In a past life, I distinctly remember wearing a full sized Gambeson under the mail, another over the mail, plate over that, and wielded two shields. The enemy wasn't going to shoot me, crush me, stab me, slice me or fold me. So they rolled me into a river.
I played a game of D&D with a guy who was a half orc cleric who insisted on using two tower shields. If things got hairy he would put one shield behind him, one on front, kneel down, and "clamshell" them together, becoming pretty much impervious to harm. Then he decided he was going to turn on my paladin character because I always prevented him from robbing shops and killing random NPCs. The fight quickly went in my favor so he "clamshelled" thinking I couldn't hurt him. I wrapped my rope around him, trapping him inside his shell then picked him up and threw him into a lake.
@midgetydeath Doubtful. I counter it with this: If armor was so useful against firearms it would have rendered firearms useless and we wouldn't have used them at all. Armor became irrelevant because back in the day it took time and expertise to make which made it expensive. Taking only the cost of the materials of a smartphone it's only worth about 50 to 100 dollars. But then the expertise factors in. Someone had to design it. Someone had to make it (a factory more specifically) and it took power to do so, transportation and more. Armor is expensive and even then an early firearm will go through mail and sometimes even plate armor. Moreover it can easily knock someone off a horse at close range meaning it can be quickly followed up with a bayonet. Modern firearms, especially rounds such as a 5.56 NATO FMJ round which are known for their penetrating power can easily go through plate armor AND more importantly can still whallop the horse of a knight leading to the same earlier situation. Ergo it is more cost efficient to employ lighter ("lighter". Modern armor weighs about the same as plate) to field a dozen soldiers with rifles and relatively minimal training to take out a handful of armored targets. Sure you can argue the heavy armor guy will kill double his weight in combat against lighter targets with lesser training but on the other hand they are cheaper to replace and thusly by the time an enemy has one heavy armor guy again you've replaced your forces three fold.
@@RascaldeesV2 if you think 5.56 NATO is famed for it's penetrative power you need to study firearms a wee bit more. Also cost may not be the only thing that factors into guns supplanting armored melee infantry. Musketeers are much more maneuverable on the tactical, operational, and strategic levels of warfare for one and with massed fires you are quite likely to hit something vulnerable whilst your accompanying pikemen keep the enemy at bay.
@@cheesestyx945 in other words standard 5.56mm ammunition. FMJ stands for full metal jacket which means the lead bullet is copper or brass plated. Most modern ammunition has this feature except for hollow points, soft nose hunting rounds, and other specialty ammunition.
@@josephahner3031 yeah I did more research after this but lost the comment. My gun knowledge is less than my medieval knowledge. I do think his point still stands though, a musket during the American revolution were powerful enough to rip someone's arm off at close range so it's safe to assume you'd rather be more agile than be wearing armor which may not fully protect you.
I never understood why people think that a reliable source makes one mistake, that makes EVERYTHING they said unreliable, and try to find ways to discredit everything they do.
Shad told me bikini armor is not as good for protection as full plate, clearly his massive ego is clouding his judgement as all Skyrim players know the skimpier the armor the better it works.
Sleepy .Time - you know, I've been noticing that myself, in Skyrim. I wince every time I see the fantasy armor that offers so little coverage, thinking that it just ruins the immersion by breaking with realism. An arrow in the belly button has got to hurt, and there are no doctors in Skyrim to even try to perform the difficult surgery needed to repair a perforated gut. Reality check, Bethesda!! Shame on you!
@Lukas - Well in defense of Bethesda they did not make the fantasy armor, modders do. The easiest thing to do is if you play on PC just open the Creation Kit or Tes5Edit and remove most of the armor rating from any of the skimpy armor sets that you like the look of but do not think should rival Ebony armor for protection. Mages run around with just some cloth covering their vital bits, being naked is hardly much worse.
The fact that he was able to respond like this shows maturity. He didn't get defensive, he respected the person's difference of opinion, he conceded that he may have been wrong and stated that he was willing to change his opinion if he was, and he explained himself without being mean.
@@mashadarii do you know him personally? Because I didn't hear any LDS sexism come from him. He pointed out that, in general, men don't like to sew. I know this for a fact because I am a man, I do like to sew, and when I tell other men this they often show surprise. Women as a group tend to have preferences and strengths just as men as a group tend to have preferences and strengths. You can call that sexism if you want. I call it quite natural, normal, and completely unoffensive. What can be offensive is people who attack other people because they don't like the fact that the other person recognizes standard roles from gender to gender.
