I just searched and found this Chinese armour...



Rental Department: Period/Historic-Armor

I am not certain about which period this armour is from, but somehow it resembles japanese armour. Could it be from Tang period? I saw similar armour in the movie, Warriors of Heaven and Earth.

BTW it looks bad***.

Wow, that DOES look bad***!

Tang Dynasty (618 - 907) mural painting of Imperial Guards in armour

Song Dynasty (960 -1279) heavy cavalry

qing armor

Peng, that looks like classic Tang-style lamellar to me.

Whoa, those Song dynasty calvalry are tight!

Unfortunately, as we've mentioned elsewhere, they got whacked left right and centre by the Khitan and Jurchen. Looking pretty isn't everything

"Unfortunately, as we've mentioned elsewhere, they got whacked left right and centre by the Khitan and Jurchen."

They did get defeated by the Khitans quite a different time, but also won a few times. However they did fare quite well against the Jurchens for some reason, Winning the second war, perhaps because they are under constant war and the troops are better prepared than the Northern Song.

I haven't herd Tang armour having masks, is that ritual or actually used in battle?

"Mongol Yuan Dynasty (late 13th century) brigandine armour "

This one look like a Qing armour.

Also these Tang armours doesn't seem to be heavy, with their fancy decoration could they be those of the imperial guards?

I recalled that in Water Margin, some kind of horsemen wear masks.

I'm pretty sure most of the stuff in water margin are based on other things that occured in the Song era.
There was a famed Song general Di Qing<狄清> who wore a mask and fought the Tangut Xia ferocially.

There's probably some artistic liscense taken here. If you look at the site it's from, European armor is divided into regions and times, while this armor is under "Asian" and "Chinese"
If you saw "Western" and "Knight" as description for a suit of armor, you might think not too much time was put into making it authentic.

They re-use the same type of mask for a kabuto. I think they just used it 'cause it looked cool



and none of those images are showing up :x

Regarding amour.

I'm quite disappointed with Ming armour. They look just like Song armour, it's as if no improvement was made.

Then you have Qing armour, looks like they took a step backwards. How and why did clothe armour make their appearance?

Qing court armor had the protective plates removed, and studs for show. That is what you're thinking of, it's just formal wear.

Combat ready Qing armor is brigandine. The cloth is covering plates. The plates (lamellar armor sized) are studded to the cloth (hence the metal studs). It's not bad armor. The brigandine armor used by Chinese and Mongol marines who invaded Japan are recorded to have had Japanese blades chip against their armor.

as for Ming armor, the only big difference I see is they used mountain-pattern-scale more often, or that's just the statues.

I learned in Junior high that the Japanese masks could stop spears...

Grigori, brigandine armour may look like just cloth, but underneath it's steel plates! Not every culture likes to have their knights looking all shiny

Hmm...I was under the same impression as Grigori...does anyone know if Korean brigandine armour was designed in the same fashin?

exactly the same fashion

cloth exteriors also allow for cool patterns and motifs.

I would guess Song. Although it is a pretty uncertain one without additional information about the lamellar size, lacing methods and material used.

Two main reasons.
(1) It it was tang ot before, it would likely to have been the mingguangjia with the two plates on the mingguaangjia was the most common at the time
(2) the only reference I know of that has chinese soldiers wearing masks is the Songshi: Mengzong-zhengzhuan (宋史 - 孟宗政傳), which depicted a battle between Jin and Song at Zaoyang, both sides wore masks. Unfortunately, we do not know what those masks looks like.

This thread, especially the post with the mask reminds me of a fantasy movie called "Willow". There were some interesting mixing of Chinese, Japanese, Persian, and European armor types by the propmakers.

Willow is the best movie noone's seen.

I've seen Willow, it's quite fun. I like the siege weapons they got in the movie.

It looks more like Tang dynasty's armour.

its either Tang or Yuan... i guess so...... if u knw which dynasty influence is reach japan then u will get the ans ... cos i really forgotten most of the info i read haha sry cnt do much help

The website is basically all your sterotypical armors...considering they have lorica segementa as your sterotypical Roman armor. The Roman armor of choice for 1000 years was always chainmail. >_<

i thought tang armour had two breastplates?

Only one type of Tang armour had steel breastplates - the so-called Mingguang ('brilliant light') armour. The other types were pure lamellar.

Yun, did the song cavalry (in this picture) have the Mingguang armour? I can't remember where I read it but, I remember reading that it was believed the Song cavalry may have used breastplates.

Chris

Thats the "Shan Wen Kai" Mountain pattern armor that guy and horse are wearing. I wonder if there are any surviving examples of real Mountain Pattern armor. I dont think I have ever seen mountain pattern armor except for in paintings. Why is there such a lack of well preserved Chinese armor(especially before the Qing) while there is a bunch of well preserved Japanese armor.

Yes, I am aware the armour is shen wen kia, but what about the armour around his torso? Is it a form of Mingguang or was Mingguang used only during the Tang era?

I too have wondered why there isn't a better archaeological record of Chinese armour. Of course, China has only 'recently' started taking a strong interest their history and conducting excavations. There possibly could still be surviving pieces, however, some of it may be in private collections.