[Ville Vinje]

[M. Eversberg II]

In Arms and Armor of the Medieval Knight, they mention that the word Curiass is derived from cur, the French word for leather, so I always figured there was some kind of "leather armor" in existance, somewhere. That's not to include the Roman leather musculata (spelling?) that officers are seen wearing, as I always figured that to be more of a mark of rank (similar to the chevrons on modern soldiers, only more expensive).

As for leather armor in the "viking age", I recall cattle being very important for milk (which is why beef didn't feature much in their original diet, not to mention that beef is the least efficient food source), so I highly doubt they would slaughter milk animals for their hide, and the ones dying of old age wouldn't have been frequent enough to sustain such an industry.

Importing leather from across the sea doesn't seem sensible either, as that's a long distance and time for something that isn't very useful at all; all other leather goods you have reindeer for, so purses, etc are taken care of.

Additionally, the shield the vikings used covers most of their upper body (the biggest target), and only leaves the face and legs open for attack. The face and head is covered by your helmet and diligence, and your legs are covered by your ability to parry and or block the attack to them. Armor, especially for the upper body in this case, wouldn't be a primary concern as you are already well protected. Wearing one would be nice, however, and I'm sure if you could get your hands on one, you would probably wear it unless you're very confident in your ability to not need it (the unarmored ones wealthy enough to afford one of their own).

Also, the Nordic style of mobile infantry warfare seems to lack one thing: maintenance units. Armor gets damaged in battle, and who brought the tools required to fix it, and are you going to be in the same place long enough to do so? I could, however, be wrong. I do know medieval armies attracted specialist craftsmen to fill their needs, slowing the army down sometimes, but never heard about these in Nordic invasion forces.

M.

[David Huggins]

Hi M,

'Viking Age' shoes where made from cow hides, favoured for soles but also used for uppers as was goat hide. I am pretty certain that areas of of dense population ( ie Jorvik, Hedaby etc) had leather processing communities. I'm also sure that reindeer skins, no doubt a a part of the fur trade exportation from Northern Scandinavia, was for the recieving parties a luxury item. Whole cow hides are quite substantial when laid out on the ground, and many goods can be made from a single hide. They where also large enough for a pair of 'holmgangr' combatants to duel upon according to the sagas.

Dairy cattle would have been valuable, although required through winter months fodder was expensive in time to produce. Protein can come in other forms, pork, fish, domestic and wild fowl, horse, hunting and trapping etc etc, all not necessarily fresh, but salted, smoked, pickled for longevity..

There is no reason to assume that a preportion of cattle where not slaughtered in the 'blood' month prior to the on coming of winter.

best
Dave

[Mikael Ranelius]

Bovine hides has always been important in self-supporting Scandinavian rural communities, and I don’t think our ancestors had any problems with slaughtering a certain proportion of their cattle to get meat and leather. An ancient Scandinavian form of cattle-breeding was and is transhumance (known as fäbodar in Sweden and seter or støl in Norway), which works similar to pastoral semi-nomadism where large herds of cattle are lead out to special summer pastures during the summer months. There the cows and goats were extensively milked and much of their milk was stored and kept somehow as various kinds of fermented milk and cheese. Grass was at the same time cut as winter-fodder, but it was never enough to support all the cattle, hence lots of them were slaughtered during fall. The rest of the animals were often deliberately starved during the winter to make the meagre fodder last, thus they produced no milk, and instead people had to rely on the stored milk-products acquired during summer and other kinds of provisions such as salted fish and bread.

We have to keep in mind that the Vikings were normally not townspeople or part of a monetary economy, instead most of the Scandinavians at the time were rural farmers who relied on self-supporting farming and barter. If you needed leather you normally slaughtered one of your cows or bulls, which wouldn’t have been a problem for most people. As for reindeer, they were not readily available during the Viking age, as extensive herding of tame reindeer was rare and not fully developed at the time. Back then the Saami of northern Scandinavia were reindeer hunters rather than reindeer herders, so up until the early 16th century when large scale herding was adopted, reindeer hides would probably have been considered a luxury item as David pointed out. Nonetheless, although bovine leather appears to have been abundant and made into various kinds of products (that we have found through archaeological excavations) by the ancient Norse, I still don’t think it was used for making armour (which of we yet have no solid proof at the place or at the time)

[Paul Mortimer]

Hi Ville - good to speak to you again -- Gzreg and Gracjana really enjoyed their trip -- it would be really good to see you in Sweden.


I'll contact you off list.

Cheers,

Paul

[Dan Howard]

[M. Eversberg II]

I stand corrected on bovine leather use. It does seem a tad strange to me, however, that a saga would reference an article of protection (the enchanted leather armor) that doesn't exist in a mundane form, or perhaps I'm reading it wrong and it's actually just a nice shirt.

M.

