Byzantine Armies 886-1118" page 15 shows a photo of an early 12th century carving of three military saints. The guy on the left, St Theodore, has a lamellar breast over a shirt (or skirt?) of mail that comes down to his knees.

A pic I put up in a thread some years ago is a mural of (I think) the archangel Michael, and shows a klivanion with one of those strange round openings at the belly, though which you can see mail underneath. I can't lay my hand on it at the moment, but I think it's 12th century.

Finally, in the Dovecote Church in Cavusin, Kappadokia, in what is now Turkey, are a number of military saints painted on the wall, apparently representing the Martyrs of Sebaste. The two horsemen have mail rings peeking out of the top of their klivania at the neck.

Note that in this same church the Archangel Michael is portrayed with only lamellar, so I really don't think the combination was common.

The helmet seems to me to be taken from the so-called "Byzantine Romance of Alexander" (14th century). Note that in the attached pic there is one (and he's the only one in the whole book!) someone has a mail or scale curtain covering his face. One of the only bits of evidence I know of for this, though there are a couple of pics in the Skylitzes Chronicle that suggest it as well.

[Dan Howard]

I've seen these two. I just can't make out both mail and lamellar being worn on the torso by anyone. I realise that we are handicapped by the fact that lamellar is not transparent. The same problem occurs in the Middle Ages when trying to work out whether a knight wears a hauberk under his plate or if he just has voiders. Is there anything at all in the texts supporting this?

[Gerhard von Liebau]

Regarding these two images, among others I've seen in publications and online... I have to agree with Dan. I have yet to see a piece of pictorial or sculptural evidence that definitely suggests mail being overlapped by lamellar, or any other armor for that matter; except the Reims Cathedral statue depicting a soldier dressed in quite an eastern fashion (probably Byzantine) in mail with scale over the top. The fellow on the far right, below. Cheers!

-Gerhard

[Egfroth]

Here's a better pic of the Cavusin church example (it's the other horseman, and the mail is clearer).

Though it might be hard for us to imagine anyone wearing lamellar (or in this case scale) over mail, we have to keep in mind that the mid 10th century was the era of the heavy kataphraktoi, and reading the military manuals of the time it becomes obvious that these were extremely heavy shock troops (whose purpose according to the manuals was to charge the enemy ranks head-on in an enormous flying wedge armed with lances and maces and crush their way though to the enemy commander and kill him. That's how they did it at the time and it was very effective, too).

I know several people who fight regularly with metal scale armour (and this isn't your wafer-thin stuff, either) over the top of mail, and they do it on foot, not on horseback.

We have to bear in mind that just because something seems unlikely to us with our 21st century perspective, doesn't mean it wasn't done back in the day.

[Dan Howard]

There is clear evidence of some Middle Eastern warriors wearing lamellar over mail so I don't doubt that was done. I was just trying to find suppiort for the claim that Byzantines did it. Most of the cited evidence turned out to be no evidence at all after tracking it down. That second image makes it clearer and I'd agree that mail is likely being represented at the neck. But in this case the armour doesn't look like Byzantine lamellar.

[Egfroth]

You're right. It's scale. But it's from the heartland of Byzantium's military personnel pool in the 10th century and in fact the church (which is a quite tiny one, hollowed out of the volcanic rock) also contains a mural of Emperor Nikephoros Phokas and his court. It seems to have been painted almost exactly the same time as Nikephoros' triumphant campaigns against the Arabs in the mid 10th century, as outlined in the book "Three Byzantine Military Treatises" (one of which is attributed to the Emperor himself).

I used to have photos of all the military saints from the church the up on my website before geocities was cancelled, and I'm slowly working on putting it back up again. So far I've only done the front page, which is here. Keep checking back, as I intend to do an analysis of the armour of each military saint individually.

However as I mentioned before, depictions of Byzantine warriors with other armour over mail are rare, and I believe that reflects the reality.

[Small-John]

The matter wasn't convincingly answered. How would Byzantine warriors have been equipped in the 15th century? I'm not interested only in the very end of the Byzantines, namely the 1450s, but the years leading up to the fall as well.

I think I'd also be interested in the various auxiliaries they used, because I know Byzantine military forces were quite a multinational lot.

[Cliff Rogers]

Back to the Varangians-- Anna Komnena (from the right time period) emphasizes the strength of Frankish mail, implying it is stronger than Byzantine armor of the time. To me that suggests it is unlikely that Varangians wore scale or lamellar over mail (aside from the absence of any positive reason to think they did).

[Gerhard von Liebau]

Back to the Varangians-- Anna Komnena (from the right time period) emphasizes the strength of Frankish mail, implying it is stronger than Byzantine armor of the time. To me that suggests it is unlikely that Varangians wore scale or lamellar over mail (aside from the absence of any positive reason to think they did).

As a close contemporary, Usama ibn Munqidh also mentions the superior strength of Frankish mail, particularly during an engagement when he approached a rider from behind and thrust at him so hard the man fell from his saddle. Because he had a hauberk on beneath his jacket, though, he was unharmed!

-Gerhard

[Dan Howard]

Back to the Varangians-- Anna Komnena (from the right time period) emphasizes the strength of Frankish mail, implying it is stronger than Byzantine armor of the time. To me that suggests it is unlikely that Varangians wore scale or lamellar over mail (aside from the absence of any positive reason to think they did).

I'd conclude the same thing. The only Varangian who might wear lamellar would be one who turned up asking for a job and didn't have any armour with him. And even then his pay would have been good enough to ditch the lamellar fairly quickly in favour of a decent hauberk.

