Evolution Western armor:


Evolution Chinese Armor:


Middle east armor (mainly chain mail)




Japanese Armor

very nice

Very nice can someone give me the order of chinese armor by dates I can't read chinese. And do you have any more pircutes showing how different areas such as japan changed through time?

Lemellar Armor (Monggol, Tibet...)



Turk Mail


Transitional armor


Full plate armor


Link for japanese armor history
http://www.sengokudaimyo.com/katchu/katchu.ch01.html
or
http://www.iz2.or.jp/english/index.htm -- go to custume history in Japan

The book 'Oriental Armour' (armour, with a 'u') would be very useful to anyone looking into the developement of armor outside of Europe. It's a good summary and goes into a fair amount of detail.

mountain pattern scale is considered just lamellar though.

Regarding Japan, this link may be of assistance;
http://www.sengokudaimyo.com/katchu/katchu.html

1st two on top row: Qin

2nd two on top row: Han

1st two on bottom row: Age of Fragmentation

3rd on bottom row: Sui

4th on bottom row: Tang

Actaully, the second to the left on the top row was a Han era armour

The first one is the Russian armour (very old replica of the end of XIX century based upon the collection of Kremlin Armoury).

The second set of man & horse armour could be Russian as well as Ottoman one as the helmets of that type were popular in Russia in XVI century (some of them are stored in State Historical Museum, Moscow).

Then you have posted 2 pics regarding lamellar armour. THe first one is definetly Tibetan as that set was taken in action by Colonel F. Younghusband in Tibet during his Tibetan expedition 1902-1903.

The second one is the rconstruction of the Mongol armour performed by Leonid A. Bobrov (Novosibirsk) or Michael V. Gorelik (Moscow).

Best regards,

Alexey.

Japanese Armor Timeline - Excerpt from http://www.iz2.or.jp/english/index.htm --


Nara Era (710-794)


The Heian Period (795-1192)

Oyoroi armor

The Kamakura Period (1186-1333)

domaru, haramaki and gusoku armor

Edo Period (1600~1868)

Improve gusoku armor

Those suits of armour date back to the 4th to 6th Century, the so-called Kofun and Asuka Periods.

Is the first suit a tanko, and the second a keiko?

I've heard the Tanko design was abandoned after influence by mainland armor. So when Japan started using that keiko armor, Korea and china were using it at that time, yeah?

I've just saw a video where they showed a lot of Gayan armor.

A lot of it was very Tanko and Keiko-esque. So yes.

Here are some videos about Gayan/ rest of Korea armor.

3 kingdoms period stuff.


http://211.252.141.15/wmv/relic/MS20040324_e.wmv
http://211.252.141.15/wmv/luxury/MS20040403_e.wmv

Would it be plausible to say that Japan eventually had more 'advanced' armor designs than the mainland with

Gusuko armor? How does that compare against the brigandine worn by the Ming/Qing?

I also think of European full plate armor as the most 'advanced' form. It seems to me that Chinese armor just kinda stopped advancing with the Ming.

I don't see how it can be more 'advanced'. First, one must remember that brigandine armour only had a very small proportion among Ming armour. But more importantly, Brigandine armour is actually more protective, deceptive and mobile compared to japanese armour. The only different in terms of component is the face mask. But in reality, no one ever really wear it in battle.

As for European armour, I don't see how you can claim it being more advanced either. They are undoubtably more protective, but they sacrifice mobility and movement because of it. They simply evolved under a completely different set of military philosophy and purpose so to compare the two on such a linear level is irrelivent.

Amongst the Ming, what was the other armor worn besides brigandine, and how did it compare to gusuko armor?

In the War where China/Korea fought an invading Japan, do you know of any reports that might tell about the armor quality between the two sides?

On the European armor, I've seen lighter plate armors that looked pretty maneuverable. Chain armor is also protective and flexible (depends on how many layers/how much coverage for mobility) The Tang commented that chain armor was the best kind, yet never fully adopted its use, relying more on cheaper/easier to make lamellar




So this offers more protection than gusuko armor?

Hey, brigandine horse armour... that's neat, I've never seen it before.

In the Ming, lamellar and chain mail were also used besides brigandine.

I doubt that Japanese armour would have been effective against firearms (unlike perhaps brigandine), so its prevalence in Japan during the 16th century should be more a result of the later introduction of firearms to Japan (compared to China), rather than its more advanced nature. One question we might explore is why the Japanese never adopted brigandine.

I guess brigandine just seems less impressive to me
I think I've only seen the parade armor, with the plates removed.




This is from the Ming era...

I wonder how protective that is.
Very interesting, it shows mountain pattern, lamellar, and scale possibly all in one group


Though small, this shows what seems to be various brigandines


I'd like to know how maneuvarable/weight and such of the gusuko and brigandine and so on

I know European full plate is around 70 lbs distributed around the body, and allows enough articulation for a wearer can do a cartwheel

South East Asia Armour

BUGIS ARMOUR

http://www.sabrizain.demon.co.uk/malaya/dutch3.htm

MORO ARMOUR

The Moro helmets are essentially based on those of the Spaniards whom they fought. The chain-mail coats seem to have been reinforced by iron plates.

