Got a Real World Weapons or Armour Question? Mk X

[Spiryt]

But are there reasons that would make leather inherently inferior to other materials. Having a fabric armor with leather layers would not be leather armor as in the common image, but is there compelling reasons to not use leather in such constructions?

Cowboys wrapped leather over their trousers, though thorny brambles and cattle horms are a completely different beast than sharpened metal blades.

Leather was generally expensive, hard to work with, easily damaged all in all - I posted the image of book page about later buff coats and problems with construction.

They were pretty much layered jacks, only from layers of leather instead of fabric.

As far as I recall, leather was often used in jack and gambesons in Medieval as well - but mostly as outer layer - stuffing/main layers were from linen, wool, animal hair.

Generally our knowledge about soft armors, especially earlier ones, is not very satisfying, but it seems that leather wasn't really favored.

After all, even modern very thin, worked leather is kinda stiff and all.

[GraaEminense]

Leather is harder to repair as well, and often becomes expensive (and thick leather always has been relatively expensive, it comes from cattle after all) as material is replaced rather than patched. This problem is aggravated by the fact that -unlike woven cloth- any stitch requires a hole that weakens the material. Not very desirable qualities in armour intended to see use.

[fusilier]

While cast iron was cheaper for making cannons, bronze was generally considered safer. Some civil war era cannons, like the 3-inch rifle, were made from wrought iron, and, while much safer than cast iron, they were very expensive to make.

Bronze is softer and will eventually wear out from use, but it's easily recycled and doesn't rust! (Bronze corrodes but in a much nicer, less detrimental way). It is often said that rifled bronze cannons didn't last very long and were not successful. But the French made many rifled bronze cannons, including breechloaders, and they don't seem to have suffered from very short lives (this could be due to the use of different/softer materials in the ammunition). I've seen a reference to "compressed bronze"(?) when referring to cannons in the second half of the 19th century, but I have no idea what it may mean.

I know that some bronze cannons were still in use during WW1, but by then steel was certainly the preferred medium.

[Knaight]

That depends on the time period. In say, 200 BC, I would say this was the case. By say, 200 AD, you probably have more good steel weapons and iron armor than bronze... by 1400 AD, steel weapons are common and cheap. Any steel sword is going to be better than the best bronze sword.

For say, a halberd, or an arrowhead it might not matter so much.

I'd also make a note regarding blunt weapons. The advantage of springiness that steel has is pretty much worthless in maces and similar, and the increased density of bronze is downright useful. As such, while steel is far better for swords, longer spear heads, etc. bronze is just as good for non-edged weapons.

Larp is larger than just SCA though. Consider other organizations, like Dagorhir, and you can definitely see that the rules allow much cheaper/easier/lighter "armor" than metal. The larps for which combat is more of a tap sport are even less likely to require leather to be particularly thick.

You don't need armor at all for Dagorhir, you just need to be willing to deal with the occasional bruise. It's generally just a costume, though occasionally you do see thick leather intended to reduce the pain of being hit. Amtgard doesn't even see pain reducing armor, as it uses featherweight weapons where light taps that probably wouldn't even cut skin were the weapons edged count as kills. Incidentally, Dagorhir is only borderline LARP anyways - whether or not roleplaying is involved at all depends on the group, and for some it would be better described as LAP.

[Xuc Xac]

In addition to being easier to work with, bronze was preferred for cannon because it has very low metal-on-metal friction. An iron cannonball with a slight defect might jam in an iron cannon but it'll slip through a bronze barrel as if it were greased.

[fusilier]

In addition to being easier to work with, bronze was preferred for cannon because it has very low metal-on-metal friction. An iron cannonball with a slight defect might jam in an iron cannon but it'll slip through a bronze barrel as if it were greased.

Hmmm. I don't know about that having a practical effect. I think I've heard of stuck projectiles in bronze cannon. More importantly the "windage" was probably the key factor. Windage is basically the difference in size between the diameter of the projectile and the diameter of the bore (i.e. the "gap"). As tolerances improved the windage decreased.

I also just ran across references to bronze-steel in relation to circa 1900 artillery. Other than being an alloy of broze and iron, I don't know much else about its properties.

[Galloglaich]

the most common cannon on both sides of the American Civil War of the 1860s, the 12 pdr Napoleon, was a bronze cannon.

as i understand it, the many early cannons were bonze because the early cannonmakers were mostly Bell makers (the only people of the time with experence in working with large amounts of moltern metal), who worked with bronze. Also, I beleive, but cannot confirm, that bronze was preffered for large metal objects because of problems with casting flaws in cast Iorn over a certian size (which is why the greeks could wear solid bronze breastplates but the romans needed segmented iorn armour), which were only overcome in the 19th century.

