Roman Full Plate Armor?

[john m roberts]

We may be approaching this question from the wrong direction. The proper question may not be "Why didn't the Romans cover themselves with armor for greater safety?" but rather, "Why did the Romans wear so much armor?" We know that during the Republic legionaries wore more armor than in later years - the hamata was almost knee-length, the scutum was almost chin-to-ankle length, the hispaniensis was longer than the later Mainz and Pompeii models. It has long been my suspicion that the senate decided that this level of protection was encouraging a defensive mindset, that the soldiers were hovering behind their big shields and poking with their excessively long swords instead of stepping right up in the other guy's face and stabbing him like proper Romans. They may have reduced the size of the shield, the defensive quality of the armor and the length of the sword to encourage a more aggressive style of fighting.

[Matt Lukes]

That's a really interesting way of looking at it John- it certainly sounds 'Roman' :wink: It's very easy to get caught in the practical reason examination of why things were the way they were and forget things like fashion or indeed culture.

[Sean Manning]

I do think culture had something to do with it. Many medieval Latins boasted of how safe a well-armoured knight was, and I can't think of anything similar in ancient literature except Herodotus' comment that after their front ranks had been broken, the Persians at Plataea were like naked men fighting heavy infantry. A hauberk would probably have protected a Roman general better than a bronze cuirass and greaves would, but fancy bronze armour was prestigious.

[SigniferOne]

I apologize I've taken some time to write my reply to the posts in the third page; here it is.

Endre you based your responses and endorsement of all-encompassing armor on your personal experience, but in some of these views another person could have an entirely valid but differing view. For instance:

If given the choice of wearing a full suite of maille with textile armour underneath and open infantry combat helmet, and a l.seg. and helmet in battle, all other things being equal, I think I would have chosen the former.

Isn't that a subjective and personal preference? People who do more Roman re-enactments probably wouldn't take your side on this one. D.B. Cambell here gave an entirely opposite answer, for instance.

I have no trouble moving around and fighting in either a full suit of maille and helmet or l.seg and helmet

However -- it isn't whether we simply have no trouble moving in these two armors, but whether moving in one is easier than in the other. That's where the objective comparison lies. I have a hard time believing that a full-plate would weigh as little and be as nimble as an articulated (non-solid!) segmentata. Why would Romans go through the trouble of inventing a segmented plate armor, when resorting to a solid chunk of metal would've been so much easier?

I've been part of test cutting experiments and public demonstrations for years now, suspending pig's haunches and carcasses from jigs and covering them with different pieces of armour. Few if any in the audience doubt the effectiveness of armour aftor going away from those. I can, with a good cut, cut straight through a pig's haunch - stronger and tougher than any man's thigh - with a sword. Even a 20cm spearhead can produce horrifying cuts to the bone into flesh and gristle. Penetrating an unarmoured carcass with a spear or sword thrust barely requires any energy at all: I can set the spear to the flesh and push it through with a finger, even if it is just a hanging haunch with little resistance due to weight. Small, quick, backhand swordstrokes can produce extremely nasty, deep wounds, even through thick muscle and gristle.

Here is the problem, although I was really interested to read your re-enacting experiences: the examples you cited seem to show a vastly predominant emphasis on slashing weapons, am I right? In other words precisely the sort of stuff medievalists would have to deal with, rather than Classical reenactors? No matter how amazingly plate armor stands up to slashing, how difficult of a time would a legionary have with just sticking his gladius into any of the dozen joints between articulations? Or what about weighted-point weapons, such as axes: look how quickly the Romans defeated the lumbering Crupellarii by thinking quickly on their feet and putting axes into play. See the short work made of heavy knights by simple halberdiers and Flemish goendags. Is there any armor that could defend you from that?

Although you made the argument that more armor always = better, I keep coming back to the notion that the Romans had it as a completely viable choice, yet simply went into a completely different direction from tactical reasons. John Roberts' last post dovetails on this exactly.

[Endre Fodstad]

I think that answer has been given repeatedly - economy and availability of cheap materials, plus prestige in some cases.

