Sub-Roman Britain (Cavalry etc)

[M. Demetrius]

The trade off between the protective ability of armor and the agility of not wearing it seems to be the main difference between light infantry (or, presumably, cavalry to a lesser extent) and heavy infantry. In Gallic Wars, Caesar mentions picking the fastest of his soldiers, and having them leave their armor at home to run alongside the cavalry. Surely he knew about all the sorts of leather/metal/felt armors available to his troops, and decided that no armor was a proper choice in these instances, wouldn't you say?

I don't know about the historically correct versions of leather armors being discussed. For me, if you can't document it, but want to wear it anyway, that's your choice. I won't fuss, or count the stitches in your breastplate's seams. I probably wouldn't, but that's my choice. I might wear a soft leather cover over my subarmalis, or when I get around to making it, make the outer layer of deer or goatskin, just to make it wear longer under the hamata. But again, that's choice, not provable. And I wouldn't suspect it would add any protection at all, just a place to make a separation line between the oil and the sweat. Sweat/oil mayonnaise doesn't work well.

Cavalry? the rider can't be much nimbler than the horse he's riding, I'd suppose, so a clunk-footed mount would negate most of the agility of its rider. But that's not documentable, really.