Testing Swords Against Riveted Mail Armor

ARMA testing swords on riveted mail. I take no credit for this video, I simply posted it from the thearma.org to represent the toughness and resilience of mail armor to the general public. All work was done by ARMA and it's members. It tests a multitude of types of medieval european swords against mail.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• sword
• mail
• chainmail
• riveted
• west
• western
• european
• europe
• armor
• armour
• ARMA

[PJDAltamirus0425]

Any evidence that people actually wore a gambeson, bulky thic leather cuirbollie breastplate and mail together?

[WitheringintheDark]

@PJDAltamirus0425

Hmm. I'm not Precisely sure about that Exact combination, maybe take it up with that branch of ARMA. Gambesons/padding were definitely worn under the armor though; one of Saladin's biographers said the crusaders wore a thick felt vest under their mail which stopped the Muslims arrows from harming them.

I know this construction is more typical of gambesons intended as independent armor(which were thicker and often leather-faced, ect.), not so sure about under armor.

[Stoozor]

What would a bullet do to this?

[WitheringintheDark]

@Stoozor Essentially, once it hits the mail, the weave of the mail will cause the bullet to splinter, sending bullet shards through your body, as well as potentially blowing some of the links into your chest cavity. Mail is basically useless vs. bullets.

[raztin1]

are you using all of youre strenght?

[WitheringintheDark]

@raztin1

As said in the description, it is not me. But you can see by how the weighted target base keeps getting shoved back that he is hitting it with all he's got.

[JohnRaptor]

@PJDAltamirus0425 I just finished a very good book on the history of european armor, and combinations like this were used. A gambeson was commonly work under mail, and there is some evidence that cuirbollie breastplates were worn over the mail (not sure about under). It's kind of speculative though, because no physical examples survive (leather doesn't last like steel does) and the surcoats of that era obscure any breastplates in artistic depictions.

[TeHGoodReverend]

Dang riveted maile is tough!

[elgostine]

@WitheringintheDark even worse, like with viking shields, you now have a very angry man, with HIS weapon free likely, and your weapon is stuck its like losing your weapon to a viking shield getting it stuck in the rim

[althesmith]

Some of the stories in the Norse sagas clearly show just how nearly impossible it was to kill a man in decent armour with a cut or thrust. In one of them, they only managed to kill one fellow by another fighter keeping him occupied while a second went in low, pulled up the lower edge of his maile byrnie and shoved a spear into his gut.