However -- it isn't whether we simply have no trouble moving in these two armors, but whether moving in one is easier than in the other. That's where the objective comparison lies. I have a hard time believing that a full-plate would weigh as little and be as nimble as an articulated (non-solid!) segmentata. Why would Romans go through the trouble of inventing a segmented plate armor, when resorting to a solid chunk of metal would've been so much easier?

First, of course, roman armorers did not work through a Senate-appointed design committee with computerized models of different armours and statisticans determining the preferred weight-to-protection ratio, so what they went through the trouble of creating is likely unconnected to that particular question.

In my experience, which was - as stated - with a suit of plate that in fact was a bit too small for me contra a l.seg. that was made to fit me, the limitations on movement (and especially movement connected with fighting) are fairly limited in both. Of course, any armour weights you down. Lighter armour would have been far more of an advantage if the legionaire wanted to run around fighting duels, if fact: dodging is easier if you know where the blow is coming for...in the battle line a great deal of blows are going to be coming from the guy a meter or two to your right, sticking his spear through the gaps in the shield-wall while you are preoccupied with someone else. That thrust might not be very powerful, attack of opportunity as it is, but if it gets past the shield it will pierce unarmoured flesh.

Of course any choice is a subjective one. "objective" testing of this sort of thing is impossible. I would have preferred not getting my hands, neck or legs cut off or pierced to wearing a lighter suit of armour. An unarmoured fighter is more nimble than an armoured one, but he is also dead easy to wound.

Here is the problem, although I was really interested to read your re-enacting experiences: the examples you cited seem to show a vastly predominant emphasis on slashing weapons, am I right? In other words precisely the sort of stuff medievalists would have to deal with, but not the Classical reenactors so much? No matter how amazingly plate armor stands up to slashing -- and I cede completely to you on that -- how difficult of a time would a legionary have with just sticking his gladius into any of the dozen joints between articulations? Or what about weighted-point weapons, such as axes: look how quickly the Romans defeated the lumbering Crupellarii by thinking quickly on their feet and putting axes into play. See the short work made of heavy knights by simple halberdiers and Flemish goendags. Is there any armor that could defend you from that?

Spears and arrows are slashing weapons? You have misread; our tests are against maille and coat-of-plates, not white plate.
As practical experience and dozens of harness-fighting manuals attest, I believe the legionaire would have had a great deal of trouble sticking his gladius into the articulation of white plate. On a moving, fighting opponent , one-on-one, the preferred way to go about that is to grapple or use entry techniques that require you to leave the battle line for them to be effective - you have to get very close in for attacks on articulation to work properly. Additionally, they require you to rely on your armour to keep you safe from attacks while you enter. When it comes to the Battle of the Golden Spurs, it might also have had something to do with the fact that the fight was conducted in rough terrain where the cavalry's mobility could not be brought to bear. But that is a whole other story.

The fact that Tacitius' description has them resorting to dolubrae and (non-combat) axes is just further confirmation that his crupellarii were walking around in badly made gear that bore little relation to later armour. A combat axe, goedendag or military pick has a weighted head, but it is literally oceans away from a regular axe or pick: those are very unwieldy as weapons. Many authors think it is possible to pick up a regular axe or pick and use it to full efficiency. That perception is dwindling, for good reason. Medieval and early modern armour-breakers, even the simple things the flemish were using, were purpose-made weapons made in response to the "invulnerability"(not literal invulnerability, of course, but what I've been outlining) of fully armoured men to swords and spear-thrusts.

Although you made the argument that more armor always = better, I keep coming back to the notion that the Romans had it was a completely viable option, but simply went away from it into a different direction, from tactical reasons. John Roberts' last post dovetails on this exactly.

We return to my first answer here. The limitation was economy and availability rather than a tactical one, I think. This is just going in circles.

[D B Campbell]

D.B. Cambell here gave an entirely opposite answer, for instance.

I have no trouble moving around and fighting in either a full suit of maille and helmet or l.seg and helmet

Not guilty -- I can be accused of many things, but re-enacting isn't one of them! I leave that to the experts.