FWIW here is the passage (Dawes translation)
For the Frankish defensive arms is this coat of mail, ring woven into ring, and the iron fabric is such excellent iron that it repels arrows and keeps the wearer’s skin unhurt. [Alexiad, VIII.8]

For completeness here is the passage from Usamah
He bent sideways so much that his head reached his stirrup, his shield and lance fell off his hand, and his helmet off his head... he then resumed his position, erect in the saddle. Having had linked mail under his tunic, my lance did not wound him.

[Russ Mitchell]

There is clear evidence of some Middle Eastern warriors wearing lamellar over mail so I don't doubt that was done. I was just trying to find suppiort for the claim that Byzantines did it. Most of the cited evidence turned out to be no evidence at all after tracking it down. That second image makes it clearer and I'd agree that mail is likely being represented at the neck. But in this case the armour doesn't look like Byzantine lamellar.

Bear in mind that by the 13th century, many of those Byzantine troops WERE "middle-easterners." Seljuk warriors were involved on both sides of the Hungaro-Byzantine fights in the Balkans, for instance.

[Small-John]

Aye, from what I've read, the Byzantines had something of a Commonwealth-type arrangement going on with pretty much all the local tribes and peoples, similar to Gurkha contingents in the present-day British army. If a group or ethnicity had military value, the Byzantines were grasping enough to use it. It could be said this brought about their eventual downfall when they started dealing with the Ottomans but, all the same, people living in a specific time-period cannot really predict what effect their actions will have in the next century.

But, what makes me more curious are these Byzantine-Hungarian wars you mention. The period between the 13th and middle 14th centuries is somewhat blurry for me, starting with the sack of Constantinople in 1204 and going on until the 1330s when Wallachia achieves something similar to independence. It is blurry especially for the Byzantines, whom I assume went to great efforts to rebuild what they could of their empire. But still, Byzantine-Hungarian conflicts would have been fought in what amounts to modern-day Bulgaria, wouldn't they? The Slav Bulgarians were already there, however. I know they were always a somewhat weakened state from conflicts with the Serbs and their own inter-dynastic rivalries (the situation in the late 14th century with the Tsardom of Stracimir and the Tsardom of Shishman comes to mind) but still, I imagine they wouldn't have been such pushovers, especially when Catholics such as the Hungarians entered their country.

Post-read edit: I hope this doesn't read as me challenging what you said. I am merely curious and what to learn more because the history of the area I live in is rather... tangled.

[Russ Mitchell]

Actually, most of the Hungaro-Byzantine conflicts had little to do with Bulgarian, but instead revolved around the Serbs and over who would control Dalmatia (for instance, when the IVth crusade hit Zadar, they were attacking a town under *Hungarian* suzerainty, not Byzantine). But if you want to understand what's going on in Bulgaria, you have to remember that they weren't all Slavs, and that the Cumans were immensely powerful and influential both within the Bulgarian nobility, and regionally. It was Qaloja, after all, who crushed Baldwin and the crusaders at Adrianople, thus effectively ending the short-lived latin empire and allowing the Byzantines to claw their way back into power (albeit much weakened, and relying upon Ottoman military support, and as you've mentioned, look where that got them).

[Gil-Galadh]

It was Qaloja, after all, who crushed Baldwin and the crusaders at Adrianople, thus effectively ending the short-lived latin empire and allowing the Byzantines to claw their way back into power (albeit much weakened, and relying upon Ottoman military support, and as you've mentioned, look where that got them).

I'm not sure whether Kaloyan ended the latin empire, given that his brother Anry (or Henry) was crowned emper after Baldwin, and that just a few years later -1207 near Filipopolis they defeated Boril - Kaloyan's successor, and established themselves as local power again, and remained such for quite some time after that.

[Russ Mitchell]

Sorry, you're right: "ended" is too strong. "Crippled" is more appropriate.

[Gil-Galadh]

Here is something from Kastoria, 12th-14th century I believe:

[Dan Howard]

There's one that I haven't seen. Many thanks. Looks like the lamellar is made of two pieces. One for the upper chest and another for the abdomen with what appears to be mail providing some flexibility at the waist and more mail covering the thighs. Impossible to tell whether the mail is a complete shirt or a type of voider integrated into the lamellar construction with a mail skirt hanging off the bottom edge of the lamellar.

[Paladin74]

That big eye on his stomach would seem to suggest mail...or perhaps the medium it is painted on has a texture to it...

[Dan Howard]

Would be interesting to know what the original colours were. If it was iron mail then you'd expect it to be the same colour as the sword.

[Len Parker]

Doesn't that look like some maille on his arm above his left elbow?

[Gil-Galadh]

It's most likely to be mail, as it is drawn in a way often depicted on frescoes, where there is maille.

[Vladimir]

There's one that I haven't seen. Many thanks. Looks like the lamellar is made of two pieces. One for the upper chest and another for the abdomen with what appears to be mail providing some flexibility at the waist and more mail covering the thighs. Impossible to tell whether the mail is a complete shirt or a type of voider integrated into the lamellar construction with a mail skirt hanging off the bottom edge of the lamellar.

I have actually tried using voiders integrated into my lamellar.

The result was difficult to put on and take off and restricted my movement a great deal. I'm actually happier and have more mobility with a seperate shirt worn under the lamellar. Its heavier, but more versatile, and easier to store away.

The weight issue is easy to explain off, as I'm sure my modern brass lamellar and stainless maille are probably each heavier than a historic counterpart.

[Dan Howard]

Experimental archaeology at work. Thanks for the insight.