This has probably been discussed before, but I couldn't find it.

What, if any, padding would a viking wear under his chain mail, providing he owned one of cause.

would it be an actual padding like a jack or gambeson or just a heavy woollen tunic?

And how about those warriors not rich enough to own a chain mail would they wear something like a padding or perhaps a leather jerking of some sort.

I know both jacks and gambesons are somewhat later than the viking era, but I find it difficult to believe nothing was used, as in either you wore mail or some variant of a woollen tunic.

any help or direction to historical material is appreciated.

This is all for the re-enactment kit I'm putting together of a fairly wealthy warrior (as he should be, wearing chain mail).

a wool tunic.

there is no historic evidence for any such padded garment.
so if you want 100% historic a tunic with what ya got. i know there might be yada yada in some saga, hehe we've had this subject numerous times on myArmoury, but as a reenactor a wool tunic is all you will need.

Hello look at this topic
http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t...highlight=

The answer is we frankly don't know. From a logical standpoint it seems something would be worn under the maille as padding but we frankly don't know what. Some people will tell you to wear a couple wool tunics but we don't even have evidence for this. Others will tell you to wear a gambeson but the earliest we see gambesons is in the 12th century. My advice is to read some books and some sagas and form your own opinion so if anyone ever asks you you can explain why you choose what you did. It also will depend as to what type of group you are in some people only want to wear things that have an archeological counterpart, others will be less "hardcore" and want what is portrayed in period art or writings.

As to your second question

Quote:

And how about those warriors not rich enough to own a chain mail would they wear something like a padding or perhaps a leather jerking of some sort.

It depends how "not rich enough" the warrior is. During the early viking age (8th cent.) mail was very expensive and only the most elite could afford it, by the later viking age (11th cent.) maille was much more common and many more warriors would have worn it. Most warriors would have a helm and shield as armour (often this was all). As for fabric or leather armour we have,
A saga mentioning the gift of 13 cotes of padded reindeer hide to King Olaf
Several carvings and statues (all mentioned in the thread I just posted)
A few difficult to interpret weavings,paintings,embroideries, carvings, etc.

What you need to do is read, read, read and form your opinion on what you have read. I personally believe leather armour existed in the viking era, but others are bound to disagree.
Best,
Hadrian

in irish accounts from the various fights between the irish and norse there are many references to padded armour and leather armour. the difficult thing is that this type of armour rots and eventually no evidence can be found and i dont know of any archaeological finds that back up the accounts. i believeone of the accounts talks of brian boru wearing a jacket made of layers of either linen or leather stitched together forgive my bad accounts i havent read it in a long time but references are there and i dont see why not. im a reenactor myself and i find a field full of chain maille clad vikings ridiculous. also using blunt weapons maille does little to add protection it merely looks nice. i hope i helped in some way. you could always try to make one of the fabled reindeer skin jackets

As mentioned, we had a gigantic "discussion" about it a few months previous. Closest thing we know is there existed a particular kind of jacket shown in a few carvings, but worn by itself. I know of someone who manufactures them, actually.

Anyways, as far as we're concerned, they wore it over their shirts, maybe even a few shirts. I don't write about MY underwear, anyways.

M.

Are you involved in a proper reenactment group? What are their standards for this?
Remember that a hauberk is not only armor, it is also a radiator. Without insulation, you may overheat, freeze or both. :eek:

You know in the end I would not say it can be proved they did not but there is little to no evidence of padded armour in use alone or under armour. Personally I think wearing mail alone is not fun and cannot see them not wearing something more than a single tunic but with the lack of real info we cannot make any hard and fast statements. That said I do not like just wearing my mail with only a tunic and wear something to correct this. In the future my idea is to make a heavy weight wool tunic. It will be made with some light padding between two lighter wool layers inside. Since the padding I will use comes in sheets I am not going to sew channels into it and no one but you me and everyone on the forum will know the better.

RPM

im in a group based in ireland and we do hiberno-norse stuff as well as alot of battles in england safety regulations are only in place really at a group level but gloves and helmets are a general agreement. as for armour you can go bare chested if you wish (though i dont) as for the reindeer jackets its likely they are similar to those worn by inuit tribes in russia and iceland and if anyone knoes where i could find an "authentic" one of these please pm me. i reckon that leather was worn. we know ship crews worn leather over there clothes which shows they knew they were durable anyone who has worked on a boat will know what i mean. this does not take a great leap of imagination to say a crew member jumped off a boat or fought on his boat and realised what he wore was sturdy. but again tests on these clothes show there just as good as modern thermal equipment so yes heat is an issue for battle but it is likely leather overalls like that butchers used to wear might have been worn. all i know is references to padding in this period was vague as it was a period that was all about image and nothing said im a rich warrior better than a shirt of shiny maille

I would defimitely think the Vikings and anyone who wore mail would have worn some sort of a protective garment underneath. True, we really don't know what exactly was worn underneath, but to wear mail without some other protection makes little or no sense.

Obviously, nothing textile survives to give proof, but in absence of evidence you need to try to use common sense, with the understanding that it is speculation to a point.

It's a good possibility the padded garments were not the same construction of a gambeson, but it could have been a few layers of thick cloth.

