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Pieter B.
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 Posted: Wed 11 Mar, 2015 3:52 am Post subject: |
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| Mike Ruhala wrote: |
I've noticed that dedicated footsoldiers rarely wore fully armored legs. I've seen greaves, poleyns and cuisses either by themselves or 2 outta 3 but never all three at the same time. I'm sure they were balancing the protection against the encumbrance, I often wonder if weight carried on the legs ultimately proves more tiring than weight carried on the body since the legs are constantly swinging the weight of any armor around.
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I don't recall the exact ratio but a saying I heard a few times from hikers is that one pound of weight on the legs is equal to three pound in a backpack. Of course this where reenactors should step in to provide their insight 
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Lance Morris
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| Posted: Fri 15 May, 2015 1:02 am Post subject: Best blades for toughness |
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Hey Hector
The del tins were super solid, tough and can take such abuse
They are very heavy however.
Atrim and tinkers are very similar in handling and toughness
I just broke my second tinker a few weeks ago. It takes a beating and like the atrims they stay true. I prefer atrim blades to play with however because of the price level.
Albinos are fun. I've had four but rather then break for a while they bend. Which sucks to try and bend them true again
Never broken a bks yet. I only have one and I think I'm dialing back a bit now it's expensive to collect and use the blades so hard
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S. Eyers
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| Posted: Fri 24 Jun, 2016 6:39 pm Post subject: |
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| John A. Brown wrote: | the assumptions many people have in the knight vs samurai discussion is that the katana will literally bounce off the plate armor the moment it impacts and that someone in plate padddings is so well protected they won't feel any pain. Hell they assume that knights armor is so much stronger that if a Katana hits hurt, no effect will happen to the plate armor wearer.
There is an assumption plate armor is so advanced that a sword as light as katanas will just feel like a tickle towards the wearer at best with the blade resulting with chipped off pieces and at worst caused the sword to shatter.
However I seriously doubt this. I definitely can see the Katana being damaged by hitting plate and the plate armor being undented.
Thing is I remember reading in battles and sword duels about Samurais getting knocked on the ground by Katanas.
The remarkable thing is in some experiments replicating these duels and battles, the Samurai armor was NOT damaged at all, not even a scratched. But despite the armor being unharmed, the participants in the experiments stated not only did they feel such force from being knocked down, they even admitted the area ******* hurts and there were bruises on the hit area (which were some of the areas the Samurai armor defended the most like the chestplate,etc).
But the fact the Katana swings (executed by an Iado expert) were able to make FULL GROWN physically strong men knocked down on the ground in full body armor (not just the Samurai armor but modern layers of padding and some participants even wore chanmail) and the knocked down participants had bruises made me doubt many knights vs samura claims
I mean peasants using light wooden farm weapons like a stick or a pitchforker were ABLE to hurt knights in plate armor and even kill them. Some of these farm tools were even lighter and more fragile than Katanas like a scythe or a branched picked off from the ground just moment before battles were able to SERIOUSLY cause knights bruisings and there are incidents of peasants killing knights with these weapons that were much weaker than Katanas. |
The plate moves as a single entity, and does not flex or deform much. in this way, it spreads the specific point force, across the entire part of the body which it covers. In the event of articulated joints, or very large armor, this might put strain on some locations first. This is especially true when the force is directed at the balance points on the human body... I.E. hips, knees, shoulders, and head etc.
For example, hitting plate armor close to a shoulder will drive the plate against the shoulder first, transferring kinetic energy into the shoulder, moving it back, and resulting in a turning movement. In HEMA, people are hit VERY hard with blunt longswords, which are quite heavy baseball bats... wearing less than plate steel, which means less spreading of force, and yet remain upright a vast majority of the time.
furthermore: a knight would have trained in plate armor, and would understand how blows affect him. a blow from a katana, would not have differred too terribly much from a blow by a longsword, or a stout saber.
The problem is the amount of energy being transferred from the katana to the armor. The katana just doesn't WEIGH enough to bruise or hurt a person in plate armor.. I think the gambeson, and chainmail would absorb what force the plate didn't, and decelerate the plate VERY efficiently... I also think that since steel armor weighs a LOT, it's take a MASSIVE force to move it laterally... I think more likely, the knight might have to make a half step back, and might stagger slightly, I really don't think it'd leave bruises... maybe you can link to some documentation on this? I love to be wrong.
