[Alessio J. Orlandi]

Hi everyone.
First of all, I'm "new" here: i registered long time ago but never visited this forum often.
Second: sorry for my poor english. I'm Italian.
Third: i hope i'm not going to spam.

Here is the matter: months ago i tried to make a 14th century leather armour. The problem is: there are no extant leather armour for what i know. So i tried to make one after medieval paintings. The second problem is: most of medieval painting of the 14th century refer to the life of Christ. So, the soldiers depicted there are supposed to be roman soldiers, dressed in roman loricas. So, we can not be sure if the medieval paintings represent roman soldiers in medieval armours or roman soldiers in roman armours as the autor of the painting assumed those armours to be.
Italian medieval painters had the chance to know how roman soldiers were armoured because they could understand it from the colonna traiana or many statues in Rome.
The question is: how much can we trust medieval paintings when trying to represent a 14th cent. medieval armour?

Here is a collection of pictures from that period.

IF YOU CANNOT SEE THE LINKED PAGES (403 ERROR), JUST TRY PRESSING ENTER IN THE URL BAR ONCE THE URL HAS APPEARED, or try to copy-paste; hitting "refresh" seems to be usless-

Are the armours depicted real medieval armour or just "misinterpretation" of ancient roman armours?

-Cimabue in the second half of 13th cent paints this Juda's kiss. Romans have various helms, but 2 oh them are tipically roman. In no other later painting, except Giotto, i found this kind of helm. Why? If medieval painters did know how roman soldiers where dressed, why they usually represent them in a "capellum de ferro" (kettle helmet)? Couldn't it be that that particular roman helm was actually used also in the middle ages?
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203796337.jpg
-on the colonna traiana there are romans wearing lorica segmenta and hamata. despite of this, i have found no medieval representation of a roman wearing those loricas. if medieval painters knew what kind of helm Romans used to wear, why didn't represent them in their typical armours? This let me suppose that the roman soldiers represented in medieval painting are actually armoured with contemporary medieval armour, that looked like roman ones.
-same as before for what is concerned with rectangular roman shields. they are never represented in medieval painting. rather, romans are represented with medieval shields. O_o
-duccio (end of 1200-beginning of 1300); same as before about shields and helmets
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203797297.jpg
-Giotto, in 1306, represents various people during Judgment day. Angels and some "mortals" wear the typical roman-fashioned armour. But they actually don't need to be roman. So again: is maybe that a real medieval armour?
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203797870.jpg
-Attila meets pope Leone in this miniature taken from Chronicon Pictum. Clothes, helms and surcote-chain (i don't know the english name for that thing) are typically medieval! But we can see typical roman "fringes" applied to shoulders and that lobed fringe under the belly.
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203799937.jpg
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203800174.jpg
-and most of all: Villani (1330-1340 circa). King Enzo captured by Bolognese army in 1249
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203800021.jpg
Everyone has those roman-fashioned ornaments on their armour.
What are those ornaments made by?
What is the same armour made and covered by?
-Simone Martini (14th century artist): everyone here http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203799197.jpg is in typical medieval armour, except the commander who is wearing roman-fashioned armour

and more....
-malazgirt battle (dated 1071, but miniature of 14th century): someone is wearin roman-fashioned ornaments.
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203799673.jpg


Before 1300 there is no representation of such roman-fashioned armours (let's think about Maciejowsky bible). So, can we say that this "fashion" of wearing roman-style armour started between 13th and 14th century? It is frequently seen on commanders and leaders in general.


I post other pictures, but please let me not translate from italian 'cuz it's getting boring. Just look at the paintings.

(Istambul 1312): see roman-style ornaments
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203590420.jpg

san giorgio, londra
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203590870.jpg

santi giorgio e teodorico 1250
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203590885.jpg

san sergio con squamata 1260
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203590939.jpg

crocefissione: please look at the greaves of the guy pulling jesus by a rope: they're brown. Is it leather?
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203591149.jpg

fortitudo by giotto (roman-fashioned armour)
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203591359.jpg

giotto crocefissione
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203591420.jpg

Padova:
http://image.forumfree.it/4/9/8/2/5/2/1203591519.jpg

Ok, so here is my conclusion: i think we could say that those "roman-fashioned" armour were probably made of leather and covered with fabrics and were more often used by commanders and leaders.
Here is my interpretation:
http://a361.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images01...aceb08.jpg
(now it has been modified a little)

Question is: could this reproduction be considered "historical"?

[Stephan Hall]

Ciao Alessio you did quite a lot of research but I´m afraid Leather armor was not common At that days the Paintings are a good reference for metal armor fashion but not for leather.
One reason could be that leather which is nowadays very common, because of modern manufacturing processes and of course mass raising of animals to satisfy the market. In the middle ages good leather from cows was rare and thus expensive. Cows where valuable they died mostly of natural causes not as food source, oxen and cow where the the animals who pulled the carts and plows and so on. Shoes and leather accessories where made out of goat leather or sometimes calves leather. So if somebody could afford buying a leather armour he could also afford metall armour. leather seams to be good choice for armour but padded clothing was cheaper lighter and also gave protection from blows an arrows fabric could also be repaired a hole could bee stuffed, but leather is hard to repair if pierced.
As i know so far leather could be used as outer layer for a a brigantine or a coat of plates but even this not realy proven.