"Sometimes it is better to know the wrong thing about the subject than nothing about it at all because often times knowing the wrong thing will lead to you learning the right." - Shad
It's really cool to see that Shad knows when to correct himself when he has mistakes, "Correct a wise man and he will thank you, correct a fool and he will get mad at you." Props to you, Shad. Great video! ... but what about Dragons?
when he mentions the leather piece that was too thin to be standalone armor, all I could think of was: "maybe they were sewing Leather onto Gambison/Padded Armor?" it kinda makes sense. both are 'fairly' easy to harvest, and Leather can keep water out of Gambison during rain and storms, among other, more dangerous situations.
@@trashtrash2169 Honestly. regular leather just seems to be more of a supplimental to 'real' armor. like when you have cloth or leather padding between yourself and, say, Chainmail, or Plate.
It's not difficult to harden leather to the point that, when backed with gambeson, it can effectively dampen cutting attacks from swords and other edged weapons. Also, it's very likely that our popular interpretation of "studded leather" comes from a type of brigandine or strip-metal armour which used a leather vest or coat to contain the more protective elements. Wear _that_ over some gamebson and you've got some pretty damn effective armour that can probably be made a little cheaper and plenty quicker than a good chain shirt.
A lot of people in the medieval period were adept as sewing, even if gambeson was more expensive, they could repair it themselves, saving costs. Leather armour and requiring the ability to cure leather to repair it would make leather armour much more expensive in the long term.
Do you know what it takes to cure a hide based textile? It depends on what sort of curing you mean, as there are two stages in processing a hide where the term curing is used. In the first you just need salt. You skin the animal, flesh the hide, then coat the flesh side of the hide with a liberal application of salt that you spread around and rub into the skin really well. This just helps to both prevent bacterial growth and speed up the removal of moisture from the hide for skins that can't be processed right away and need to be stored. These cured hides will keep just fine for several months easily, and in the right conditions they can last for years before they need to be further processed into a finished material. In the other case, where you are taking something like finished rawhide and looking to make it weatherproof, all it takes is some fat and a camp fire. You rub the rawhide down with the fat, and let it sit near a fire to help the fat soften and penetrate deeper. That's about it, for best results though you'll want to use a rendered fat like tallow so it doesn't spoil on you and start to stink. Alternatively, in some cases you can also choose to smoke a skin instead, such as is commonly done with buckskin in order to make the finished product washable without worrying about it turning into rawhide after it gets wet. This process is also sometimes referred to as curing. It just requires you to gather some punky hardwood to get a nice thick smoke going and a bit of hide glue to temporarily hold the buckskin in a bag shape that you suspend over the fire to capture the rising smoke, in order to force it through the fibers. Repairs are really simple too in most cases. You take some thread made from either rawhide or sinew, bind the hole shut with it, and then let it dry. If you want you can also take some hide glue and really work it down in there for further reinforcement (on items that should be more rigid). Even someone with almost no skill at all can do these things and they cost almost nothing, as all the supplies mentioned here aside from the salt and punk wood are usually created with hide scraps and other commonly available waste materials from the animals you get the hides from. The repair tools are pretty simple too and shouldn't have been all that hard to come by - a heavy duty leather sewing needle and possibly a hole punch in the case of things like rawhide and thicker leathers. I've made quite a fair bit of buckskin over the years, and a ton of rawhide for a friend who makes tribal drums. Most textile work related to animal skins are really simple to pick up and most of it can be done at home with primitive tools. They do however usually require a fair bit of endurance and some arm strength though.
Ian S I forgot to mention the tanning that would need to take place and high amounts of tannin obtained from oak would not have been cheap and tanning was a noxious unpleasant process. Most people wouldnt be able to tan the hides after the curing. I should have mentioned that rather than jist the curing, plus its the time required to make the leather to repair the armour whereas linen to repair gambeson would be more easily and quickly obtained. Good info on the curing process though, i knew some but not the entirety of it.
I'm still not convinced most "leather armor" was made with actual leather, it just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Rawhide is very simple to make and far more tough and rigid. It can even be built up in layers for further protection, just by spreading out hide glue between the layers before stretching them out over a form to dry into the desired shape. I never bothered to look into the history of what medieval folks did, so I can't say for sure how much of that is relevant. But regardless - whether we're talking leather, buckskin, or rawhide - they can all be mended fairly easily with an animal based thread made from rawhide or sinew. They should've been very common back then and you just need a couple of basic leather working tools to use them to sew up any sort of rips or tears. Did some reading around just now, and it seems one of the more common hide based materials used back then for things like the outer face of wooden shields, helmets and other stuff is something called boiled leather (that wasn't actually boiled). It seems to be something similar to rawhide that was often pressed into molds to get fancy embossed patterns. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiled_leather
'loricis minoribus' written by Gerald of Wales it differentiates between the 'lorica' and maille. Set that alongside occasional references to 'leather jerkins' or 'hides' being worn as armour in wales. Walter Map, another Welshman writing in 1180 or thereabouts, only in this case he's describing the Brabançons.
