Armor

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.

This is a doublet or corslet of stiff, quite thick leather like saddle leather. It is fairly rigid and restricts movement similarly to an iron cuirass, but is much lighter. It is not very efficient armor and offers only limited protection, there is little evidence of this type of armor being used in Europe, but it’s better than nothing. (Leather armor of this type may have sometimes been used in Central Asia)

This is simply a brigandine vest (see Brigandine Doublet) worn over a heavy gambeson (see Gambeson and Helm), and a full helmet. This is medium weight, reasonably light armor which provides good coverage and pretty good overall protection.

The first row represents the protective quality of the helmet or the brigandine and the gambeson, the second row represents the protective quality of the gambeson alone. See Armor Table Key, Layered armors for more about how this works.

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.