I think this is all correct except for the last part; the assumption there seems to be that iron armor was cast, but cast iron wasn't used for armor (it was too brittle). All iron or steel body armor was forged. But you are correct in that while they could cast a large bronze plate, iron (which was forged) was only really available in relatively small pieces during Roman times. Large pieces could be made, but they were more likely to have slag in them, which could make them break.

Very gradually they learned to make large billets of iron, using larger bloomery forges. Eventually by the 8th-9th Century automation became more often part of the process, water wheels (spread around Europe by the Cistercian monks) powered bellows and trip hammers in ever more sophisticated devices, a process which hit an early peak of efficiency probably around the 13th Century. By that time pretty good homogeneous (i.e., all made of the same composition) iron in quite large pieces was increasingly available. So it's no coincidence that this when you start seeing armor made of nicely shaped pieces of iron.

I also don't think it is a coincidence that ever larger iron billets led in short order to ever larger steel swords, peaking with the monster six foot zweihanders in the 16th Century, steel prod crossbows more powerful than anything the world had seen before, steel gun barrels, and so on.

In other places, for example India, you see a similar parallel evolution of ferrous metalurgy coinciding with remarkable military technologies - like steel sword-whips, steel bows, and swords (as well as other weapons) with longer and longer (and more supple) blades, bullet-proof steel shields, and so on.

G

[Conners]

Anyone know much about archers with plate armour? There's an argument about whether archers can wear heavy armour such as plate, and still be effective bowmen. Some people have alluded to archers in Venice of this nature, and some Scottish ones... but there isn't much documentation which is easily found, and the sources are questionable.

How plausible is using a bow in plate armour?

[Spiryt]

Anyone know much about archers with plate armour? There's an argument about whether archers can wear heavy armour such as plate, and still be effective bowmen. Some people have alluded to archers in Venice of this nature, and some Scottish ones... but there isn't much documentation which is easily found, and the sources are questionable.

How plausible is using a bow in plate armour?

It's absolutely plausible, after all shooting bow is way less dynamic and movement dependent thing that actual melee fight - person exerts force in two directions on pretty much one 'plane', and that's it.

Spoiler

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Theoretically, gauntlets and closed helmets would be problem, but a lot of sources seem to portray archers shooting in them anyway.

[Galloglaich]

Yeah, I agree with Spyrit, period artwork is full of archers (and gunners, and crossbowmen) wearing plate armor, I mean there are scores, probably hundreds of paintings like the one he linked, esp. from the 14th -15th Centuries. And like Spyrit said, fighting with hand weapons (swords, poleaxes, spears etc.) requires much more range of movement than just shooting a bow or a crossbow.



Horse-archers weren't always heavily armored or even armored at all, but sometimes they were. Russian, Ottoman and Byzantine heavy cavalry for example often carried bows and were fully armored.

Like Vasnetsov's famous Bogatyr



Of course he's just wearing bakhterets (mail and plate) but it's the same difference.

G

[Yora]

But I think it's notable that the artists usually show archers without gauntlets, while everyone else has them. It is something the artists were paying attention to.

[Eldan]

Questions I need for a bit of world-building:

What were the first Spanish conquistadores equipped with? I'm thinking Cortez to Pizarro, beginning of the 16th century. My research shows Arquebuses and early muskets, but what melee weapons would be commonly used by these expeditions? How good were those firearms? Most pictures show steel breastplates and helmets, was that the norm for all troops? Was there other notable equipment? How good was it in quality?

And for statting: does anyone have any data on how long it took them to reload their firearms and how far they could shoot with any degree of accuracy?

[Conners]

Thanks guys. BTW... where do you find all the good artwork? I have trouble finding anything historical, when I do searches.

[Dead_Jester]

Questions I need for a bit of world-building:

What were the first Spanish conquistadores equipped with? I'm thinking Cortez to Pizarro, beginning of the 16th century. My research shows Arquebuses and early muskets, but what melee weapons would be commonly used by these expeditions? How good were those firearms? Most pictures show steel breastplates and helmets, was that the norm for all troops? Was there other notable equipment? How good was it in quality?

And for statting: does anyone have any data on how long it took them to reload their firearms and how far they could shoot with any degree of accuracy?

