[Brandon C.]

Hi! First, let me just say that, after spending some time going through the special features, articles, and the forums that this website is an absolutely amazing source of information, and I am very happy to have found it!

I have a question for the forum, and I am hoping you can help me out:

I am interested in the practical differences between Brigandine armors and Mail - namely in terms of the protection offered.

I have spent a lot of time combing through the forums, and as a result, have been able to get a pretty good grasp on what constitutes mail, scale, lamellar, coat of plates, plate&mail, brigandine and jack of plate armors. While I was able to find a number of good discussions concerning, say the advantages of plate vs. mail, or mail vs. lamellar, I was not able to find much concerning mail vs. brigandine.

It would seem that brigandine eventually supplanted mail in the west, in a general way of speaking. The progression seems to be:

Mail ----> Coat of Plates ----> brigandine or Plate

...with mail seeing continued use in combination with the above armor types. (coat of plates or brigandine worn over mail, brigandine with mail sleaves, plate armor with mail to protect joints and fill gaps.)

Now, it seems to me that brigandine has the advantage over mail in that it is A) cheaper, faster and easier to construct, and B) lighter. These in themselves are reasons enough for brigandine to surplant mail. However, what I want to know is how does brigandine compare to mail in terms of protection? Was the protection offered by the two roughly equivilant, or was brigandine simply better all-round, or are there any advantages (vs. thrusts, cuts, bludgeoning, arrows, etc...) to remaining with the old fashioned mail hauberk?

Thank you so much for your help!

[Randall Moffett]

I think that they both are not rigid is a weakness in the impacts the wearer would recieve but with the brigandine I think it would be less so but still be an issue. Another is piercing through the mail, especially the long thin bodkins, might find the brigandine plates a harder target. Another point to add to this is that likely under both one would have padded garment. this would help both impact and piercing some.

In England You go from mail to coat of plates or pair of plates to either
1) full or more full breastplate- eventually cuiraiss which is one of the last bits of armour discarded in the 18th/19th generally speaking. There is some debate as to where the line between Coat of Plates and Brigandine exists.... Some of the Wisby examples of Coat of Plates are Brig's by some definitions.

2)Brigandine to jack of plates somewhere in the very late 15th or early 16th. In the end this is replaced by the munitions cuiraiss later, by the end of the 16th more or less.

RPM

[Andrew Babbini]

From what I've seen of reproductions of brigs, their construction really isn't easy. Coat of plates, yeah it's time consuming but fairly easy (check out ToMAR for a nice detailed dissertation on CoPs.) But for brigandine, I'm not sure if it is on this site, but it is on Armour Archive, a fellow named Bob Reed did a repro of one. It was extremely in depth and it was more or less a rigid defense but of course had more flex to it than a solid cuirass. Also from what I've gathered about them is that a hauberk wasn't worn under them but had maille attached such as sleeves or even a brayette. Some even had faulds. I do have an picture of a pretty nice example. I can't remember where I got it from but if I did, I'd give credit where credit is due.

Respectfully,

Andrew

[Lafayette C Curtis]

How common was brigandine defenses for the arms and legs, BTW? it seems fairly common in Asia, but I can't really recall many examples from Europe. So, when people mention "brigandine" in a European context, the image I usually get is a fitted armor for the torso coupled with either no limb defenses or plate limb defenses. Seen that way, the knee/elbow-length hauberk has the advantage of greater coverage, but the vest-like brigandine's solid plates give better defense against a broader array of attacks.

Of course, that's only valid when no other armor is worn--and when we're strictly talking about the brigandine "cuirass" (the "corazzina" in some modern classification systems. Asian brigandines--such as the armors of Qing Chinese infantry--tend to have a coverage that is quite close to the hauberk, so they're arguably more protective when worn on their own. Not when the European brigandine is coupled with good arm and leg defenses, plus a good sallet and bevor...

[Michal Plezia]

There were also brigandine pauldrons(Scots Guards for egzample).