[Sean Manning]

Here is the problem, although I was really interested to read your re-enacting experiences: the examples you cited seem to show a vastly predominant emphasis on slashing weapons, am I right? In other words precisely the sort of stuff medievalists would have to deal with, rather than Classical reenactors? No matter how amazingly plate armor stands up to slashing, how difficult of a time would a legionary have with just sticking his gladius into any of the dozen joints between articulations? Or what about weighted-point weapons, such as axes: look how quickly the Romans defeated the lumbering Crupellarii by thinking quickly on their feet and putting axes into play. See the short work made of heavy knights by simple halberdiers and Flemish goendags. Is there any armor that could defend you from that?

Although you made the argument that more armor always = better, I keep coming back to the notion that the Romans had it as a completely viable choice, yet simply went into a completely different direction from tactical reasons. John Roberts' last post dovetails on this exactly.

That's a bit misleading. When dismounted knights fought commoner infantry, the knights usually won unless the commoners had another major advantage (numbers, surprise, standing behind entrenchments or at the top of a hill). Pure examples are hard to think of, but the first phase of Sempach (1386) is suggestive. Of course, the knights had the advantage of morale and training and not just armour. Battles between mounted knights and infantry are a whole other can of worms ...

[SigniferOne]

That's a bit misleading. When dismounted knights fought commoner infantry, the knights usually won unless the commoners had another major advantage (numbers, surprise, standing behind entrenchments or at the top of a hill). Pure examples are hard to think of, but the first phase of Sempach (1386) is suggestive. Of course, the knights had the advantage of morale and training and not just armour. Battles between mounted knights and infantry are a whole other can of worms ...

That's not exactly true. At Courtrai (1302) the number of Flemish was pretty much equal to the French, and they slew them in great numbers with a simple goedendag weapon, which was basically a wooden plank with a sharp nail attached to the top of it. The only thing the knights had was the factor of chivalric morale, and armor too when the enemy didn't have it. When the enemy was equally ferocious (as the Flemings at Courtrai were), and had a bafflingly simple armor-piercing weapon, the odds were evened out very quickly.

That's why I am skeptical about Endre's more armor = better principle. I don't disagree that the matters of economy and supply could've played some role in the decision not to employ full-plate, but heck, Segmentata was not exactly the simplest armor to maintain either. As I understand it it was the most complicated armor to maintain for pretty much the next 1 thousand years. Yet the matters of economy and supply, important and relevant, still did not prevent vast numbers of legionaries from outfitting themselves with it, because it did exactly what they wanted. Some, at least some, tactical consideration still must've played a role when they considered the Cataphract/Crupellarius and went in another direction. If Flemings, Halberdiers and the Swiss discovered how to dethrone the knight a thousand years later, there's no reason not to assume that the Romans saw it ahead of time as well. For, if we realize that the knight lost on the battlefield long before gunpowder came into the equation, then more armor doesn't equal better indeed.


P.S. Sorry about the misattribution Duncan, it was Tarbicus who said that he found segmentata comfortable to wear.

[Robert Vermaat]

D.B. Cambell here gave an entirely opposite answer, for instance.

I have no trouble moving around and fighting in either a full suit of maille and helmet or l.seg and helmet

Not guilty -- I can be accused of many things, but re-enacting isn't one of them! I leave that to the experts.

Indeed. It was Endre who said that. Careful whom you ascribe your quotes to!

[Endre Fodstad]

I also find the l.seg. comfortable to wear. I just don't find it much less, or more, comfortable than well-made white plate.
And again, I doubt the existence of a roman armour planning research central deciding what the field armies were to wear.

That's not exactly true. At Courtrai (1302) the number of Flemish was pretty much equal to the French, and they slew them in great numbers with a simple goedendag weapon, which was basically a wooden plank with a sharp nail attached to the top of it. The only thing the knights had was the factor of chivalric morale, and armor too when the enemy didn't have it. When the enemy was equally ferocious (as the Flemings at Courtrai were), and had a bafflingly simple armor-piercing weapon, the odds were evened out very quickly.