By the period and the few historical records of equipment I have seen, I'd say they where equipped like the standard Spanish soldiers of the period, so a mix of standard tercio, probably with more Rodeleros and less dedicated pikemen (AFAIR, the standard equipment for most spanish soldiers was spear, morion, and a side-sword, and the force's size was too small for a full Tercio block), and a few arquebusiers and crossbowmen, maybe also a few halberds. The more well-off troops, including most of the cavalry, probably had steel breastplates, but they were not universal.

The firearms where probably of decent to good quality for the period, but as early matchlock arquebuses, they where heavy and inaccurate, due to having a usually non-standardized bore size. The impact would probably have been psychological more than anything, considering the relatively small contingents.

As for the reload time, I can't seem to find the video demonstrations, but, from what I could find, it was a bit slower than an early matchlock musket, but that may have been caused by relative inexperience in the use of a firearm with a gun fork by the testers, so maybe 1 or 2 shots per minute for trained shooters in good conditions, maybe 3 at best.

[Galloglaich]

There is an excellent first hand account of Cortez initial expedition, by one of the soldiers in it, Bernal Diaz.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Conquest-S.../dp/0140441239

If I remember correctly the initial force consisted of 500 men, of which there were 12 crossbowmen and 13 arquebusiers (hand-gunners), they also had maybe a half-dozen small-bore cannon, and about 20 cavalry.

Most of the men including the author, Bernal Diaz, were rotoleros equipped with textile armor (aketon / gambeson) steel helmets, steel shields, and swords like sideswords or 'transitional rapiers'. There were also a number of halberdiers equipped similarly. The cavalry had more complete plate armor (half armor or three quarters harness, or at minimum a cuirass) and lances, and longswords, sideswords or arming swords.

The textile armor could be fairly effective, but it had it's limitations as you can see here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...A2LV_-fTGRyL_A

Some of the infantry also had mail shirts which would be very helpful, and as Jester said others who were better off had cuirasses.

The fact that they survived and won several battles against huge numbers of locals in their first few weeks in the Yucatan with almost no casualties is amazing. After his first march to Mexico City (Tenochtitlán) Cortez took over a larger Spanish force which had been sent to arrest him, I think something like 1500 troops. Soon after that they had large numbers of native allies, especially Tlaxcalans. But the initial fighting was just this tiny number of mostly light infantry. One of the many strange coincidences about the initial Spanish invasion was it happened at the time, the cusp of the 15th / 16th Century, when the Spanish military with their Tercios was arguably at or near it's peak of effectivness, having just defeated the Moors... they had even learned to beat the Swiss. Arguably they were the toughest infantry in Europe, certainly in the top 2 or 3.

Cortez was very cunning and used all kinds of tricks. For example they took the fittings off of all the ships they burned and when they got to Mexico City, they made small schooners to sail around the lake, and mounted some of the guns on them. Later when they had to fight their way out block by block, island to island, this saved their lives several times. The locals were afraid of horses and dogs and Cortez used this effectively.

The guns and crossbows were deadly, the former were nothing like a modern assault rifle, more like a 12 gauge shotgun shooting slugs, but that was no joke. The noise did have an effect but the bullets far more so! Against mass formations they didn't have to be particularly accurate. They could still easily shoot individual people within 50 feet or so, and the crossbows probably out to about 80 meters. Into a mass formation and / or shot in volleys both weapons could be lethal out to 300 meters or more.

But a lot of the fighting came down to hand to hand combat for guys with shields, swords, open faced helmets and textile armor.

G

[Galloglaich]

For context on late Medieval handguns:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkbSTyT1COE

G

[Galloglaich]

Thanks guys. BTW... where do you find all the good artwork? I have trouble finding anything historical, when I do searches.

It's a symptom of our modern culture, fake stuff is 1000 times more popular than anything real, and you can multiply this by another 1000 for anything to do with pre-industrial European history.

Or Samuria, or Ninjas... Pirates. A whole host of other things.

So google reflects this back to us. Searches for generic terms rarely give you anything useful. To find that, you learn places to go (like say, the Wiktenauer, Myarmoury, or Schola Gladiatoria forum, Armor Archive, Roman Army Talk, All Empires and so on... and I like to think, this forum). You learn more obscure technical terms which aren't already made into some imbecilic product. 'Schiavona' or 'Yataghan', or 'Jian' instead of sword. Foreign words are even better. You learn the names of artists, authors, and authorities of eras past. For example for anything to do with warfare in France, 'Froissart' is a good search term because he did a beautifully illustrated chronicle covering most wars in that part of the world.