I must not be the scholar you are, I can't seem to find references to much of the assertions you make.
A group of people using tree branches and poles might be able to knock a knight down...absolutely. I've never read of it, but it IS theoretically possible. one man with a long sword can use it as a dirty great lever and knock a knight off his feet. This is how knights were often dispatched in fact. However, this is not equivalent to knocking down a knight in full plate by hitting him with a katana. They are completely different animals, and the physics is entirely different. Bashing the knight doesn't do much... it's the LEVERAGE that's important. " https://youtu.be/2bdMfaymGlk "
"there are incidents of peasants killing knights with these weapons that were much weaker than Katanas." I'd like to see the documentation on this... I've never seen an account of a FARMING scythe used to kill a knight. It's a very awkward thing to use, the blades are VERY thin... for cutting grass better... and mounted with blade oriented parallel to the ground with the cutting edge towards the user... again for cutting grass... hitting a knight in platemail with a scythe or a pot metal pitchfork is similar to hitting a bowling ball with a dollar store metal tube broom handle.
but... don't take my word for it watch this video of a dude getting hit with a long sword while wearing plate. ( longswords and katanas are going to have a roughly similar amount of kinetic energy.)
https://youtu.be/Z5tuklPjtAU?t=637
ignore the sheetmetal crap armor before and after... Metatron (the video poster) was trying to make a point that the original documentary is inauthentic and silly, and included that clip of legit plate armor for comparison.
Note: the guy in the legit plate armor doesn't even flinch when he's hit with a blow that could have otherwise disemboweled him. sure doesn't look like bruising to me!
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Nat Lamb
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| Posted: Fri 24 Jun, 2016 9:39 pm Post subject: |
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If you look closely, he does flinch... from the noise.
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James Arlen Gillaspie
Industry Professional
Location: upstate NY Joined: 10 Nov 2005
Posts: 587
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| Posted: Fri 24 Jun, 2016 9:40 pm Post subject: |
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I don't suppose anyone can explain why we are talking about katana when we should be talking about tachi. Even the name 'samurai' is anachronistic (try 'bushi'). Even this gaijin plate armour smith knows that. A tachi is a field sword, used best on horseback, with a blade often well in excess of 30", and the katana is a street fighter with a much shorter blade (but see below). It is itrue that many a tachi was shortened and used as a katana blade. In any case, some sort of pole weapon was used when fighting armoured folk on foot, same as in Europe. It does seem to me that katanas were carried by footsoldiers much as a pistol is carried by today's soldiers; if you lose the use of your rifle, at least you still have something that might do in a pinch.
jamesarlen.com
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Timo Nieminen
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| Posted: Sat 25 Jun, 2016 1:04 am Post subject: |
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| James Arlen Gillaspie wrote: | | Even the name 'samurai' is anachronistic (try 'bushi'). |
While bushi would be the usual term for warrior, samurai is not anachronistic, dating to before AD1000. "Samurai"="servant", so is analogous to "knight" or "knecht" = "servant" (or even "mamluk"="slave"), and is distinct from bushi just as knight or carl is distinct from warrior.
| James Arlen Gillaspie wrote: | | It does seem to me that katanas were carried by footsoldiers much as a pistol is carried by today's soldiers; if you lose the use of your rifle, at least you still have something that might do in a pinch. |
Or carried by courtiers as a badge of rank. It looks to me like the tachi-to-katana transition was driven by a decreases in the relative importance of cavalry. As armies got larger, and no more horses were available, cavalry became a minor arm. So, rather than tachi slung from the belt (very suitable for cavalry), we see katana worn through the belt (very suitable for infantry).
"In addition to being efficient, all pole arms were quite nice to look at." - Cherney Berg, A hideous history of weapons, Collier 1963.
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James Arlen Gillaspie
Industry Professional
Location: upstate NY Joined: 10 Nov 2005
Posts: 587
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| Posted: Sat 25 Jun, 2016 9:09 am Post subject: |
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Years ago, when I was researching a novel I intended to write that was set around the year 1600, I came across something written by a bushi at that time, in which he said that for one bushi to call another 'samurai' was a great way to start a fight. Those of higher rank could get away with it, but apparently the label had not yet acquired the honorable status it would gain under the Tokugawa bakufu, something that amused me immensely.
jamesarlen.com
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Timo Nieminen
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| Posted: Sat 25 Jun, 2016 3:50 pm Post subject: |
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It would be saying "You can't make it on your own. You have to work for somebody else." Whether or not this would be seen as an insult by somebody whose highest ambition is to become a retainer for a daimyo, I don't know, but it would certainly be an insult to a daimyo or anybody with ambition to make it to that level.