As I wrote earlier, that is another story. Sean has already posted the ground reasons why it is not an applicable example in this case. Here comes the story:

At Kortrijk the french attacked a flemish militia force with a mixture of goedengdags - that were not simply wooden planks with nails on top, but iron-bound clubs with a spiked top and, just, and likely far more, important: long spears, standing in a spearwall in a defensive position with severely broken ground to distrupt mounted close-order approach and with archer/skirmishers in support. Heavy cavalry had trouble with that sort of infantry formations all thorough the middle ages - Hastings being an example where the norman cavalry was unable to make much headway until the anglo-saxon line disordered itself, without the brook in fron of the anglo-saxon formation. It could be defeated head-on - by infantry-cavalry combined arms, as used extensively by the english marsher lords against the welch, for example, but the french at Kortrijk made some really bad mistakes.

What won that battle was not any new weapon, but position and tactics. At Bouvines a hundred years before, the Brabancon spearwall block, equally well equipped and proving entirely capable of dealing with heavy cavalry, were cut off as the rest of the Imperial army retreated. Then, not having the luxury of having the french attacking them across a brook and surrounded by cavalry in open ground, they were slowly ground down until they were disordered enough for the cavalry to ride them down. This would have been the fate of the flemish at Kortrijk as well, had they not been favoured by terrain, good tactical positioning and bad french dispositions, goedendag or no. We've come a good fifty years in medieval military history research since Verbruggen had to play up on the exceptionalness of Kortwijk to actually make his audience believe it was possible for such a thing to happen, to put it to a (perhaps too fine) point.

Of course armour could be defeated. If it had not been possible to defeat more heavily armoured opponents, armour would have the only tactically sound thing to wear. However, for all the reasons listed above, armour is a really good idea for heavy infantry who want to slug it out in close melee.

[SigniferOne]

Not guilty -- I can be accused of many things, but re-enacting isn't one of them! I leave that to the experts.

Indeed. It was Endre who said that. Careful whom you ascribe your quotes to!

Sorry there seems to be a confusion here. I did not attribute that quote to Duncan (where it indeed wa Endre's). The only thing I mistakenly attributed was the statement that Segmentata is comfortable to wear, which I thought was said by Duncan but was actually by Tarbicus.

What won that battle was not any new weapon, but position and tactics. At Bouvines a hundred years before, the Brabancon spearwall block, equally well equipped and proving entirely capable of dealing with heavy cavalry, were cut off as the rest of the Imperial army retreated. Then, not having the luxury of having the french attacking them across a brook and surrounded by cavalry in open ground, they were slowly ground down until they were disordered enough for the cavalry to ride them down. This would have been the fate of the flemish at Kortrijk as well, had they not been favoured by terrain, good tactical positioning and bad french dispositions, goedendag or no. We've come a good fifty years in medieval military history research since Verbruggen had to play up on the exceptionalness of Kortwijk to actually make his audience believe it was possible for such a thing to happen, to put it to a (perhaps too fine) point.

Yet Verbruggen was supported by a book by DeVries which she published in 2000, entirely vindicating his account in every sense. She additionally listed a dozen more battles right after Courtrai where cavalry were not only impeded but actually defeated by infantry, which is a highly unusual thing for the Middle Ages. I'm not saying the goedendag was a miracle weapon which fought humans' battles for them, but rather that if there were no armor-crushing weapons, if the paradigm you draw up where a heavily encumbered unit was practically invulnerable was indeed the case, then no tactics or manoeuvering could've saved them.

The key point that I want to take away from all this, so as not to derail our conversation towards middle ages, is that lightly armored Flemings, armed with little more than fierceness and well-designed weapons, defeated the most heavy-armored, most encumbered units on the planet. All this goes towards a central point: that more armor does not equal better; that at some point there clearly is reached a tipping point, and more heavily armed units begin to lose absolute effectiveness, only able to defeat enemies when they are fleeting and disorganized (which most of the infantry during the Middle Ages were, having won 1-2 battles in about 400 years).