As for the paintings the painter tried to work as efficient as possible.
The Leaders where fashioned like real Romans a statue or relief or so was taken for reference from the painter. The mass of soldiers were middle aged soldiers because they were comonly available as modells so it was i think more easy and faster to paint then making roman soldiers up. The painter knew what a roman soldier looked like but thy had no idea what the armor consisted of so they painted what they found appropriate for the Roman.
For your armour breastplate, it is nice work but not historical correct sorry.
Yours Stephan

[Alessio J. Orlandi]

Thanks for the interesting reply.
Regarding the use of leather for armour, i found proof of it in many "statuta" of "società d'arme" (armed militia companies). There are frequent references to pieces of armour such as "correttum" (leather armour, also called "gayferia") or "capello de corio" (leather hat)... These statuta range from mid 13th century to the beginning of 14th century.
In the mid of 14th century iron extraction became more significant, so what you say could agree with the research i made: probably the leather was quite expensive but anyway more convenient than iron until mid 14th century, so it was more frequently used (most of all by rich people). With the increase of commerce in iron, maybe leather was replaced by this metal.
Could it be so?
Thanks again.

[Lawrence Parramore]

As far as I am aware leather armour was very common at this time, and there are many monuments in churches in England showing what was very likely to be leather armour tooled as you have shown,

Nice piece, it will be interesting to see it finished.

Lawrence

[Randall Moffett]

Part of the issue is to ID what is the material being used. Many inventories or literary descriptions fail to tell what the armour is made of.

There are a few clear instances of leather being used in armour. The black prince orders 500 leather helmets for a group of his setting out for war on the continent. London ordinance from slightly earlier speak of the use for splinted armours such as COPs etc. The inventory of Ralph Nesle also have a few leather bits.

Leather could be much, much cheaper than iron billets and sheets. We have tolls and customs books in existance with info on the price per hide so it was not nearly that hard to get ahold of. Maybe not as easy as is today but in York for example there are loads and loads of tanners to deal with the volume of hides. I am not sure if they were selective between hides by animal but by toughness and thickness, though of course animals vary in that way naturally.

The question really is trying to figure out what is what in literary accounts though that is a hard one. My guess is actually that leather was more common in certain regions and by relative cost.

RPM

[Stephan Hall]

unfortunately leather rots and so there are no old items to use as reference. I haven´t seen leather armor pieces dated to 13th or 14th century, if anyone has let us know. What i forgot bin my first posting that iron reinforced leather was common (splinted graves ...) . if someone has historical references about leather armor that would be interesting .
I,am looking forward for news about leather stuff !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Lawrence Parramore]

Leather and the Warrior by John W Waterer, might be a good start.

Lawrence

[Randall Moffett]

The BM has a rerebrace of leather that can be seen upon request of a viewing as well.

The leather helmets are noted in the register of Prince Edward and the London ordinance is in the London Letter Books.

Sorry for the short post but I have to run.

RPM

[Chuck Russell]

just a thought here. if leather rots so easily in the ground, then why are there tons of roman shoes? not saying it doesn't etc etc. but still.

and one can not use a period painting/sculture as historical proof. most artists were not armourers also, many artists like to "represent the ideal" and such, such as using the ole roman armour look as a representation of beter times... even thoguh their interpretations of the roman armour is completely wrong. . there are many paintings done in 15thc armour that are about an early 14thc past... does this mean they wore 15thc armour in early 14thc??? no jsut means the artists used what they knew.

[Alessio J. Orlandi]

@ chuck.

but how can we say that artists were trying to represent roman armours in paintings if we really don't know if those depicted were or not the real medieval armour?

in a painting from Giotto (beginning of 1300) about the life of S. Francis (XIII cent.) there is a rare representation of a soldier (it's rare to see soldiers depicted in the life of s. francis). That soldier is dressed with that typical roman-fashioned armour.
So, why should have Giotto painted that particular amour instead of a contemporary one? Isn't it possible for that kind of armour to be actually "contemporary"?

PS: maybe we have roman shoes because of Pompei or the british peat bogs in wich they can survive longtime (as it is for celtic robes found there)

[Lawrence Parramore]

The Romans had leather tents too

There are lots of accounts of leather armour.

For the tournament at Windsor Park in 1278 for example, 38 leather helmets were ordered and 38 cuirasses,!

Cuirass, our word for breastplate means leather as other parts of armour also derive their names from leather too, because that was what had formally been used in these positions.

Lawrence

[Stephan Hall]

Yes chuck it depends on the place the humidity temperature,pH... . but you´re right it is interesting that there are no leather Armour pieces have been found as far as i know. So what has happened to them ?

[Lawrence Parramore]

I think there will have been many more shoes that leather armours in the roman period.

We are lucky that any leather survives.