Was the leather muscled curiass of the later times sexier?

[Matthew Amt]

Buff-coats were tanned leather and a form of armour; armour can and has been made from leather. It cannot be supposed that the Romans were unaware of this and never used it - indeed what were pteruges made from?

Helloooo! Did you not read my post?? We KNOW all that! I have to ask, are you or Wulfgar the same as this guy?:

http://forums.armourarchive.org/phpBB2/ ... hp?t=88624

Cuz the three of you are sounding the like same darn broken record. "Leather is great! They knew about leather! Why COULDN'T it be leather?!" The response remains the same: WHY SPECULATE?? We have several alternatives with GOOD evidence!

There was a test done with a reconstructed Irish leather shield and a reconstruction of the same design of shield in bronze, examples of which have survived. They were cut with a reconstructed bronze sword. The leather shield (not dissimilar to the targes used by Jacobite clansmen in 1745) was very resistant to sword blows but the bronze equivalent was sliced open with ease.

This "test" was done in 1962 by John Coles. The "bronze" shield he chopped was 0.3mm COPPER, and bore no relation to any known Bronze Age shield. Way too thin, way too soft. But practically every author since then has used this "test" to declare that all bronze armor was "useless" or "ceremonial". This concept is now entirely discredited--ancient bronze armor was HIGHLY effective. For a much better test, try this:

http://forums.swordforum.com/showthread ... adid=21752

This and other good information should also be available in Barry Molloy's book "The Cutting Edge" (which I hope to get for Christmas!). By the way, the leather shield Coles tested was nothing like a Highland targe, which were oak plank covered in leather. The Clonbrin shield which Coles based his repros on is the one I mentioned above, a single layer of leather about 1/4" thick, oak-tanned but not very well so that the middle was more like rawhide. There is a second layer of leather on the boss. Coles made several versions, some hardened with hot water, etc. We don't know if the original Clonbrin shield was hardened or not, but that doesn't seem to be entirely necessary (according to both Coles and Molloy).

BTW Antoine De Brack, a French cavalry officer, examined iron-skulled cuirassier helmets which had been sliced open by Austrian sabres after the Battle of Aspern-Essling. He said he would far rather wear a stout leather shako than an iron pot as it gave better protection - something of a 'horses-mouth statement.'

Must have been pretty crappy helmets! Several trained experts in arms and armor, including a Japanese sword expert with a specially mounted blade, and curators at the Royal Armouries in England, have been unable to do that much damage to helmets with swords. Here you go:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-h0e0NSwYNg

I've never seen a surviving Roman helmet with an identifiable significant open cut from a weapon, though many are damaged in various ways. Seems to me if the Romans were SO familiar with the glories of impenetrable butch leather, they would have given up those silly metal hats, eh?

I am an academic, and without the application of logic all arguments are crippled. Once again I feel I must point out that I am arguing for the mere possibility, not in any sense either the probability or, heaven forfend, the actuality, of Roman leather cuirasses.

Roman logic is not like modern logic. And modern ideas of the "logical" progression or development of armor do NOT always match the facts. And if you are not trying to say that the Romans had leather cuirasses, why the heck argue for the "mere possibility"?? Pliny writes about the discovery of aluminum, so why not argue the possibility of Roman beer cans or Zepplins? Why not argue the possibility of swim fins or tutus? Maybe because it's a completely pointless activity?

Note the cuirass on the left exhibits scale mail.

No, it shows SCALE. Mail is made of rings.

[/quote]However, how come the figure suggests a "muscled form"?[/quote]

Because, as I have said, this artwork is in the Hellenistic heroic tradition, with little regard to reality. Heck, look at it! It has layers of guys standing on each other! Classical drapery on the barbarians! The muscled cuirass shape was a crucial element in any military scene of that style! The artist did not care what it was actually made of, even if he knew. Realism was not the point.

Yet look at the figure on the right. Note the chain mail has little form.

Because it's directly copied from Trajan's Column, as was a LOT of sculpture from that time.

This is my bid. There were muscled cuirasses and battle mail was placed over them... I don't how the muscled form could be implemented in the mail itself otherwise. Unless the undergarment gave the muscled form?

THE ARTIST CARVED IT THAT WAY. It was the STYLE of the time. Now, in reality, if you wear a nice and fine shirt of mail or scales--or the combination we like to call plumata--over a nice set of chest muscles, with no padding at all, you can indeed see some of the body shape under the armor. Mail is especially good at forming to the body. (Put a mailshirt on your girlfriend sometime--well, I'll let that drop!) So maybe all the artist had to do was emphasize that effect. But that would mean NO padding under the armor at all.

Have a look at this famous relief of the Praetorian Guard 2nd Century. Look at the figure on the left. Now tell me how a reconstruction would go? Could a cuirass of bronze be constructed from this figure. Or would only leather reproduce this figure in the detail. I'd assume somebody has attempted a life reconstruction. Now what would the results look like?

That's the Louvre relief, and it has been HEAVILY restored. The entire middle of the left-hand figure is a modern replacement, and not a very good one. Looks to me like he's wearing a perfectly normal Roman bronze muscled cuirass. Travis Clark believes the shoulder flaps were indeed often leather, and I have no real problem with that, but there's absolutely no reason to suspect that the body of the cuirass is anything but metal. A number of bronze originals exist, and they are lightweight, very strong, and wonderfully attractive. What more do you need?

If you feel like you're getting some hostile reactions, it's because we've all been over this a dozen times, and it gets tiring when someone who is just CONVINCED he's right simply blows through everything we have tried to teach. If you're hear to learn from the huge mass of knowledge on this board, then learn, and we will be happy to share. If you're just going to tell us how stiff-necked we are for not bowing to your perfectly logical and commonsense preconceptions, maybe some other discussion board will seem like a friendlier place.

Valete,

Matthew