Thus far for situations when ultra-heavily armored men win. But once infantry gets its act together and behaves properly, the heavily-encumbered clunky knight quickly loses, and his dominance is over. This was shown not just by Flemings but by Halberdiers which every army tried recruit, and by that rebirth of the ancient phalanx, the Swiss. So what does this mean for us in the end? It all begs the question: why couldn't have Romans foreseen this development a thousand years earlier? If Europe was discarding the knightly panoply as demonstrably weaker to the infantry, what motive would the Romans have had to adopt it in the first place?

[Endre Fodstad]

Because the romans, as far as I know, were not able to predict the future 1300 years down the line?

I am not actually sure what DeVries was supposed to be vindicating Verbruggen about. Verbruggen wrote "The battle of the Golden Spurs" in 1952, when the perception was that cavalry was the dominant arm all thorough the middle ages. Devries - who is not a woman:



...as far as I can see (it's the beard), wrote a book detailing infantry warfare in the fourteenth century, where he expanded on the rising use of professional infantry armies in the century, at a point when most historians had accepted that all was not as written by Delbruck and Oman; Beeler's introductory book "Warfare in Feudal Europe 730-1200" (1973), for example, is characterized by european warfare apparently not being very feudal and mention and extrapolation on the use of infantry in the covered period. The main criticism of Devries would be that most of his examples are of passive infantry who rely on the cavalry being the aggressor...that formed infantry could repel cavalry is not really new, although certainly DeVries argues that. Tinchebray, Lincoln, Legnano, the aforementioned Bouvines. It's just a matter of looking through enough sources. Passive infantry's main problem would always be that unless they could trap the cavalry in some way, as at Kortrijk, they would not be able to actually defeat them, only drive them off.

The flemish militia at Kortrijk, on the only real images we have detailing them that seem to be from the same region and period, the Kortrijk chest, seem anything but lightly armoured. They all wear helmets and maille coifs, a number are wearing separate maille gloves, and the front (nobles and men-at-arms?), spear-armed ranks in the battle panel, are armoured in fully covering maille hauberks, not much inferior to their french opponents. In the other images on the chest, many militiamen are wearing hauberks, and there is a belief that most of them, like most heavy infantry of the period, wore thickly padded gambesons. Many also of course wear covering surcoats, so it is difficult to determine exactly what they are kitted out in. The Grand Chroniques de France image has every flemish militiaman wearing maille hauberks with gloves, maille coifs, and helmets. This was the communal militia, trained in formation fighting, proud of their traditions of regular military exercise, and equipped to counter cavalry charges and hold positions, stiffened with flemish nobles loyal to Count of Flandres and their men-at-arms, not a random assemblage of townsmen - hardly some sort of rabble "armed with little more than fierceness and well-designed weapons".

If you want lightly armoured soldiers taking on heavy cavalry, look up the exploits of the Catalan Company and the Almagovars in the Latin Empire - spesifically the battle of Halmyros. Of course, they were hard-core veterans of a number of campaigns (who, for example, were able to treat the thracian and macedonian provinces of the byzantine empire as their own personal doormat for two years after Emperor Andronikus, their employer, tried and failed to wipe them out) that usually fought in a combined arms force, and they dug prepared covered battle traps before the battle of Halmyros to trap the cavalry.

I can go on for pages about medieval battle tactics, details of a number of battles before Kortrijk where formed infantry were able to repulse cavalry and why the "infantry vs cavalry" shtick tends to be rather moot: major medieval engagements tended to have at least one side fighting in a combined arms force and capitalizing on that, if it was not the result of an all-cavalry raiding or rapid movement force or, as at Kortrijk, one side was drastically short on cavalry for other reasons. The majority of major engagements involve both infantry and cavalry. I will also kindly ask you to not reconstruct my own opinions for me in creative ways: the only place in this discussion where "invulnerable" has been written before you did in your last post was in this sentence:

You are of course not invulnerable, even in fully covering "white plate".

The entire issue of the "clunky" knight has been covered already, as have armour-breaking weapons; there is no point in bringing it up again - just read previous entries in this very thread. I strongly advise you do so again anyway, as I assume you did not mean to post misinterpretations of my posts, but simply had not read them through well enough.