The truth is, to find anything 'real', you have to work hard and learn to do real research at an almost professional level, and it really shouldn't be that hard. It's something those of us who post here regularly are trying to correct. It has gotten slightly better in recent years, as more people become aware of certain things, and more resources have become available. But it's still swimming upstream.

G

[Endon the White]

Been playing Dragon Age: Origins lately, and I've been wondering how effective trained attack dogs would be in an open battle. The Fereldan's seem to just have their Mabari charge the enemy lines, but that doesn't seem like the most efficient way to use them. Were dogs ever used by historical armies for combat? How do you think would be the best way to use Mabari War Hounds in a pitch battle?

[Galloglaich]

I think they were... the conquistadors used greyhounds of all things, the Romans used Mastiffs, as did the Irish and many others. I've even seen dog armor, depictions of firepots attached to war-dogs... but I don't know many details of how they were used though.

G

[fusilier]

The war dogs used by Spanish conquistadores are believed to be the ancestors of greyhounds, and not greyhounds per se. (If my recollection serves me right).

The fact that they survived and won several battles against huge numbers of locals in their first few weeks in the Yucatan with almost no casualties is amazing.

The nature of Mesoamerican warfare at the time should also be kept in mind. Mainly that it was concerned with taking captives and not killing the enemy. During the siege of Tenochtitlan it was noted that Spanish sometimes survived, because the enemy was trying to take them alive. Clearly the superior armor and weaponry of the Spanish enhanced the ability to fend off such attacks intended to wound and capture.

Also a few decades later, the Spanish were almost completely outclassed in the field by the Chichimecas. After four or five decades of war, they basically bribed the Chichimecas into peace, as they could not defeat them militarily. The Mapuche resisted the Spanish for something like three centuries! They very quickly learned how to work iron, and were fielding pikemen supported by archers by the early 1600s!

Chain mail seems to have been pretty common among Spanish in the New World, and I have read reports of it at least into the early 17th century. I've also heard that helmets hung on longer too in New Spain.

[I would love to provide more details, but I might not be able to respond for a week or two, as I will be travelling]

[fusilier]

The firearms where probably of decent to good quality for the period, but as early matchlock arquebuses, they where heavy and inaccurate, due to having a usually non-standardized bore size. The impact would probably have been psychological more than anything, considering the relatively small contingents.

As for the reload time, I can't seem to find the video demonstrations, but, from what I could find, it was a bit slower than an early matchlock musket, but that may have been caused by relative inexperience in the use of a firearm with a gun fork by the testers, so maybe 1 or 2 shots per minute for trained shooters in good conditions, maybe 3 at best.

Arquebuses were not terribly heavy. They became longer and heavier --> becoming what is known as the "musket" <-- later in the 1500s. Around 10-lbs or less is probably a good guess for an early arquebus (the early ones did tend to have short but surprisingly thick barrels). There's some debate about how much a musket would weigh -- lately I've been told by a couple of gunsmiths that they never weighed more the 15lbs, though many sources would say 20lbs.

They were not inaccurate because they used a non-standardized bore size. That has nothing to do with accuracy; each gun was provided with a bullet mold to make bullets in the correct size. This was the responsibility of the individual soldier -- and could cause logistical problems. Accuracy of these early weapons are difficult to determine, because there are so many factors at play. Even period sources can be all over the map in terms of accuracy and penetrating power. (For example, it appears the arqubusier could choose to use loose fitting or tight fitting bullets, as he saw fit). However, we can say that the early arquebuses did have rather short barrels, and that would affect the accuracy.

Loading times run into the same problem. Is the soldier using the "rowling" (rolling) gauge ball that's so loose fitting it doesn't need to be seated with a ramrod? Or is he using a tight fitting, bore gauge ball? Or is he using a patch? I've handled and fired a matchlock. The important thing is to not blow yourself up. In one hand you have gunpowder and in the other fire! So I don't try for speed, I try for precision. Nevertheless, about one-minute between shots is what seems to have been expected. Certainly with practice it could be improved, and the smaller lighter weapons (arquebuses, later calivers), would probably be a little faster loading than the heavier ones (muskets). Also the equipment wasn't standard either. Loading from a flask, chargers (small wooden bottles with a pre-measured load), or later paper cartridges, could all have an affect.

