[Mart Shearer]

[Stephen Curtin]

Thanks for the reply Eirik. I could be mistaken but this text seems to be describing garments worn instead of armour rather than under it.

Thanks Sean for the clarification. The linea = linen thread thing was bothering me. Linen cloth makes more sense in the context of the passage.

Mart I think that you are right that the corium excoctum is a cuir bouilli defence, and so not likely to be the top layer of quilted garment. I think that the horse's pourpoint in de Nesle's inventory is probably a aketon-like garment intended for under the horse's mail. The silk testiers don't mention anything about padding or quilting, nor does the testier on FitzWalter's seal appear (to me anyway) to be quilted.

[Stephen Curtin]

Hi Håvard, thanks for the reply. In answer to the two points you feel are under-communicated in threads like this;

1. How universal do I consider my interpretation?

Well my interpretation used to be that by the 13th century everyone wore an aketon under their hauberk. I now believe that some did wear aketons, while others wore arming tunics, made from at least 2 layers of stout cloth, or a single thick layer of felt. In the OP of this thread, I said that I didn't know of any evidence for aketons worn under mail prior to about 1300. I've since seen a reference to an aketon worn under mail in the 1180s, and although this reference doesn't specify the construction of the aketon, based on its early date, I'd be willing to bet that the etymology of the word aketon = cotton had not yet lost its meaning (if it ever did). I was unaware that the sleeve of St Martin had iron oxide on its exterior. This is indeed more evidence of aketons prior to 1300. I also used believe that the garments described in the King's Mirror were stuffed and quilted, though I now have my doubts. I think that it's possible that words such as wambeis and panzar did sometimes refer to stuffed and quilted garments, but might also have sometimes referred to layered (but not quilted) garments.

2. How thick were these garments?

It probably varied depending on the individual. I'd say anywhere from 2 to 8 layers of cloth, or the equivalent thickness in cotton stuffed between an inner and outer layer of cloth, or the equivalent thickness in felt.

[Mart Shearer]

I always go back to the comparison with pants. If I were German, I might use a different word, Hose. Even in American English, I might say that I am wearing pants, khakis, BDUs, or cargo pants, all when speaking about the same piece of clothing. Not all pants are also khakis or BDU's, etc. Not all BDUs are pants.

Some words are interchangable, while other describe some specific feature. It is possible that an aketon could also be described as a gambeson or as a pourpoint, but this might not always be the case.

Gambeson/wambais seems to be ultimately be derived from the word for belly, which also gives us the modern English womb. So we would conclude it is a body armor. Yet we have gamboissed cuisses, where the word has been turned into an adjective meaning "made like a gambeson". Mail hauberks make a similar transformation where we find gauntlets or horse bardings de haubergerie, of hauberk-work, i.e. mail. Aketon seems to be derived from the Arabic word for cotton, but if the center is full of linen tow, is it any longer an aketon? Pourpoint seems to derive from per punctus meaning punctured or sewn through. Doublet simply implies something made of doubled layers. The later Jack seems to take it's name from the everyman - Jacques, so implies an armor for commoners. Jupon aso seems to have its roots in the Arabic long gown known as the jubba (Arabic جُبّه‎‎), but what distinguishes it from the others is also uncertain.

[Stephen Curtin]

Getting back to the subject of arming garments in the Viking Age for just a moment. This thread has veered way off where I originally intended it to go, but I'm not complaining, I've enjoyed the discussion, and I'm glad that it managed to stay civil for once.

As I said earlier, one of the arguments why the Vikings "must have" used an aketon under their mail, is because the Romans used subarmalis. I don't think that this is a good argument. There is no evidence that the Romans ever used a stuffed and quilted arming garment. The Pliny and De Re Bellicis references suggest that Roman arming garments were made from felt. Felt can be made very thick, so it doesn't need to be layered. Also felt doesn't need to be quilted between layers of cloth to hold itself together. I believe that there are traces of felt lining the inside of some of the surviving examples of Roman helmets and greaves.

So if the idea of arming garments under mail carried on after the Romans, and through to the High Medieval period, then this garment was probably a thick felt tunic, and not an aketon-like garment. The idea of cotton stuffed arming garments probably came to Europe through contact with the Holy Land during the crusades. There is one well known reference to crusaders wear mail in combination with a thick felt garment, but unfortunately the author (Saladin's biographer) doesn't mention whether this felt garment was worn under the mail or over it. This could be evidence of a native European tradition of arming garment, which eventually got replaced by aketons.

