Hi,

I'm the author of the following essay on Shan wen kia (mountain pattern armour).

http://www.flatbow.com/shanwenkia/

I wrote it because I was fascinated by this beautiful and advanced form of armour. As you can see from reading the essay, it is quite speculative. I have not found many good sources that discuss this armour (beyond statues and paintings, of which I have images of hundreds), nor have I been able to find mention of any existing pieces.

The sources I have are all secondary, and sometimes contradictory. They include Oriental Armour, 5000 Years of Chinese Costume, and Ancient Chinese Armour (Zhong Guo Gu Dai Jun Rong Fu Shi).

I am interested in finding any more sources, especially primary sources, and ESPECIALLY information on the location of any extant fragments, or even photos. Any information is appreciated.

Thanks!

Daniel Slone

I thought that armor was either Jia (甲) or Kai (铠). I've never heard of Kia

In 'Oriental Armour' Chinese armor is referred to as kiai and kia, where I believe Kiai is hide armor, and kia is a general term for armor

and if it helps... in OA, I think shianweikia shows up at the mention of 'Lion armor' worn by Tang soldiers

These must be some very non-standard translations which I can't recognise...

Jia (甲) was a term that came from the term Ge (革) which meant 'leather'. We can understand why they used this term because some of the earliest armour that were around was indeed made of leather. In ancient chinese, these two terms sounded really similar so it was easy to see how one term Ge (革) as used at least as far back as the Shang dynasty while the term Jia (甲 ) only started to appear during the Zhou.

The term Kai (鎧) started to appear during the Qin dynasty. In the Jingdian-shiwen (經典釋文) it was noted that:

“皆言甲胄秦世已來始有鎧，兜鍪之文。古作甲皮，秦漢以來用鐵，鎧，鍪二字從金，蓋用鐵為之，而因以作名也。”

“… we all say that even in Qin times there were characters of Kai (鎧, armour) and doumou (兜鍪, helmet). In ancient times, leather was used to make armour. From the Qin and Han era onwards, metal were used. Because the character for kai (鎧) and mou (鍪) both includes the character of metal (金), it is because they used metal to be constructed. That was how they got their names…”

I have got some information about Shanwen armour. Although like you, I have not yet found any existing specimen. Just statues and books and historical records.
If you want good sources, you should go to primary sources like the Tangshi which were writting in Chinese. The main reason being alot of things are often lost in translation so english sources are not the best to go to.

kia= jia

Daniel, have you read this article before?

http://www.armourarchive.org/essays/Shanwenkia.pdf

of course he did, he wrote it

Oops sorry, I'd forgotten the name of the author. Very nice to see you here on CHF!

Thank you all for your replies. So, would it be a better transliteration to refer to the armour as "shan wen jia"? I'm obviously a beginner at the language, but always ready to learn. Yes, I got the term "kia" from Oriental Armour.



Wujiang, I am most interested to see any information you have if you would be willing to share. I am of course interested in any primary sources, though I would not be able to read them. I was working with a fellow whom I met on the internet who was helping me translate some pages out of the "Ancient Chinese Armour" book that I have. I received this book after I asked a Chinese friend to bring back anything on armour that he could find during a trip to Beijing. He moved away, and so cant help me with the translation. Is there a place where I could order copies of any other documents I should have?

Thanks again!

Daniel Slone

Also, does anyone know the characters for "shanwen"? I know the "shan" part (山), but I can't seem to figure out the rest.

Many thanks from a struggling beginner!


Daniel

山纹=山紋=Shan1 Wen2

Thank you!

[COLOR=red]Does your book cover the period of southern Sung Dyansty?

"Ancient Chinese Armour" covers pretty much all times, broken down by dynasty, with "prehistory" being the first chapter. I'd guess, without the book in front of me, that it does cover what you are looking for.

CHeers, Daniel

You know, it really seems like we're the only people in the world that are aware of what an amazing form of armor China had invented, this mountain pattern scale.

Hello. Im new to this forum. And I appologize ahead of time for resurecting a thread but I have recently looked into reproducing something similar to the lions head armour or the mountain pattern.

I have read this topic authors short essay and patterns.


Obviously because no one has found an existing piece of this armour we can't say definetly what the construction pattern was. However I wanted to ask f this pattern thats offered allows for the piece to curve to the body. In the sculptures the parts that have the mountain pattern seem to curve to the body and allow for mobility.

This proposed design would allow the piece to move side to side but im not sure about the curvature.

I got the impression from the various images that the center of the piece popped up a bit and this gave the over all armour its curvature. If you were to set the piece down, i got the impression, it would only hit on its three points.

I would love to see any of those photographs youve gotten.

Have you progressed any further with your pattern, like tried to build a piece of it and see what the mobility was like?



I have one final question. WHat are the details surrounding this piece, such as the legends etc? I remember hearing that this armour was in a way impervious to slashing attacks because their isnt any exposed threading that could be cut and the pieces fall off. Are there any other points to this armour?


Thanks

I think he has the best idea.

It would allow for some movement of the scales, while stiffening to direct impact.
I think it's a really clever suit of armor, the 'last step' of scale I would say

scale- no cords to slash, but scales are hanging and can be bypassed by certain angles. Overlap makes it heavy
lamellar- cords are exposed to weathering and battle damage
shan wen kia- no cords to slash, no exess overlap, takes the best qualities of both kinds without the weakness.

Chinese armor was also known to be very precise with how each scale was made, exposed parts would have thicker scales, less exposed parts thinner scales (like how good plate armor is made).
Because each scale is tailored to fit in a specific place in the armor, it is not hard to assume that the curvature to fit the body would also be planned, so pieces near the flank would curve more than on the chest.

I imagine shanwenkia to have been a great form of armor, but very time consuming to make. It also looks impressive.
From what I've seen though, the mountain pattern was used mainly for the shoulder guards, while lamellar made up the torso and thigh guards.

Well most of what looks like scales in the picture looks to be mountain.

What about the animal heads on the shoulders and the stomach. My guess is its a thick and slightly hardened leather. Otherwise it would be impossible to form.

I wonder if the scales could be made from leather also. Ive been thinking about recreating this but it would be time consuming.

Any more informations on the historical use of the armour? How widespread was it? Any modern tests against arrows or swords? The internet is almost totally void on this interesting armour.

Could it be that this mountain pattern armour was tsimilar chain mail in terms of function and properties?

This author calls the armour "star scale".

thanks for making the site!

Duo Xie Ni La! Zhe ge wang zhan zen de hen fang bian!

Translation: Thank you very much. This website is really convenient and handy!

Zombie thread!

Ahem. I see I'm a little late to the party, but this is the second time I have stumbled on Lu Shan's (aka: Daniel Sloan's) work on Shan Wen Kia. This time, though, I have time and money to actually build it (for SCA use). And I had a few questions about what he'd encountered in working on it. Also, I am quite interested in any pictorial information that anyone has on the mountain pattern.

This site has already given me one thing, though, and that's access to the PDF version of his essay on the armour.

Thanks for any help you can provide.


(sloan, if you're reading this, we need to talk about this armour. I intend to put it to use)



If I can manage to put together a suit of it, I intend to use it and test it. So if there aren't any tests results, there will be.