Making brigandine is a hard job.I recently started a project-prototype of the future series of brigandines.It has circa 200plates and 2000 rivets

[Frances Perry]

Hi Brandon,

I have had some superficial research into brigandines and their development (Western European only I'm afraid), and how mail and plate were also used alongside them in lesser or greater amounts. It appears to me that from a full mail shirt the tendancy of progression has been to move towards small square plates sewn into a leather tabbard, as seen in the Wisbey coat of plates which fitted over the head and attached at the back of the wearer to a more fitted, almost doublet shaping (sometimes with pauldrons) which could have overlapping and smaller plates. Flexibility of the brigandine also improved towards the middle of the 15th century onwards as the plates got smaller and the whole brigandine became more shapely.

I often point out to member of the public with European flat ring rivited mail (Manufactured from 1.8mm mild steel wire flattened to give a 9mm internal diameter and woven using the 4 in 1 pattern) the disadvantages of mail when faced with a barrage of needle bodkin arrows - the arrow goes straight through the mail by a good 2 inches! Hence the need for either plate or some kind of padded / layered protection. In terms of thrusts and cuts - both mail and a brigandine stop draw cuts - but mail can sometimes fail under a full thrust - especially from something like a bill or the beak end of a poleaxe!. Full blows with a sword can also be stopped, but the force of the blow is not absorbed as well with mail - the undergarment is the thing that will absorb this - brigandines would have been worn with a padded jack or arming doublet of some kind, so they would absorb a blow much better. The later brigandines, with overlapping plates, would have spread the force of a blow by lessening the force of the impact toward the body. You can still get winded or knocked over though!!

The thing going for mail is its flexibility - which is why it was not phased out altogether - plate and a brigandine - and even padded / layered clothing - can only go so far before it starts to impede movement. Mail that remained covered areas which plate, etc could not - voiders (under the arms and the insides of the elbows), standard (round the throat), and skirt to protect the crotch and insides of the thighs. Mail doesn't - as far as I have seen - appear to have been used for the backs of the legs / knees though.

In terms of weight, I agree that the brigandine can be slightly lighter than a mail shirt (all dependent on the guage of steel that it used), however, with replicas I have tried on, the varying weights become negligable when the item is put on as the weights are distributed over the body / shoulders. Once one is used to wearing something of that weight, the difference between the two become pretty negligable. Put a chainmail shirt in a bag and try to carry it - then put it on and carry it that way instead - the difference becomes clear. the same happens with a brigandine - though admittedly the weight is focused over a smaller area of the shoulders, and can use different back muscles depending on how well fitting the brigandine is!

Making them - I would have said that both the mail and the brigandine are equally complex to construct -both in their general construction, or in the time required to produce such a thing by hand. As previously mentioned, mail was, in later periods, being used in smaller amounts for the more vulnerable areas, and padded / layered clothing was preferred as it was easier (ahem!) to make and cheaper for the common soldier. Brigandines and plate were more expensive because of the costs involved due to time and construction by the armourer. Embleton comments that Brigandines appear in lists and accounts all over Europe and that their manufacture was controlled for quality - many being “proved” by having a crossbow bolt shot at them - something you would not want to happen when wearing mail and padded clothing!

Unfortunately, both brigandines and mail both appear to have become less widely used as firepower became more prevalent on the battlefield.

Hope this helps you with your discussions - it is a very interesting subject, and if I have made any glaring mistakes in my comments, my apologies!

[Frances Perry]

[Steven H]

[Steven H]

[Dan Howard]

[Randall Moffett]

There are plenty of mail items with ID over 5mm ID. I have not spent my life looking into this but to me the 4-5mm or so catagory down are aventails often. You can find extremes of course. It becomes difficult to use if the links are not flexible for the torso but for the neck it is quite useful to have a less mobile mail which would likely cut down penetration (which I do believe took place with mail but do not think it worth while to get into here ) and impact as it is more dense weaves. It would seem the more mobility required the less dense larger ID rings would be used. Here is a quick look at some of the larger rings from churburg armoury-

Churburg #3- 7.5mm- Sleeve
Chur #4- 8mm- hauberk
Chur #6 - 8.5mm- hauberk
Chur #8- 9mm-skirt

Andrew,

Awesome suit. Looks great. Very nice brigandine!

RPM

[Joe Fults]

For a bit more about the brig in the photo, try this thread over at FireStryker:

http://www.wolfeargent.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb...p;t=000377

[Dan Howard]

[Daniel Hawley]

[Steven H]

[Dan Howard]

[Michael Edelson]

[Steven H]

[Luka Borscak]

[Michael Edelson]