What makes you think people would have to skin, tan etc, a hide to obtain leather? Do you think they did that to obtain every pair of shoes or leather bag they owned? Of course not. There were people who did this for a living then just as now. The same goes for textiles. Most people wouldn’t grow their own flax then harvest and produce their own linen. Just as not everyone would own sheep and make wool and woollen clothes, blow their own glass, own bees and make candles and so on
Victor García I sometimes watch a bunch of shadiversity videos in a row when I want to escape everyday life (and learn something new while doing that).
Thanks for the tip, now people will backlash at Shad saying stuff like "OH why do you have non-historical bla blah blah" Ehat have you done to poor old Shad
Apparently, most of the "leather armor" debate is due to the not-so-clear distinction between "rawhide" and "leather" in several languages; and the fact that ceremonial/tournament/training gear wasn't always listed in separate sections in the armory inventories. Tanned leather "armor" did exist in significant quantities, but it usually served very different functions, it was not something you'd choose to wear on a battlefield when rawhide is both a cheaper and harder material. *However, both leather armor and rawhide armor were called "armure de cuir"* in the _lingua franca._ Most historical hide armor was actually made of rawhide, not tanned hide (not even vegetable-tanned). Rawhide is the rigid plastic-y stuff that dog chew toys are made of. Hardened leather is worse than rawhide or hardened rawhide as a main armoring material, and was more expensive. Tanning serves to keep the hide flexible when dry, it has nothing do with armoring performance. To make rawhide armor, you take raw hide and work it on a shape or "convex mold" while it's wet and flexible. Then you make it dry on a rigid shape to take that shape (usually, lamellar pieces). Once dry, you lacquer the rawhide to seal it and make it waterproof. An alternative is to boil rawhide in wax and/or oil, in a similar way as how tournament/training armor could be made from boiling tanned leather to harden it. *It is arguable that historical **_cuir bouilli_** was actually made from wax-boiling rawhide, not leather, which explains why modern attempts at reproducing cuir bouilli by boiling leather rarely come close to its alleged historical performance.* Bonus points: boiling rawhide is how hide glue is made. Armor made of boiled rawhide is essentially closer to polymer or resin than it is to leather, even to the so-called "boiled leather" of modern reproduction attempts. Of, course, leather was still very useful as a main material for constructing armor, but as I said, it was not used for what people think. A lot of the *ceremonial equipment* and *training/practice gear* was made of leather or hardened leather, because tanned leather requires less maintenance than raw hide. Which is the whole point of the tanning process, we tan hide so that it stays softer and flexible when dry. Tanning a hide that needed to hold up well against blades would be counter-productive. Now, for the language part. : The French word "cuir" denotes any sort of "tough skin", not just leather specifically, it is semantically metaphorical and can apply to steel armor in the sense that _any_ armor is a "tougher skin" that you put on top of your body. Rawhide is also called "cuir cru" in French. We unfortunately don't clearly differentiate untanned hide from leather in French; one is "cuir cru" (crude leather) while the other is "cuir tanné" (tanned leather). This lead to a lot of misconceptions over time. Many people still tend to think that dog chew toys are made of tanned leather, when it's usually raw hide... and they tend to think that historical battlefield armor was made of shoe-grade "cuir" like biker saddles. A "cuirasse" could be made from pieces of hard rawhide forming a shell, but it could also be made with leather as a base if it was reinforced with steel. In French, when we think about a "cuirasse", we usually picture steel or iron, not leather. This word is equivalent to what anglophones think of with the word "ironclad". The word for an ironclad warship in French is "cuirassier", even though these ship hulls were obviously not reinforced with leather. Also, you have to check the cost of *wool,* not just linen, for pricing a poor man's gambeson. Low-quality wool was probably comparable in price to linen, so it could have been cheaper than low-quality rawhide, let alone tanned leather. Coarse linen was preferred also because it's not as hot as wool for the same amount of protection. This is a very important advantage in the summer. People may have preferred wool gambesons for winter and linen for summer, if they could afford to be picky. Now, about the "clearly-identifiable leather armor", the examples shown could still be steel armor covered in dyed fabric or painted. Many medieval armors were painted, and many medieval armors were covered with a layer of textile or rawhide, which was then lacquered to seal it and prevent drawing in moisture. Lacquered rawhide is waterproof, very hard, and _very_ scratch-resistant; unlike _any_ tanned leather. To my (limited) knowledge, there are about as many historical sources for lacquered rawhide armor or boiled rawhide armor as there are for any sort of leather armor. The sources and finds for rawhide armor also seem to be a lot more oriented towards use in actual combat; they're less likely to be indicative of tournament or training usage. There's also the fact that many existing rawhide armors in collections nowadays tend to be incorrectly labeled as being "leather", for various reasons. Notably, not all museums and collectors do chemical analysis on their organic collection pieces when they can just look at it, call it "leather", and be done with it. Pretty much everybody is familiar with the idea of using leather in armoring, but not so much with the idea of rawhide. People, even well-educated ones, tend to think of rawhide as something that decomposes quicky and doesn't even last a couple years, let alone centuries. But they usually forget that lacquer existed since antiquity and that tanning was not the only method used to preserve hides.