Other than this, the only other evidence that I know of for felt arming garments in Europe, is that recently some 17th century "buff coats" have been found to have been made from felt, and not buff leather.

As for the argument that aketons were worn in the Viking Age because without them mail is "useless". Though this has not been argued on this thread, I've seen this argument so many times that I had to talk about it. As Dan Howard has pointed out on other threads the main threats on the battlefield in the age of mail were spears and arrows. Of course the first line of defence against these threats were large shields. If a spear point or an arrow did get around the shield, and struck someone on their mail, then I believe that the mail was enough to handle it. Could the blunt impact of this strike cause bruised flesh and perhaps broken bones? Yes of course, but it still saved lives. A comparison could be made to modern ballistic vests. These vests stop bullets from entering a human torso, but do nothing cushion the impact. This is very similar to mail, and yet law enforcement officers wear these vests without any padding underneath.

The Maciejowski Bible and King's Mirror were brought into this thread to show that even in a time when aketons were used, they were not universal, and so in earlier centuries might not have been used at all. They have now become the focus of this thread, but as I said, I'm not complaining. I'm enjoying the discussion, so thank you all for the replies.

[Dan Howard]

[Stephen Curtin]

Dan I agree. We don't know whether Romans used a padded liner, or a separate arming garment under their mail. My point was that IF the Romans did use a separate arming garment under their mail, then it was most likely a thick felt tunic, and not a stuffed and quilted garment.

Well felt was definitely used for Roman helmet liners / arming caps, or am I mistaken on that too? I remember reading somewhere that a felt greave liner was found somewhere. Perhaps whoever told me that was wrong. Ancient Rome is an area that I only look into occasionally. You say that there was a linen greave liner found as Dura Europos, do you know how this liner was constructed, was this liner made from multiple layers etc?

[Dan Howard]

Twined linen is just as likely as felt.

[Stephen Curtin]

Mart. Yes I understand your pants analogy, and I don't disagree with anything you said. Panzar also seems to come from a word (pans) which meant belly. This seems too coincidental to not be connected in some way to wamba > wambeis.

Getting back to the King's Mirror.

All of these garments are described as being made from soft and thoroughly blackened linen cloth; the panzar from the naval combat section, the horse's "kovertúr", and the rider's hoes.

Both the armour breaches, and the sleeveless good panzar are "made in the manner that has already been described". To me this sounds like the author meant that these two garments were also made from "soft and thoroughly blackened linen cloth".

Then there are two garments which aren't described as being made from soft and thoroughly blackened linen cloth. There's the horse's "grima" which is made of stiff linen (stirðu lérepti), and there's the rider's soft panzar, which isn't described at all.

I'm not sure if the fact that the soft panzar is not described as "soft and thoroughly blackened" is significant or not. What do the rest of you think?

[Sean Manning]

The elephant in the room in these discussions is the Japanese. We know what they usually wore under their mail sleeves and it was not a lot (three layers of built-in padding, over a two-layer short-sleeved kimono). Worked for them!

[Stephen Curtin]

[Håvard Kongsrud]

[Mart Shearer]

Does anyone have the exact source of the "felt coats" worn by Richard I's men on the Third Crusade? I have seen it cited as being Arabic and Latin, but have never found the specific document.

[Stephen Curtin]

Mart here is the relevant passage from Saladin's biography:

"The enemy had already formed in order of battle; the infantry, drawn up in front of the cavalry, stood firm as a wall, and every foot-soldier wore a vest of thick felt and a coat of mail so dense and strong that our arrows made no impression on them. They shot at us with their great arbalists, wounding the Moslem horses and their riders. I saw some (of the Frank foot- soldiers) with from one to ten arrows sticking in them, and still advancing at their ordinary pace without leaving the ranks."

The full text can be found here:

https://archive.org/stream/lifesaladin00condgoog/lifesaladin00condgoog_djvu.txt

[Dan Howard]

[Stephen Curtin]

Thanks for the reply Håvard. Yes I know that some of the ideas that I've put forward might seem a bit "radical", and I could well be very wrong about all of this. My take on the meaning of "vel svörtuðum", is that instead of meaning thoroughly blackened, it meant (not literally) well worn. I believe that there is at least one references that states that used linen was preferred to new linen for textile armours, because it had been rendered flexible.

[Philip Dyer]

[Stephen Curtin]

Philip. If the felt garment was worn under the mail, then the only way for a Muslim scholar to know of this, is if he had seen or heard of armour being stripped from dead enemies.

[Henry O.]

[Dan Howard]