looking for references. no i think its logical, they musta had it etc. would like to have or see what collection we can did up on how many sources of gambesons, arming coats, padded garments we can dig up. please site the source, author, when it was written and whom or what time frame it was written for. (NO FLAMES, or any other comments other than the listing of the sources, we can make a new post for talking about each source and what it could/does mean or be interpreted)
anyone like to start?
Period Gambesons or padding
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Doug Confere
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I don't know if there's an English translation, but the treatise of John of Ibelin has a list of equipment a Knight should have, and "Ganbeison" and "guanbeison" are in there. I think it's dated 1266. It also mentions a cote a armer
The French rule of the Templars speaks of "Jupeau d'armer" or "jupon of arming". The French rule is generally dated prior to the fall of Jerusalem in 1187 since it makes reference to the Templar office in Jerusalem and also details how to protect the True Cross, which they lost in 1187 also.
The Catalan rule also speaks of Jupeau d'armer, in a list of arms that brothers may not take with them when they leave the House.
The French rule of the Templars speaks of "Jupeau d'armer" or "jupon of arming". The French rule is generally dated prior to the fall of Jerusalem in 1187 since it makes reference to the Templar office in Jerusalem and also details how to protect the True Cross, which they lost in 1187 also.
The Catalan rule also speaks of Jupeau d'armer, in a list of arms that brothers may not take with them when they leave the House.
"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined." Patrick Henry
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Endre Fodstad
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Oki doki.
Norse sources first. All translations are my own from translations into norwegian from old norse and suck mightily.
The Landslov (Law of the Land), between 1265 and 1275, from the reign of Magnus Lagabøte, says:
-The man who owns 18 weighed marks (of silver) excepting his clothes, shall have shield and chapel-de-fer and pannzara or maille and all the "weapons of the people" (spear, axe or sword and bow in some cases)
The Hirdskraa (regulations of the hird), first written ca 1265, extant copy 1300) says:
-A Skutilsvein (knight) shall own full harness, that is first spaldener (?) or vapntræiu, mail coif and maille with maille hose and maille glovs, helmet or chapel-de-fer and plate.
-A hirdman shall also own a vapntræiu, and outside of that pannzara or maille, and mail coif and shield and...(weapons follow)
-The gestir shall have a strengthened vapntræiu
The King's Mirror, ca 1250, says:
This get-up the man himself needs have: good and fine hosen made from soft and well "svorta"(?) canvas that reach all the way to the belt of the breeches and outside these a pair of maille hose, so tall he can fasten them to a belt that goes around the body twice and outside those a pair of "maille pants" made from the same kind of canvas and the same way before said, and outside those good kneescreens of iron with steel-hard rivets. On the torso he must closest to the body have a soft pannzara that does not reach longer than mid-thigh, then a good breast-screen of iron and outside that maille and outside the maille a good panzzara, made on the same way before said, but armless.
(Pannzara and vapntræiu are used in the literature interchangeably. A "soft pannzara" or vapntræiu seems to be a textile armour worn closest to the body, inside the maille, whereas the "good pannzara" or "strengthened vapntræiu" is worn outside maille or as armour in itself.
Similar rules are reproduced in swedish and danish later laws (likely copies of the norwegian ones) and use terms like "muza" and "trøia" for textile body armour.
The laws of the city of Bergen, ca 1274, confirms that textile-armour makers are to have the same status as maille-makers.
The Sturlunga Saga (assembled ca 1300, from earlier oral sources) tells us that "Th. var i thofastakki theim er sverin theira bitu eigi” (Th. was in thofastakki and their swords did not bite him). Thofastakki means "felted garment".
Outside scandinavia:
Chronicon colmariense, 1298, says:
”armati reputabantur qui galeas ferreas in capitibus habebant, et qui wambasia, id est, tunicam spissam ex lino stuppa, vel veteribus pannis consutam, et desuper camisiam ferream, id est vestem ex circulis ferreis contextam”.
I.e. "a wambasia, it is a thick/tightly packed tunic of linen or "smeared" hemp sown together or, sown together of patches"
Ordonnances des Métiers de Paris of 1296 og 1311 discusses the rules for construction of textile armour.
In 1296 we are told that one against the body should have canvas (telé) and inside the armour "folded cotton in many layers" (coton et de plois des toiles) plus strips of textile (d’escroes). Sendal (cendal) is mentioned both as covering and on the inside (sendal is the cheapest form of silk. The ordinance demands a certain thickness of the cotton compared to the sendal if it is used as "stuffing"; folded so and so many times. "Coton" might not necessarily be cotton, it could also refer to "cottonizing" a process we know little about.
In 1311 textile armours are called "cote gamboisée", "garments sewn through" and we are informed at least three pounts of new cotoon must be used per cubit of textile armour.
I 1322, The Armourer’s Company of Londons has this to say:
“It was ordeyned for ye comon proffyt and assented that from henceforth all Armour made in ye Cytie to sell be good and concenable after ye forme that henceforth That is to saie that an Akton and Gambezon covered with sendall or of cloth of Silke be stuffed with new clothe of cotten and of cadar and of olde sendall and not otherwise. And that ye wyite acketonnes be stuffed of olde lynnen and of cottone and of new clothe wth in and wth out.It is ordeyned that all ye crafte of ye citie of London be truely ruled and governed every person in his nature in due maner so that no falsehood ne false workemanshipp nor Deceipt be founde in no maner wise in any of ye foresaid crafte for ye worship of ye good folke of all ye same crafte and for the common proffytt of ye people”.