And people tend to forget what type of steel was used to make armor. Their regular mid-to-low carbon steel was more likely to rust very fast because of how close it is from pur iron (although the type of rust was more likely to be a protective shell we still found on rough iron these days instead of the ugly pitting we see on modern steel). So, in order to be able to carry your armor around without having to take care of it too often, you need to protect it in some way. This shows the importance of the rawhide, leather or paint backing you are talking about.
Hmm, wool gambeson. I try to look at historical arms and armor from a soldier's perspective. Looking at the linen gambeson from that point of view, the first thing that springs to my mind is how much wearing it would suck once it got wet. Wool would be a lot more tolerable in a rainy climate.
immikeurnot agreed. And wool was still a prominent fabric as a great deal of peasants (in England, the Scottish Highlands, and in many regions of France, for sure) were Shepherds, and so wool was already the go-to hard-use and somewhat affordable fabric of the medieval era. Although linen is a better fabric when dry (because air flows better trough it) wool is so much better when wet. I did fought wearing a gambeson, I can tell you that even when it doesn't rain, it does get sweat-soaked pretty fast on the inside layers... With this in mind, I think linen would be great for the external parts of the gambeson because of the the better air flow, but the core of the gambeson should be heavy weight wool, as it absorbs shocks better on top of all.
Thank you so much for all this information about rawhide vs tanned leather! My textiles professor is going to drool over your explanation and probably reference it in a lesson. Also, I never thought of rawhide as being used for anything other than dog toys today. I wonder if it could have any other practical uses today?
I would hardly call you arrogant... you have repeated admitted errors... quite graciously actually. You always leave open the possibility of discussion and critique.
I'll still read their criticism, unless said attacks continue. Just because they attacked me initially doesn't mean that they don't have anything worthwhile to say, but often it does mean that I won't be able to have a proper discussion with them as they will continue to attack me in the future.
I would say that Shad IS arrogant when he's stating things as if they're strict fact when they've been more in the realm of opinion, BUT he also admits errors, repeatedly, as you said. *shrug*
Not always, no. I've actually had to offer some corrections myself to some of his statements of fact over the past year. But, as I said, when he has realized this he has admitted his error, too.
Hey, French here, a cuirasse doesn't have to be in leather, we call battleships "cuirassés", but they're not made in leather. It's the origin of the word but we use it to designate pretty much everything that do a protec.
i feel this is a case of "A Little knowledge is a dangerous thing" and the reddit poster having a case of hearing and seeing only what he wanted to hear and see to prove his point. Great reply as always Shad.
Even after his persona and his work are being attacked he keeps his composure, his manners and calmly replies with facts and proofs rather than lashing out and transverse other's arguments. That's a true gentleman! Something the Internet desperately needs in bulk these days.
It would be best to identify the salient points of the article and bring them to the fore, arguing that first. Then defending himself against the little kid-spat of context and ad-hominem, etc. The article was unfair, I get it, but filter it out and distill the substance of the article to grab the audience's attention, because rehashing and explaining those spats can be a turn off, especially when it's used to open the video content. I understand he wanted to start out point-by-point about what he felt was misrepresented, in order to give his viewers context of his past arguments; the problem is that it's boring and uninteresting. Better to grab his audience's attention and go through his own substance and current conclusions about Leather Armor, then go through the substance of the article, and then when he's made his argument of the merits and given his conclusion, THEN go ahead and defend yourself if you are inclined. First rule of debate: , "Present your opponent's viewpoint better than he can". IMO it would make the video more watchable; I appreciate Shad trying to be humble, but he's trying too hard and he doesn't need to. It's "CRINGING" to listen to, not to mention see it displayed in the title. He should probably continue to do so, perhaps, I'm not saying he should change his personality and style (as if anyone should listen to me), but I think these kinds of "Was I wrong" episodes would be better if he filtered out what I think is hand-wringing out of the opening and middle, leaving it for the end AFTER he's made his conclusions. Get straight to the "substance", then you can worry about "style", where he can tick off all the points about why the article was just a little unfair and unnecessarily antagonistic (and it was).