When it comes to wonder-weapons, I have always found it entertaining to bring out the two most idealized infantry styles of the late middle ages: english-style longbowmen and swiss-style pikemen. The only army that brought these two together in a well-drilled whole was Charles the Bold's Ordonnances of Burgundy. He never won a battle with them.

I can see this discussion is just circling itself and going wildly off-topic in odd millennium-spanning comparisons, as it has been tilting toward for the last two pages. Thus, I'm butting out. Hopefully, something more useful will appear in the future that can shed more light to the Versigny figure and/or the cruppellarii.

[Alcoatari]

"slaves who were being trained for (as?) gladiators"
So presumably in this context they were outfittet in the same armament they would use in the arena.
This is signifficant as there are only a few types of gladiators known wearing body armor.
We have a depiction of scale armored equites from the 1 century CE, which later seem to only wear tunica.
From the 2nd century AD onward we see the Scissor as being armored either in scale or in mail fighting against the retiarius armed with the trident mostly in the eastern provinces.

As I was reading this, something occurred to me.

the line: "slaves who were being trained for (as?) gladiators"

I think should be: "slaves who were being trained FOR gladiators"

Now, humor me, if you will.

A lot of the gladiatorial combat was in and of itself reenactive, yes?

I think this statement: "slaves who were being trained FOR gladiators" is quite accurate.

If the Gladiator is perceived as a sporting hero by the populous, suppose these scenarios were a reenaction of the supposed battle wherein the enemies wore full armor against the Romans and were defeated by the Romans' superior fighting ability and mobility.

Therefore it is possible that a skillful gladiator, or a fan favorite, was pitted against multiple fully armored adversaries, who in this case could have been slaves. The spectacle then being: A scant clad Roman gladiator resists and defeats heavily armored opponents and thus demonstrates the martial supremacy of Rome.

[Olaf]

A lot of the gladiatorial combat was in and of itself reenactive, yes?

Actualy that does not seem to be the case, contrary to what certain movies and TV series do depict.
There were instances were untrained slaves, criminals and prisinors of war were killed in the arena in a speczacle that was supposed to mimiC mythological stories, and then there were the Naumachiae were whole see battles were reenacted on natural or artificial lakes, but trained gladiators always fought amongst themselves in mostly one on one fights.

[Alcoatari]

Actualy that does not seem to be the case, contrary to what certain movies and TV series do depict.
There were instances were untrained slaves, criminals and prisinors of war were killed in the arena in a speczacle that was supposed to mimiC mythological stories, and then there were the Naumachiae were whole see battles were reenacted on natural or artificial lakes, but trained gladiators always fought amongst themselves in mostly one on one fights.

( I haven't seen the Spartacus TV show yet)

As I understand Gladiatorial combat, a lot of the featured combatants were free men. As you and I both said, they were similar to modern sports heroes. That is not to say, however, that none of the premier combatants were slaves. It is my belief that the free Gladiators could agree or disagree with whom they fight. If most had a choice, they would likely choose to only fight one on one, minimizing variables. But a slave who has made a name as a Gladiator is still subject to his masters brokering of his skills. And while this slave master may not want to waste a good slave, maybe the money is right.

It is possible then that this type of gladiator may be forced to kill other slaves, Christians, lions, etc...

And I will agree strongly that TV and Movies do take liberties in this arena, often depicting all Gladiators as slaves. But who ever watches Hollywood films for historical accuracy? For example, a recently made WW2 film about Pearl Harbor features P51 Mustangs. Pearl Harbor was DEC 1941 and the P51 was not released until early 1944.

Anyway, my main point was: Perhaps the man in the "full plate" was never a featured gladiator in the first place, but a slave killed as spectacle by another, more revered slave. As it has been said, the Romans were known to favor mobility over protection, as well as hampering the mobility of their enemies. They would often hide or cover stakes in the earth on a pitched battlefield so that enemy soldiers, who often wore no shoes, would impale their feet and render themselves useless in the battle.

I think gladiators often wore little to no armor for the same reasons that people today watch NASCAR or boxing; the crowd wanted to see blood, crashes, a knockout. And by all accounts, these Dacian full plate wearers were pretty easy to overcome.