"Samurai" was used in administrative documents, to describe retainers. Before "samurai" became a distinct social class (an Edo Period thing, mostly, though Hideyoshi started the process), I suppose that ronin weren't samurai - "samurai" was a job description, not a class.
"In addition to being efficient, all pole arms were quite nice to look at." - Cherney Berg, A hideous history of weapons, Collier 1963.
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Dan Howard
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| Posted: Sat 25 Jun, 2016 4:24 pm Post subject: |
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The term was used by superiors to refer to inferiors. It had derogative connotations in the same way that "servant" does in our society.
Author: Bronze Age Military Equipment, Pen and Sword Books
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Eric S
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| Posted: Sun 26 Jun, 2016 7:11 am Post subject: |
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| James Arlen Gillaspie wrote: | | Years ago, when I was researching a novel I intended to write that was set around the year 1600, I came across something written by a bushi at that time, in which he said that for one bushi to call another 'samurai' was a great way to start a fight. Those of higher rank could get away with it, but apparently the label had not yet acquired the honorable status it would gain under the Tokugawa bakufu, something that amused me immensely. |
You could call samurai armor "katchu" and be correct except that almost no one uses that term, same with "bushi", when I have read period accounts from Europeans or Americans that were in Japan during the samuri era I can not remember seeing either "bushi" or "katchu" being used to describe samurai or armor, some terms just become popular and get used more often.
Do a test, search for "bushi armor" and "samurai armor", see what gets more results, you also can search for "katchu" and "samurai armor" and compare results.
On a side note, do a search for "chainmail / chain mail" and then search for "mail" and see which brings up the images you are looking for.
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Lafayette C Curtis
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| Posted: Sun 26 Jun, 2016 10:23 am Post subject: |
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| James Arlen Gillaspie wrote: | | Years ago, when I was researching a novel I intended to write that was set around the year 1600, I came across something written by a bushi at that time, in which he said that for one bushi to call another 'samurai' was a great way to start a fight. Those of higher rank could get away with it, but apparently the label had not yet acquired the honorable status it would gain under the Tokugawa bakufu, something that amused me immensely. |
Could you cite the source? I know of this kind of thing happening much earlier in the 12th and 14th centuries, but I haven't heard of an instance of it happening as late as the 16th or 17th century. Would be a very interesting data point if the somewhat demeaning connotation of the word "samurai" hung on for a couple of centuries longer than I previously knew.
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Eric S
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| Posted: Sun 26 Jun, 2016 11:48 am Post subject: |
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"Samurai" has been used by Americans and Europeans for a long time, one example is "Honda the Samurai: A Story of Modern Japan", William Elliot Griffis, 1890. This book describes the authors travels in Japan, 1852.
| Quote: | | Life in a Japanese city, to one fresh from the intense life and energies of an American metropolis, would have been like existence in the thirteenth century. Society was so simple; there were but two classes, the governing samurai and the governed people. The latter class knew nothing of the government, except that they must yield unquestioning obedience to its decrees. |
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Dan Howard
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| Posted: Sun 26 Jun, 2016 3:49 pm Post subject: |
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| Eric S wrote: | | On a side note, do a search for "chainmail / chain mail" and then search for "mail" and see which brings up the images you are looking for. |
It isn't particularly difficult to add an additional word. Entering "mail" and "armour" into a search engine brings up plenty of relevant results.
Author: Bronze Age Military Equipment, Pen and Sword Books
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Eric S
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| Posted: Sun 26 Jun, 2016 9:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Dan Howard wrote: | | Eric S wrote: | | On a side note, do a search for "chainmail / chain mail" and then search for "mail" and see which brings up the images you are looking for. |
It isn't particularly difficult to add an additional word. Entering "mail" and "armour" into a search engine brings up plenty of relevant results. |
Your right but how many times have you seen people having discussions about "mail" on forums were they do not use the term "armor", what happens then is that internet search engines often will not find the discussion for you, it gets lost amoung all the "mail". If you use "chainmail / chain mail" search engines are way more likely to find it, so even if not the correct term it does have its use, if you want your discussion concerning mail to be easily found use a term that search engines will pick up on.
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