While I am also impressed by Shad's excellent record of responding fully and with dignity to those who call out his conclusions, I think it's wrong to think of the reddit post as an 'attack'. Only once did the OP use the word 'arrogant' in his very long, comprehensive post. Granted, I agree with Shad's logic on Leather Armor, especially after the clarifications and corrections he made in this video. But at the same time, the redditor in question used sourced information in his arguments against Shad's position and by-in-large focused on Shad's conclusions rather than the man himself, even if the sources were not representative of the overall distribution of findings and evidence and despite the fact that he came to certain conclusions that did not necessarily follow from the evidence he presented.
I just want to add that "proofs" is not a word. Proof is just proof. Just like you don't go to the bank to get monies and generators don't generate electricities you don't have proofs either. :)
Reaper in the mathematical context, proofs is considered a word. For example: "Today in math class, we had to complete three proofs for homework." So while it is incorrect to say something like "The detective gathered plenty of proofs", proofs is a perfectly acceptable when referring to a type of mathematical problem.
Some decades ago my friend was visiting my home dressed in hollywood leather armor. He got hurt by common houseplant, whose pointy sawbladelike leaves stung just through it like nothing. The plant is called in my language [the mother of wife]'s tongue.
You had me at "I might be wrong." Good for you. TH-cam is trending towards Ego, this sector of TH-cam (the Historical Dark-web of You Skal, Lindy, Scholar, Thengn and others) are all about exploring the possibilities and historical evidences behind the arms, Armour and warfare of the medieval period. For which I think I can speak for all your viewers, we thank all of you very much. Keep up the great work. From QLD, Sam.
I mean, Shad makes perfect sense. He never said he thinks leather armor didn't exist at all, just not how fantasy and Hollywood presents it. Personally, I think the idea of leather armor in fantasy is not that big a deal since fantasy is entitaled to some anacronisms and creative liberty. But if the idea is to depict a technology or culture based in European medieval history, then it makes sense to treat it in a historical context. Texile armor would be more prevelant due to cost effectiveness, ease of manufacture and all that, but if a sell sword or lower class noble had the money, but not for steel plate or mail, then it makes sense that they would consider leather. I agree with Shad that leather would be a step up, in cost and utility, than textile armor. I've never heard Shad just outright say "No leather armor was never a thing and it's stupid".
The way Hollywood usually treats leather armor is just a way to show peoples' abs without having them go naked. It's not real armor, more like a fashion statement.
Movies like to have leather armor because it is way easier on the actors to have a jacket modified to look like light armor than a Thicc Gambison. At least. For making movies.
Its probably because leather armour looks more durable to a casual observer and is easier to make form fitting than a thick gambeson so it doesn't make your star actors look fat.......... sorry thick when wearing it.
I don't think Gambeson makes you look fat, unless you were already fat in the first place. It looks very schwifty which isn't something people expect from the medieval time period.
@@jakublulek3261 You don't actually need to have real full plate though. A fake one can do just as well for the purposes of a movie. But really, I myself don't like leather armour. So I'm quite biased against it.
"Arrogantly asserting his case with poorly thought out thought experiments"... WHAT? If there is one thing you cannot say about this man is that he is arrogant, nor that he arrogantly asserts anything. If one thing Shad is the antithesis of arrogance. A man who fails to realise that to me automatically fails in his assesment of the world. He clearly has a mind which overlaps personal hatred and preferences with secular facts and THAT is a dangerous mind. Is it really so difficult to be professional and just critique the man in a costructive way without having to use attacks ad personam? I get those all the time Shad, so I obviously sympathise and commend your ability to remain calm and polite. Keep it up you are a great example for all.
To be fair, he does come across as arrogant with limited exposure. His method of speech, how he emphasis and his assertiveness of opinion. If one is unfamiliar with his work and, more importantly, his passion on the subject matter it is a fairly easy mistake to make.
