Armor

A lamellar vest made of thick leather pieces like saddle leather, strung together on heavy laces. Provides adequate if not excellent protection.

Aka plated mail, banded mail, yushman, behterets, bachtarets. This is a type of armor of integrated mail and small metal plates, used in Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and in Central and South Asia. It closely overlaps with the similar yushman armor. Another common term for it is ‘mail and plate’ armor. The extra plates may have been added to the mail due to the relatively poor quality of iron in most of these areas compared to Central European iron (South Asia being a notable exception to this). There are various forms of Bakharets (see Bakharets in the Glossary)

In the armor table, the first row represents the protective quality of the helmet or the bakharets, the second row represents the protective quality of the Mail alone. This mail is slightly weaker than Western or Central European mail.

This is a sort of poor-mans brigandine armor consisting of small metal plates sewn inside two layers of textile armor. It was used by common footsoldiers in late Medieval through Renaissance Europe.

A haubergeon or habergeon is a mail shirt similar to a byrnie with incrementally (maybe 10-15%) more coverage: sleeves come mid- way down the upper arms, and the shirt itself passes to the mid-thigh level. This version includes a light aketon or padded jack.

This is a type of mail armor coat made of thinner gauge wire, significantly lighter and less bulky than ordinary mail, but also less effective protection.

Essentially a bigger version of a haubergeon, this is a knee length mail coat with sleeves at least to the elbows. Usually slit along the sides or front and back in order to allow the rider to sit in a saddle. This includes a light gambeson.

This is a sleeveless vest of iron lamellar armor. Provides good protection against cuts and low inertia missile weapons like arrows, and cheap and easy to manufacture.

A khazaghand aka ‘jazeraint’ is the Arab / Central Asian variant of a mail haubergeon, of long sleeves with integral padding both above and below the mail built into the armor. The cloth is usually silk and the version listed here would include a high quality hauberk, either of foreign ‘ferrengi’ origin or from a top quality Muslim armorer.

Some khazaghands incorporated inferior quality mail, these may cost as low as half the normal price (if the buyer can determine the quality of the mail he is buying) but the protective value is reduced to 6/12/18.

The khazaghand represented here would consist of fine quality mail haubergeon with several layers of silk both above and below the mail quilted with a thin padding of rabbits fur, raw silk or felt. The textile component of these armors was thinner and less bulky than a standard European aketon or gambeson while being equal or superior in quality, making these highly desirable panoplies which were sometimes imported into Europe

Ordinary street clothes for winter consisting of two or more layers (under and outer clothing) do provide some protection against injuries from weapons.

A sleeveless vest of brigandine armor, consisting of two layers of textile armor with overlapping metal plates sandwiched in between. Quite effective protection.