Acturally no, it was more advanced because it required higher level of metallury to produce, it was also quiet flexible, stressful yes, bad for long battles yes, but in a limited time it wasn't very hampering to your flexibility. in fact one could climb ladders, jump on horses and do acrobatic tricks with it on...

Chinese armor did not advance in this direction for various reasons, technologically, socially and militarily you can see some of the reasons. for example chinese were using weapons that simply no armors could protect effectively. (which was possibily why late Ming Qing infantries didn't even wear armor most of the time.)
Socially the aristocratic classes weren't on the battlefield nearly as often as it was in Europe and elsewhere, thus protection tend to be more focused on economical efficiency instead of single man protection above all else.
Militarily after the Ming was founded they were rarely fighting anyone with weapons on a equal level of sophisitcation as they were, the need to advance seems limited.

Please explain where you got this idea from ? Tampers steel armour was used by the Chinese as far back as the 3 kingdom period and high temper steel during the Song dynasty. While they were not on the level of steel that were used to produce swords. it was not in anyway inferior to the steel used by the European during the 1300s.

Japanese Armor



Samurai



Ashigaru (foot soldier)

How useful were those strips of leather on the sleeves of the ashigaru (foot soldier)? I can't see them being any help against a katana.

The 'farmer's hat' was actually an iron helmet (jingasa), and could be used as a pot for cooking rice. BTW, those bags in a chain around the guy's neck contain uncooked rice for his rations.

Inner layout for western coat of plate









Qing china and indian had nice brigantine armor but still wonder how their inner layout

Indian Armour ..

Moghul Empire Or Delhi Sultane...

Siam Armour

A quick image search and...

What country and time are those helmets from ?

hmm, would anyone know of any significant difference between brigandine and lamellar? (the the scales were held together, was one more maneuverable, hold better, etc.)

Development of armor depend what tactic used in battlefield... Eastern people (China, Japan, Turk, Mongol) prefer to fight with range...use lot projectile weapon (bow, crosbows etc) and fought on a very large and maneuverable battlefield , so it need an armor that can protect them from this weapon and more maneuverable..for this porpose brigantine armor or lemellar armor a good choice..also, this armor very cheap and easy to produce..

so chinese armour main use is to stop arrows or slashing attacks?

Aha! shanwenkia armour!

A Chinese warrior on the left and a Korean on the right...

Mainly arrows and secondary slashing attacks. Western were also made to defeat crushing and pierching attacks by spears and axes,

wouldn't a spear's piercing attack be simiar to a crossbow bolt?

Does anyone know how much maneuverability is allowed by brigandine

how much does it weigh?

I've heard that full plate is about 70lbs total

Hm..pretty anti-typical sword the Korean dude has there.

I know, the site isn't entirely accurate. It calls shanwenkia "Chinese star scale"

Still one of the best websites on eastern armour out their.

his description of them seems to be wrong

The guy said it would've been too heavy and inflexible...

but the theory of the scales being shaped like 'mountain' and being able to move, yet stiffen on impact, was explored on another thread.

Chinese armour during the early and mid Ming was equal in protection to Japanese armour. However by the late Ming the widespread use of firearms made heavy armour obsolete. Unfortunately we have almost no examples of early/mid Ming armour left. But their is one particular specimen of a "Steel jacket" on display at museum in China.

When Ming and Korea fought Japan, is that when the armor was about equal?

I've seen pictures, and it looked like they were wearing brigandine.

Do you know what style of armor it was that was of equal protection to Japaense armor?

During the Imjin war, the samurai were not heavily protected. Neither were the Chinese or Koreans.Their are some examples here http://johnhamill.tripod.com/1590s.html

This is a typical example of muromachi period(1336 to 1573). armour. During this time, armour would have been similar to what is seen in the late Song and early ming.

Examples of Chinese armour from this period are hard to come across-I'll do some research.

No offence but those images from the Korean War Memorial are not wholly-reliable; excellent artefacts well laid out but very nationalistic and the images are modern renditions not contemporary with the events. If you see Yi Sun-Shin's fabulous statue in Sejongno (amusingly next to the US embassy), equally modern and nationalistic I freely admit, but he is bedecked in a jolly grand suit of Korean armour. Neither make for good (as in solid, stand-alone) sourcing (at least in regard to armour of a certain period).

Yi sun sin was an admiral, he would have worn more armour than a regular soldier . Korean forces were predominantly unarmoured. And the ming were lightly armoured during the Imjin war. Heavier armours exist for Chinese forces, but they were never widespread as far as I can tell.

I've just found images of two different Chinese armours.

This one looks pretty tough...

That second one was the armor unearthed from the mausoleum of Duke Yi of Zeng, warring states era (480-220 BC).

That isn't a Chinese armour. That is a mongolian armour (ok, maybe you can call them Chinese), currently sitting in the Armoury of Leeds, UK.

To say more it is not Mongolian armour but Tibetan one. It was taken by Colonel Younghusband in 1903, if I am right.

Best regards,

Alexey.