Brian Hensley wut m8? Being well informed and presenting scripted material with confidence equals arrogance now. Bragging about being arrogant? Really? Ok, it must be a millennial thing. Shad may be gruff at times but he knows his stuff. That’s why he made this channel, to dispel common myths and get to the most accurate historical truth he possibly can. Attacking someone like this, even mildly by calling him arrogant, is just bad form, logically fallacious and, well, rude. No need to defend someone like that.
@Brian Hensley Throne not thrown. I personally don't see why you're so focused on it as it's just a chair. Shad is not arrogant. Arrogance is having an overinflated sense of self. Shad has never displayed this in ANY video. To call someone arrogant in a video where they are responding to an opposing view reasonably and not rudely or brashly, is just foolish. If anything the only one here that has displayed arrogence is you.
*Hey Shad, you ever just realize that gambeson was basically medieval kevlar? Strong interwoven strands with a viscous (the waxy matrix in this case) medium to increase it's strength, think of say shear thickening fluid in modern stab-ballistic comvinations vests.* *There's also a similar relation to kevlar and steel (ceramic doesn't really fit into this comparison) plates to that pf gambeson and steel plate. The gambeson/kevlar fills the roll of a lighter more flexible armor that doesn't lend all too much protection (relative to it's competitor, being steel plates) but is far more comfortable, easy to wear and way more cost effective. Steel in both the modern ballistic and historical suit forms severed the purpose of heavy armor that can take several shots from the most dangerous thing on the battle field. The same reason applies to why we don't give GI's kevlar. They're engaged in high damage symmetrical warfare.... or at least that's what they're equiped for.* *On the far other end of the scale insurgency groups won't even bother to armor themselves because they don't intend to be in direct symmetrical battles. Not unlike say, kelts. The time line isn't quite accurate but the idea is still the same.* *I just think this whole repeating themes in armor is an interesting phenomenon, one that possibly warrants a video?* *For a name drop of course ;) love the content my guy!*
I don't find you to be arrogant in the slightest. You are very well informed, and go to great lengths to research and present your opinions with sound evidence in backing. I feel that possibly some people take your confidence and descriptiveness as pedantry when they already have an axe to grind. I appreciate you and your humility, and the fact that you have the professionalism, courtesy, and respect to give your critics' arguments a fair shake.
Let's all say it together... CONTEXT!!! In the grand scheme of global human history, leather armor was fairly widespread. We have buff coats, lamellar, and hide shields (not common in Europe) just to name a few. However, in the specific context of medieval Europe, leather armor, that is armor made entirely or primarily of leather, was rare. Flax was commonly grown, and quality steel was relatively common, so gambeson, mail, and plate were preferred. Move to an area with limited access to good steel, and leather armor, like lamellar, becomes much more common because the steel is reserved for weapons. Move to a hotter climate, and lighter weight armor becomes desirable. If we're discussing a nomadic or semi-nomadic people, non metallic armor rises in popularity due to reduced weight. It's all about... CONTEXT!!!
Also, if you're a nomadic people, such as the Mongols or Huns, you would have more excess animals available, but much less access to plant-based materials.
As an artisan leather worker, I find it frustrating that archaeologists and historians make baseless assumptions about tradesman tools and materials. There are leather working tools in museums today incorrectly labeled as pole arms, when they are actually a multi purpose tool that had an awl, a round knife blade, and a hammer on a small wooden handle. The modern leather workers round knife is based on this design. Knowing the evolution of a trade is common among tradesmen, yet we are rarely consulted. Cuir bouilli is not a historical method of hardening leather. The term actually comes from an experiment in hardening leather by baking it in a straw oven. The result was a very hard, but very brittle substance that had no apparent use. Water hardened leather was used for vessels, decoration, and occasionally as a temporary repair for timber frame beams. Wax hardened leather is a modern method. Beeswax and pitch were historically used to seal the flesh side of the leather to resist water, not to harden the leather. Leather was almost never used in armor as the sole defensive material. It has always been accompanied by metal, wood, textile, or lacquer-like coating. Hardening leather through any means will weaken it. Marrying the flexibility and durability of leather with a more rigid material makes them both stronger and more useful as armor.
One of your statements is incorrect: Although in general leather does not survive long burial, and excavated archaeological evidence for it is rare, an Irish shield of cuir bouilli with wooden formers, deposited in a peat bog, has survived for some 2,500 years.[8] It has been used continuously since then, though in varying amounts and purposes. The method is well-described in medieval texts.