As far as the padded/quilted armour on it's own, once again we know nothing. The reindeer hides in the saga are enchanted, but as someone else mentioned there is a good possibility soemthing of this type was used to provide protection, as myths have some basis in fact. It's clear in the saga they were used as armour, and an enchanted spear mentioned in a saga does not indicate spears were not used just because the spear mentioned was enchanted.

I feel comfortable (as do some of the authors on the reading list) that Vikings very well could have used some form of layered textile/padding/hide garment for protection.

The one thing though that makes it a bit tough for me - illustrations show an attempt to represent a gambeson garment worn alone as armour in the 12th century or so in europe. Prior to this, these gambeson type garments are not illustrated. Is this a change in the techniques of illustration? Could some 8-11th century illustrations show a multi-layered garment like I mentioned above? It's real hard to say, as illustrations are often not very clear. There are conflicting opinions on what illustrations represent.

Depending on your group you can wear something under your tunic under your maille so no one will see it. This will make you more comfortable and will not change the look of your outfit.

Quote:

A saga mentioning the gift of 13 cotes of padded reindeer hide to King Olaf The famous reindeer coats where bought by Olavs advesary, Tore Hund, from a lappish shaman, who had "enchanted them so that they turned sword blows." Since Olav later became a saint (aka superhero) his saga is a lot more Fantastic than the others, and featureplenty of miracles, magic and trolls...

Please see the other topic I put as a link it discusses's this quite a bit...
Logically something was worn under maille, historically there is no evidence.
As to fabric or leather armour the only evidence is artistic or written so you will have to believe what you want on this, rather than on archeological evidence. This means you will get polar opposite opinions from equally knowledgable people. A few years ago no one would have dated wheel pommels any earlier than the 13th century, the only evidence for wheel pommels from the 11th century was artistic, then the lepahoo swords were found and now everyone knows that swords with wheel pommels existed in the 11th century (an example of how now people believe in pre-1200 wheel pommel swords would be the Albion Bayeux).
Thus a long and vicious argument will inevitably begin, the one side will provide logic, art, and writings as evidence. The other side will provide logic, and that since nothing has been found fabric and leather armour didn't exist.
Best
Hadrian
P.s. As someone said leather armour would be very warm, we must remember that it is quite cold in scandinavia and the north of the UK I have spent much time in both places and I get quite chilled there.

sigh. this argument again. please read the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method scientific method. not to be disrespectful, but it is not up to the non believer to prove the non believe, but rather those that believe to show it's there. no one is going to change their minds without proof. whether someone "thinks" or "says its foolish" or not. I've fought in mail over wool, gotten hit with good hard hits with steel.. ya it hurts but still doesn't convince me of viking padding. i just don't see it.

and its prob up to your group as to what you can and can't wear. the reenacting group's I've been associated with would not let you wear something that couldn't be documented. whether it made sense or not. always check first, recheck, and then buy or make the item. less heartache that way :)[/code]

I'm with Chuck. Let's not repeat this argument.

However, I do laud Gadda for citing sources to back up his presented view. I think more of us, in general, should cite sources.

M.

sigh, never mind. I'm done. you must be right and all else is wrong.... please forgive. sigh...

As any professional, serious historian or archeologist knows "logic" is not an historical source and thus have little value as historical evidence by itself.
Despite the fact that almost none of the various forms of padded garments and textile armours in use have survived until today we have plenty of other sources which describes their use. None of these exists from the Viking period.

The 170J blade vs mail&jack test done by Alan Williams was not conducted using the padding which supposedly provided 80J protection but rather a much heavier piece of padding made up of 30 layers of heavy linen meant to simulate a 15th century Jack. The mail&padding tests in the Knight & the Blast Furnace suffer from several problems as written.
170J was enough to penetrate both mail and 30 layers of linen, yet on page 943 the Jack by it self is supposed to withstand 200J when hit with the same simulated blade. Both of these two numbers can not be true. It is simply impossible to gauge the level of protection provided by the mail alone using Williams numbers.

The modern mail tested also provided more protection, even at 200J it was not fully defeated. This brings us to the second question, what kind of mail was tested? Preserved mail varies a lot as far as the thickness of rings are concerned. The 16th Century mail voiders I've examine used much smaller and thinner rings than the 13th century mail shire kept in a local museum. The rings of the later are massive in comparison.

I know we have been down this road on a number of occasions, but do we ever consider the economics of what any possible padding material may have been how this may have effected any potential material of choice. I appreciate we have discused the viability of leather hide as a potential material for armour ect in this period.

I just had an email from a friend in which we where discussing layered linen and although not in direct context of its use as a component of viking age padding, he tells me the amount of land needed to make linen would be very big, massive.

I need to ask if he meant for it's production in the Classical Period for the production of Hoplite armour or Early Medieval Period.

Interestingly he tells me that the use of linen rope is also now questioned , as the amount needed & used would be unsustainable. I do know that sea mammalian hide was used for rope, and it is now believed that other hides may have been used.

Perhaps as my friend suggested layered leather (perhaps even with linen) could have been used as a padding?

I do tend to side on Charle's opinion that padded armour was known before and after the Viking Age, and find it unlikely that this was some how 'lost' during that period.

Dave