In "The Life of St. Louis", Jean de Joinville, c1300, he at one points pulls up "a saracen's tunic of tarred hemp" and uses it as a missile shield.
In 1521, in the Historia Majoris Britannia, John Major, we are told that "the scottish common peoples" used ”linen garments manifoldly sewed and painted or daubed with pitch, with a covering of deerskin”. "
Somebody else will have to reproduce the ordinances of Charles of Burgundy.
I've always liked to envision the description in the King's Mirror as the armour of the fully armoured high medieval knight: his whole body covered with textile armour, then maille, and his vitals protected by a a breastplate under the maille and a thick padded garment outside that again. Add in kneeguards, elbowguards, some sort of shoulderguards and a good solid helmet.
Norse sources first. All translations are my own from translations into norwegian from old norse and suck mightily.
The Landslov (Law of the Land), between 1265 and 1275, from the reign of Magnus Lagabøte, says:
-The man who owns 18 weighed marks (of silver) excepting his clothes, shall have shield and chapel-de-fer and pannzara or maille and all the "weapons of the people" (spear, axe or sword and bow in some cases)
The Hirdskraa (regulations of the hird), first written ca 1265, extant copy 1300) says:
-A Skutilsvein (knight) shall own full harness, that is first spaldener (?) or vapntræiu, mail coif and maille with maille hose and maille glovs, helmet or chapel-de-fer and plate.
-A hirdman shall also own a vapntræiu, and outside of that pannzara or maille, and mail coif and shield and...(weapons follow)
-The gestir shall have a strengthened vapntræiu
The King's Mirror, ca 1250, says:
This get-up the man himself needs have: good and fine hosen made from soft and well "svorta"(?) canvas that reach all the way to the belt of the breeches and outside these a pair of maille hose, so tall he can fasten them to a belt that goes around the body twice and outside those a pair of "maille pants" made from the same kind of canvas and the same way before said, and outside those good kneescreens of iron with steel-hard rivets. On the torso he must closest to the body have a soft pannzara that does not reach longer than mid-thigh, then a good breast-screen of iron and outside that maille and outside the maille a good panzzara, made on the same way before said, but armless.
(Pannzara and vapntræiu are used in the literature interchangeably. A "soft pannzara" or vapntræiu seems to be a textile armour worn closest to the body, inside the maille, whereas the "good pannzara" or "strengthened vapntræiu" is worn outside maille or as armour in itself.
Similar rules are reproduced in swedish and danish later laws (likely copies of the norwegian ones) and use terms like "muza" and "trøia" for textile body armour.
The laws of the city of Bergen, ca 1274, confirms that textile-armour makers are to have the same status as maille-makers.
The Sturlunga Saga (assembled ca 1300, from earlier oral sources) tells us that "Th. var i thofastakki theim er sverin theira bitu eigi” (Th. was in thofastakki and their swords did not bite him). Thofastakki means "felted garment".
Outside scandinavia:
Chronicon colmariense, 1298, says:
”armati reputabantur qui galeas ferreas in capitibus habebant, et qui wambasia, id est, tunicam spissam ex lino stuppa, vel veteribus pannis consutam, et desuper camisiam ferream, id est vestem ex circulis ferreis contextam”.
I.e. "a wambasia, it is a thick/tightly packed tunic of linen or "smeared" hemp sown together or, sown together of patches"
Ordonnances des Métiers de Paris of 1296 og 1311 discusses the rules for construction of textile armour.
In 1296 we are told that one against the body should have canvas (telé) and inside the armour "folded cotton in many layers" (coton et de plois des toiles) plus strips of textile (d’escroes). Sendal (cendal) is mentioned both as covering and on the inside (sendal is the cheapest form of silk. The ordinance demands a certain thickness of the cotton compared to the sendal if it is used as "stuffing"; folded so and so many times. "Coton" might not necessarily be cotton, it could also refer to "cottonizing" a process we know little about.
In 1311 textile armours are called "cote gamboisée", "garments sewn through" and we are informed at least three pounts of new cotoon must be used per cubit of textile armour.
I 1322, The Armourer’s Company of Londons has this to say:
“It was ordeyned for ye comon proffyt and assented that from henceforth all Armour made in ye Cytie to sell be good and concenable after ye forme that henceforth That is to saie that an Akton and Gambezon covered with sendall or of cloth of Silke be stuffed with new clothe of cotten and of cadar and of olde sendall and not otherwise. And that ye wyite acketonnes be stuffed of olde lynnen and of cottone and of new clothe wth in and wth out.It is ordeyned that all ye crafte of ye citie of London be truely ruled and governed every person in his nature in due maner so that no falsehood ne false workemanshipp nor Deceipt be founde in no maner wise in any of ye foresaid crafte for ye worship of ye good folke of all ye same crafte and for the common proffytt of ye people”.
In "The Life of St. Louis", Jean de Joinville, c1300, he at one points pulls up "a saracen's tunic of tarred hemp" and uses it as a missile shield.
In 1521, in the Historia Majoris Britannia, John Major, we are told that "the scottish common peoples" used ”linen garments manifoldly sewed and painted or daubed with pitch, with a covering of deerskin”. "
Somebody else will have to reproduce the ordinances of Charles of Burgundy.
I've always liked to envision the description in the King's Mirror as the armour of the fully armoured high medieval knight: his whole body covered with textile armour, then maille, and his vitals protected by a a breastplate under the maille and a thick padded garment outside that again. Add in kneeguards, elbowguards, some sort of shoulderguards and a good solid helmet.