As an artisan leather worker, specifically in cuir bouilli...hard disagree. The process of "jacking" leather, for the manufacture of jack-boots, black-jacks, costrels, flackets, flagons, and the like *is* the cuir bouilli process, we've scads of linguistic, textual, and artistic evidence for those products. Thus, circumstantial evidence for the (light, hard, and inexpensive) armours in question. It was the plastic of the time, and nearly as ubiquitous. To make it, truly, you need (historically more common) half-tanned leather, which is most widely used in modern times for prosthetic and orthotic medical devices...as it holds shape well after heat and water forming. Reference: Master armourer Chris Dobson of the Royal Armouries, "As Tough As Old Boots?Essays on the Manufacture & History of Hardened-Leather Armour" chris-dobson.com/cuir-bouilli-armor.html
I would love to see videos on this kind of stuff made by actual tradesmen who have the tools necessary to demonstrate. Do you know any in your craft who run such channels?
I know a guy who hardens his own leather and I always gave him crap because I didn't think leather would be very protective. Then he showed me one of his leather gauntlets. It was a regular glove sewn into a hardened leather shell covering the wrist and outer hand up to the knuckles. It was harder than wood but was fairly light. While I don't think it would stand up to a sword or axe without being severely damaged I also don't think a person could casually cut through it with a one handed weapon either. So as far as protecting a medieval conscript's hand from a mistake on the battlefield I think there is an argument to be made about this technology.
I mean... I haven't ever really seen him "burn down" counter arguments. Most of the time he is just doubling down on his bad history. If that is not the case, then he merely claims "I simply misspoke or was not undersrood correctly." His vids are fun to watch, but his history is quite frankly terrible.
@@commiecowboy3386 Claiming he was mis-understood in this case is correct, though. It is clear in his original video that he acknowledges the existence of leather armour.
@@commiecowboy3386 terrible? I'm sorry he's not the best but he's a lot better at history than a number of people out there, terrible is way too much of an exaggeration.
@@ozkan576 he is terrible though. It's very clear he doesn't research, but instead goes conclusion shopping. And once again, instead of accepting criticism and actually learning why his arguments and conclusions are often bad, he just doubles down and then says "let me prove it to you with this demonstration which has very little historical evidence to support it as to why I am right because I can make it happen today." I'll say it again. Fun to watch. Bad history.
It's actually, on the other hand, incredibly obvious that he researches. Are you dumb? He literally cited many sources in this video alone and he does so in every video, what, do you think the sources just fall into his lap? You are incorrect. I have seen "Terrible History™" used numerous times in this comment section now, should we make it a slogan?
@@yzfool6639 this lol. I actually agree with Shad here and don't think leather armor was very common, but Shad is really bad at arguing, mostly because he brings no evidence to the table, including in this video...... It's just more rambling of him stating reasons for 35 minutes of why HE THINKS it is this way, but he doesn't show us any real evidence. The problem is that while I agree with Shad here, because he offers no real evidence in his arguments it makes it extremely easy to counter argue him. For example, he says there are belts, scabbards, and leather clothing in abundance that have survived since the medieval period, but not really many pieces of leather armor. That argument isn't very logical, because armor compared to common items like clothing, even metal armor, was already extremely rare in comparison. Thus we can conclude it would make sense if there was little/no remaining evidence of leather armors, even IF they were prevalent. He also fails to address that there really aren't THAT many surviving metal specimens of armor either, especially not ones in good condition relative to common items like clothing, pots, etc. In some cases there are even museums out there holding the ONLY piece of armor or sword of its kind that wasn't destroyed to time. It's clear to see he is really biased in his arguments, even if they make sense for the most logical reasons and even IF I personally agree with them. The issue is him just rambling and showing his face, where Shad should have been showing us the art in a reel, and evidence from texts showing us what we know about armor. Because they exist, and he was lazy and just failed to show them to us.
@@escapetherace1943 I'm not sure what evidence we would want though. A writing from the 15th century, where someone states: "Oh yeah, we don't really use leather armor. It sucks compared to a gambeson"? He can only bring up evidence that's available - and, the fact is, more metal armor survived than leather armor, and artwork and literature mentions plate, mail and cloth much more often than leather.
People calling you arrogant is for the same reason people claim Lily Peet is "Arrogant" ... you speak in a clear, direct voice and have confidence in your assessment and opinions, as well as a willingness to back up your thoughts with evidence. That's all it takes. So long as you do anything other than a simpering "Well, this is just my opinion" at every turn while talking in a submissive tone, people are going to get upset at how emotionally stable you happen to be.
Lol Hergrim! I've had an argument on Reddit with him before! He's the one who actually motivated me to go to University for Medieval Studies rather than just watch TH-cam videos.