[Yora]

The nature of Mesoamerican warfare at the time should also be kept in mind. Mainly that it was concerned with taking captives and not killing the enemy. During the siege of Tenochtitlan it was noted that Spanish sometimes survived, because the enemy was trying to take them alive. Clearly the superior armor and weaponry of the Spanish enhanced the ability to fend off such attacks intended to wound and capture.

Also a few decades later, the Spanish were almost completely outclassed in the field by the Chichimecas. After four or five decades of war, they basically bribed the Chichimecas into peace, as they could not defeat them militarily. The Mapuche resisted the Spanish for something like three centuries! They very quickly learned how to work iron, and were fielding pikemen supported by archers by the early 1600s!

And then 98% of the continents population was killed by smallpox.
Though that still does not negate that Spanish did do really well when it came to actual military engagements.

Been playing Dragon Age: Origins lately, and I've been wondering how effective trained attack dogs would be in an open battle. The Fereldan's seem to just have their Mabari charge the enemy lines, but that doesn't seem like the most efficient way to use them.

Yes, that doesn't make sense. But nothing in that scene really does make any sense. It's Hollywood Tactics at it's best.
For those who don't know the scene.

[a_humble_lich]

Chain mail seems to have been pretty common among Spanish in the New World, and I have read reports of it at least into the early 17th century. I've also heard that helmets hung on longer too in New Spain.

I was at the New Mexico museum of history and I remember they had some chain mail on display. I can't remember when exactly it was from, but northern New Mexico wasn't settled until 1598 so I would think after then. It wouldn't surprise me if things like that hung on longer in New Spain. After all Kearny was attacked by lancers in the Mexican-American war.

[Yora]

Helmets were also the first piece of armor that returned in world war 1. Might not stop a rifle, but there are more than enough things in war that can cause significant head injuries that makes them worth wearing. The same thing would have applied to the spanish in south america.

[eulmanis12]

Got a question about early firearms.

Were there ever line infantry that fought with pistols?

I did some thinking an figured that a flintlock or wheel lock pistol is less than a third the weight of a musket, and carrying a brace of 4 or five pistols was not uncommon at sea (naval combat being a crazed meelee in a boarding action many men carried more than one firearm, pistols being the prefered type due to the ease of carrying more than one of them). So say I have 4 loaded pistols going into battle, I can fire four shots in the time it takes the enemy to fire one, then I can reload a single pistol at the same speed if not faster than the enemy can reload a musket. I know pistols at the time were not very accurate but niether were the muskets and I think against a group of enemies standing in a line the volume of fire would more than make up for the accuracy. Are there any examples of this being done? If so what were the results. If no examples, any ideas as to why? I can think of the cost of providing multiple firearms per man as one but not much else.

[Yora]

With muskets and flintlock pistols, the barrel length should make a huge difference. Longer barrel means more push from the same amount of powder and more stable flight.
I don't know about the actual ranges of engagement. Modern reenactments use much more advanced rifles but are also supposed to be watched and are done with smaller numbers of people, so those don't tell us anything in that regard. But I say that every army would be more than happy to have superior range so they can shot their enemies from a distance they are not at danger themselves. What use are 4 pistols when you've been shot at several times before you have chance for your balls to injure someone?

[Spiryt]

Muskets and other 'full scale' firearms were going to have bigger velocity, so flatter trajectory of bullets, more range, bigger caliber, all in all more power, armor/obstacle penetration, two handed hold was more stable and accurate, and so on.

Carrying such a lot of pistols would be greatly impractical, in theory it would allow some 'rapid volleys', but in practice would mean a lot of carrying around, trouble, confusion, more things to operate in battle, confusion - which one had I loaded, again? - and so on.

Tactic with firearms anyway revolved around mass volleys, at least roughly coordinated -tough to do if every man would try to shoot as quickly as possible with multiple pistols.

At close ranges, it could possibly be feasible, but at close ranges shooters are obviosuly not going to involve in any serious shooting -it's time to retreat or fight hand to hand.

[Yora]

I've done some searching for effective ranges and for pistols the numbers are estimated at about 15-20 meters and for muskets from 50 up to 100 meters.

[Conners]

How much does a strike's power vary, just on how solidly it lands? Could a strike end up twice as powerful as what's normal, if the opponent was lined up perfectly?

In this case, I mean pure strength and quality of the blow--not hitting a vulnerable spot.

[Yora]

Depends on how much muscle action goes into the blow, how firm the stance of the striker is, and in what direction the opponent is moving and at what speed.
The most powerful strike by a world class boxer to the chest is not any different than a toddler patting you on the leg. Between those every amount of "power" is possible.