Milan vs Gothic. A movement myth?

[Rodolfo Martínez]

I heard that Milanese armours had less movement rate than Gothic armours, and there are some techniques wich only can be made if wearing Gothic armour. It smells like myth, becouse milanese armours had great rate of movement despite their huge spaulders but i want to know the more proffesional experience of ARMA with armours. Thanks

[Brian Hunt]

The thing to remember about different styles of armour is that it was frequently about fashion rather than about a specific movement or restriciton of movement. As for mobility, a full harness will change how you can or cannot move. Different Pieces were frequently added or removed depending upon the activity the wearer was going to be invovled in (for example adding more pieces for jousting and removing them for foot combat in the lists). As for Milanese vs. Gothic, that seems like a silly debate to me.

all the best.

Brian Hunt
GFS

[LafayetteCCurtis]

As for Milanese vs. Gothic, that seems like a silly debate to me.

Same opinion from me, since the debate makes te silly assumption that there was such a thing as a "typical" Milanese or Gothic armor in a time when such suits were made on customized individual commissions.

[philippewillaume]

I would agree with the general opinion here.
In fact there seems to have been trend by country (read region of influence of a given king or king like potentate.
So fror exemple you have French, burgondian or English style of armour and from there you have really what the guy ordered.
Fro exemple French seemed to like spaulders and besigrew but some french armours have pauldrons and massive guard brace.
My understanding is that for 8-10 lbs, if you wanted your armour to whistle in the wind that would make it so.

I joust and I wear a milaness harness made for the French market (allegedly) I have the same restriction and movement that a friend of mine that has a sigismund harness.
The sigismund is lighter since it is in proper tempered steel (as the original) but that is about it.

I would just add that mobility in that armour has more to do with how well the armours fit than anything else. As long as we don not speak of specilised jousting armour that were produced in the XVIth and after.

phil

[Rodolfo Martínez]

Maybe this is a silly question too, Did all Milanese style armours had both pauldrons different because of the lance rest, or there were specimens with both pauldrons equal too?
And about armour skirts, Were cloth skirts only for jousting armours, a part of the gambeson, or a knight´s custom choice?
This are XVI century armors:
http://www.aceros-de-hispania.com/gb/in ... _armaduras

I found very similar italian foot armour but using mail skirts, Did XV century armours used such cloth skirts too?.

[philippewillaume]

I do not think the dissymmetric pauldrons, has any thing to do with the lance rest, but with the need of couching the lance in the arm pit. I the guard brace is there no chance of couching at all.

You could say that yes it seems to be the way Milanese armour was done through the XVth.
There is even a “gothic” like Milanese Harness that has the same characteristic.however on the same token, Milan workshops produced an armour in the “French” fashion for a german block and this armour had spaulders and besigrew.
But we could say that the vast majority would have two different pauldron

Italian import for the English market tends to have more equal pauldrons. But I am not sure if the actual pauldron is different or if it is just the guard brace those changes.
After all on each pauldrons the guard brace sits on a stub and is held by a pin.
So may be they just changed the guard brace. (Though I would suspect that guy like Beauchamp would have two set of pauldrons)

As far as I can tell, we can not even be sure that XVIth was cloth only.
Usually when fighting on foot, you are wearing a mail short (that is what a XV cent text tells us and that is what thalhoffer illustration shows us)

I have seen kind of scale/brigandine skirt as well (on illustration). All I can tell you is that even in jousting, lance always have a way to find your gonads.

phil

[Rodolfo Martínez]

Mr. Willaume, you said that you use a milanese harness in jousting. My question is, Can you still handle properly a sword with a gardbrace in, or a knight would remove it when fighting on foot?

This is a milanese gardbrace model, i don´t think that it could inmovilizate your arm, or difficult the use of the sword, but i prefer to listen your personal experience. Thanks.
http://www.ageofarmour.com/gardbrace.html

[philippewillaume]

Yes is use the fence in harness with this amour.
But I need to say that I Patrice only Ringeck and strikes when in armour are a big no-no and I have little if no reason to lift my front arm other than to deflect a thrust or a strike with my forarms.
That being said I can touch the top of my armet with both hands, (I was about to say helmet there), and my garde-brace has increased in size since the attached picture has been taken.
In fact, as with riding, this type of paudrons is protecting the arm pit relatively well.

Just to make sure the pauldron is attached at the shoulder neck by some point and later to the gorget plate, you have strap around the arms but it there to make sure that it does not flap too much more that to secure it to the arm.
As a rule of thumb if you armour prevent or restrict you leg or arms movement, it is a sign that it does not work properly.
(You will lose range of motion, but most of the time it is due to another piece of armour being there) but nothing that will matter in a fight.

I.e. without the armet, I can lift my arms over my head a touch the opposite
elbow with my hands. But you just can do that with the armet on. (it is just too tall)

I hope that helped.

[img]http://C:\pw\wiwi\armour\lessthan100k\Img_1438.jpg[/img]

[Rodolfo Martínez]

Thank you very much. So, no need to take out the gard brace?

[philippewillaume]

Hello,
Nope, though I suspect that if you knew for sure that you were going to fight on foot you could change both to something more English but they without changing anythong it will do the trick.

phil

[Rodolfo Martínez]

I heard that you can do some acrobatics with armour on, like jumping on the horse, or the pine, is this true?

[Brian Hunt]

Heck,

I've done somersaults and cartwheels while wearing a complete harness. You just have to learn to move with the extra mass of your armour and not fight it.

Brian Hunt
GFS

[Rodolfo Martínez]

Hello again Gentlemen, do someone know wich style/styles is this armour?

http://198.144.2.125/Armour/Full/HerculesArmour.jpg

I saw early XV century italian examples of this harness, with different fauld and tassets but with the same pauldrons and helm. I found later three quarter versions and half versions too of XVI century.
There are lots of armours like this in the Malta museum, full threequarter, and half versions from different centuries.
Thanks
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