Illustrations of Sassanid Persian Clibanarii

[Renatus]

. . . there is a problem with the apparent inequality of armour provision between the limbs and torso in descriptions of cataphracts. Why armour the limbs with plate, if you leave the torso with mail or scale?

Beware of translations. There is no word for 'mail' in any of the examples quoted above by Adrian. Ammianus speaks of the clibanarii having protecting breastplates (thoracum muniti tegminibus, literally, 'protected by coverings of the breasts') and being encircled by iron bands. Julian's 'Heroic Deeds of Constantius' says simply that the riders were protected by cuirasses and helmets of iron. In Nazarius' panegyric, the words "(of mail)" are a gloss not found in the Latin. None of these need refer to anything other than solid armour. The only exception is Julian's 'Panegyric in Honour of Constantius', in which the words translated as "a coat of mail" translate literally from the Greek as 'a thorax of cut-up pieces', which sounds much more like scale than mail.