02-23-2009, 01:20 AM
Dan wrote:
>No you don't. If it is quilted properly then you only need a dozen or so layers to stop >the hardest knife thrust you can deliver. Half a dozen layers are enough to stop a >sword cut. The closer the rows of stitches the more rigid the result.
Alan Williams, author of "The Knight and the Blast Furnace" documentented the effectiveness of 16 layers of linen armour against cuts of the sword and thrusts of the spear, and found that a mere 50 Joules of energy is needed to penetrate the fabric with a spear, and 80 for a sword cut. Over 25 layers were require to defeat a sword cut in the midrange of energy for an effective sword cut (140-220 Joules)
For reference, 50 joules is approximately what you generate when you heft a shovel full of snow.
You also mention leather armour being very rare in North-western Europe. As leather armour was widespread enough to to lend its name "cuirasse" in French and English to armour in general, your position isn't terribly tenable.
Consider, when Edward the first and his friends have a tournament in cloth armour with light weapons at Blythe in 1258, William Longsword and Robert de Quincy are killed, and Roger Bigod has his faculties permanently impaired. And they were friends.
Subsequently Edward comissioned suits of cuir bouilli armour from existing leather armour makers for tournaments, which served quite well.
As mail armour begins to be less adequate during the middle ages, it is widely supplemented by leather armour throughout north western Europe and elsewhere. Leather breastplates (cuirasses) are among the first additions, and cuisses (thigh armour) as second. Both names are based on their origins as leather armour in north western europe. Leather was supplanted by inexpensive sheet metal in the industrial revolutions of the fourteenth and fifteenth century in north-western Europe, but leather armour is still manufacture in the area through the fifteenth century and beyond. The buff coat is a great example of the survival of leather armour well into the age of the gun in North western Europe as well.
Thanks,
Cole
>No you don't. If it is quilted properly then you only need a dozen or so layers to stop >the hardest knife thrust you can deliver. Half a dozen layers are enough to stop a >sword cut. The closer the rows of stitches the more rigid the result.
Alan Williams, author of "The Knight and the Blast Furnace" documentented the effectiveness of 16 layers of linen armour against cuts of the sword and thrusts of the spear, and found that a mere 50 Joules of energy is needed to penetrate the fabric with a spear, and 80 for a sword cut. Over 25 layers were require to defeat a sword cut in the midrange of energy for an effective sword cut (140-220 Joules)
For reference, 50 joules is approximately what you generate when you heft a shovel full of snow.
You also mention leather armour being very rare in North-western Europe. As leather armour was widespread enough to to lend its name "cuirasse" in French and English to armour in general, your position isn't terribly tenable.
Consider, when Edward the first and his friends have a tournament in cloth armour with light weapons at Blythe in 1258, William Longsword and Robert de Quincy are killed, and Roger Bigod has his faculties permanently impaired. And they were friends.
Subsequently Edward comissioned suits of cuir bouilli armour from existing leather armour makers for tournaments, which served quite well.
As mail armour begins to be less adequate during the middle ages, it is widely supplemented by leather armour throughout north western Europe and elsewhere. Leather breastplates (cuirasses) are among the first additions, and cuisses (thigh armour) as second. Both names are based on their origins as leather armour in north western europe. Leather was supplanted by inexpensive sheet metal in the industrial revolutions of the fourteenth and fifteenth century in north-western Europe, but leather armour is still manufacture in the area through the fifteenth century and beyond. The buff coat is a great example of the survival of leather armour well into the age of the gun in North western Europe as well.
Thanks,
Cole
Cole
