Leather Armor? (NO HOLDS BARRED!!)

[Dan Howard]

I've never dismissed it. I have repeatedly agreed that leather/hide was used as armour in many time periods and in many cultures. I have also said that every extant example of leather armour uses leather that is not flexible. Modern experimental data supports the case that flexible leather provides little protection against the most common weapons on a battlefield. I conclude from this that if flexible leather is evident either in an illustration or an extant piece of costume then it cannot have been intended as "armour" - i.e. expected to resist the most likely threat on the battlefield. I have no problem with Romans wearing flexible leather for a purpose other than what I would define as "armour".