[Matthew Amt]

[James Barker]

[Paul Mortimer]

Thank you for correcting me James. What I meant, of course, is that there is no more proof of wool - however many layers -- being worn under mail, than there is leather garments.
I believe that I have shown that it was certainly possible, albeit during a slightly earlier period than the Viking Age, that leather garments were worn, and possibly under mail. Of course, I can't prove it, at the moment, but nor can you prove that woollen garments were used for that purpose, even though the people of that time were known to have worn wool in other contexts.
We could have a circular argument that goes on forever but I would add that Martin Carver, erudite archaeologist that he is, has no problem with seeing the quantity of leather found within the Mound 1 at Sutton Hoo (there are quite a few other mounds) as representing the remains of clothing.

Paul

[Mikael Ranelius]

Actually, some of the Sagas do mention specifically that maille was worn on top of a woolen cote/tunic (i.g. the Färö Saga) and in the Heimskringla it is described how king Magnus throws off his maille coat, exposing a red silk-shirt worn beneath

We have to keep in mind that while maille, shields and helmets are frequently mentioned in the Sagas (along with various types of weapons and other military items), leather armour or padded fabric-armour are conspicuously abscent

[Dan Howard]

[Jared Smith]

Marion Kite and Roy Thomson wrote a brief paragraph about the history of cuir boulli in their text "Conservation of Leather and Related Materials", 2005. One of the earliest known surviving examples of leather armour is a complete leather shield along with the wooden press form used to make it, dating to iron age, found in a bog in Ireland. Sorry, I don't know the specific find. Their reference numbering system is difficult to figure out... The claim is reference #2 on page 94 of their text. Drinking vessels are also good period examples of objects the authors considered to be made through essentially the same technique. A variety of hides (goat, sheep, pig, cow, etc.) have been utilized historically.

We don't see a lot of recorded specific terminology classifying leather armour until 14th century (a common armour for behourd) and later, although, 12" century treatises (Ralph Niger, et al) start mentioning leather plates over some areas of mail (shoulders, knees) of better equipped knights. Possibly it existed, but was rare...We don't know. I would say leather was probably being used by some before there was common terminology to describe it. It's true that leather does not survive well. These circumstances make it difficult to refute opinions like "most scabbards did not have leather coverings because there are so few examples...."

[Dan Howard]

Leather has been used for armour for thousands of years by many many cultures. That has little relevance to this particular thread which is specifically about Scandinavia during the Viking period.

FWIW the earliest recorded mention of cuir bouilli is in the Chanson d’ Antioche (1185).

[Matthew Amt]

[M. Eversberg II]

So, ten pages later we are in conclusion. There is no evidence supporting "leather armor" as a stand alone or a batting to maille. Congratulations to both sides for the lively discussion, and I think we long ago answered the original question. If the interested parties would like, we can begin a topic discussing leather-based armor that actually existed, and its' protective qualities. I, for one, recently gained interest in the Roman leather musculata given to people of rank.

M.

[Paul Mortimer]

Hi Dan,
First of all let me, again, explain that I have no problem with textiles being worn under mail, I am sure that all sorts of things were worn under mail; I merely pointed out that the evidence for it is weak in the Viking period, and despite Mikael's evidence it still is, more of that later. Incidentally, I am also fairly certain that mail was worn over just one layer of cloth from time to time, mainly because in hot weather, wearing too much under mail makes you very hot.

What puzzles me is that you are quite happy to admit that, "Leather has been used for armour for thousands of years by many many cultures", yet not by the Vikings, it seems.

Now Mikael mentions the Heimskringla, according to my editions, it was written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson. While the gist of the story may well resemble existing traditions, it is more than likely that Snorri made up many details to make it a good story and that those details reflected his own times, i.e. the 13th century, rather than the earlier Viking period. As for the Färö Saga, this too appears to have been written in the 13th century, although the author is unknown. So not entirely clear how that is relevant.

Paul

[Dan Howard]

[Gavin Kisebach]

Just as an aside, it does appear that leather can survive in the Scandanavian climate; there are at least a dozen surviving examples of shoes, some of which look like you could still wear them.

I point this out only because I had wondered early on in the topic how well leather fares in northern climes, and thought that perhaps leather armor was worn but has since perished.

[James Barker]

There are hundreds of shoes at Hedeby. There are quite a few good finds with shoes.

Now I use to argue not having any surviving leather armor was telling but I don't any more because leather for armor in the middle ages becomes common, again layered with maille, and all we have is one good surviving piece of it. Wills and inventories tell us it was real common in the 14th century but only the one example? We have hundreds if not thousands of shoes from the have era; fact it warrior to population ratio is low and armor to shoe ratio is even lower in medieval culture so there is a slim chance of finding good extant leather armor of any time period.

As Dan said until we have clear evidence there is no way you can claim that a leather armor or clothing is a likely solution.