Heck, Me and my class made linen in elementaryschool. Just waddle out in the field and start picking flax. It is obvious that any household could make linen armour.
@Andrew Gray Any gambeson is better than no gambeson, and when your life is on the line you do your absolute best to make it as good as possible. It may not be the quality of shads gambeson, but it certainly will help.
I think that Shad has a long ways to go before he can become the king of context, that title currently belongs to Matt Easton, he uses context in a lof of his videos.
"Hey Google, is leather armor more effective than gambeson?" "Well, I have one million results that say it's not, and one result that says it is." "I knew it!" "JUST BECAUSE I HAVE IT DOESN'T MEAN IT'S TRUE!"
@@bloodypine22 Well I'd rather wear a warm, thick, silky, comfortable, protective, maneuverable gambeson than stiff, ratty, cracked, crumbling leather.
Shad Fact: Shad is one of the few in the world legally licensed, by all the countries that matter(get out of here New Zealand), to own and operate his own doomsday device.
i havn watched the video yet but just for you know i love whenever you adress critics and mistakes (like the last one about stone being good isolator) and create a good standard to speak criticly and constructivly without falling in coment wars, pride or such, you are an example to follow
In regards to gambeson's ability to stop arrows, I'll always remember back in middle school when I was reading a book about medieval arms and armor, and there was a photo of an illustration from a medieval manuscript depicting a crossbowman wearing gambeson with about a dozen arrows sticking out of it, calmly drinking from a waterskin.
I feel for you shad. I to am often surprised by the interpretation of my words by people who are not paying sufficient attention or lack the linguistic skill to properly follow my wording.
tygonmaster so true. Any time I disagree with an OP or comment on Reddit, i get shouted down and told to 'never post here again.' Doesnt stop me though
Sometimes it's legitimate honest misinterpretation, but very often it's not. People intentionally ignore the full context of statements all the time simply because it's very easy to disprove the misrepresented statement and then claim a victory. It's a form of straw man argument that is prolific in any debate setting.
I'll bet you made a good missionary, Shad. It's halariously relatable how that opening you offered about sharing your views was so much like missionary work.
I'm trying to make a tabletop role playing game and these videos are really proving useful! It's set on a medieval period so knowing what kind of clothing peasants wore would increase the immersion for the players. Amazing video Shad.
Number of Chromosomes Don't forget, people liked being colourful back then. (So, everyone wasn't wearing just brown, black, and etc.) Edit: Also, love the Ed profile pic.
I once tried to add more realistic elements to my D&D game, but for some reason the players couldn't wrap their minds around the idea of armor granting damage reduction. Also they didn't want to play anything that wasn't D&D.
Fleem Q Swipes Well yeah damage reduction via armor can make things kinda unbalanced, I can tell just from the amount of times I struggled trying to figure out how the players may break the game. A little tip from me would be adding equipment durability, kinda solves this issue.
Fleem Q Swipes third edition has alternate rules for armor as damage reduction, but there are also way of boosting damage crazy high... I've always just worked it that HP represents stamina more than injury and an attack that kills was a vital hit while hits that damage may actually be minor nicks or scrapes, or even just stressful close calls that push a character a little closer to collapse, or failing to stop that all important LAST hit. Just my take lol
continuation to that chain of logic. *Shows a painting with a samurai posing with his sword* after looking at this picture I think its safe to assume that at one point 99% of humanity were samurais!
Most people I see on the internet who dislike you seem to purposefully take your words out of context and/or mishear them. I think your video about hema and blindly following manuals is a great example of a video I see many people take out of context even now. These people probably decided they didn't like you the first 2 minutes they watched you, and from that moment on they continued watching the video incredibly biased. It's sad that's how the human psyche works, but HEY it's their loss.
Just in this video I noticed that among all these medieval swords in the background there's also a lightsaber :D It seems so out of place, yet so fitting at the same time, cool ;)
Same, i have been suspecting it for a long time. Cant believe they have been making a huge for many years and no one correct them, i mean there must be an expert or to on this kind of matter right?
Hollywood people tend to look at fantasy armor vs real historical stuff. The Real stuff never looks as "Cool" and that what they are going for Visual appeal vs actually effective.
Shad - my manly-man soldier brother sews very well. In fact, he sewed a winter coat for me years ago. The Y chromosome doesn’t prevent one from learning to sew, LOL. I suspect that few women became tanners (unless the men in their family were already tanners) because so many women of the peasant class worked & manufactured items on their own family’s property/home while watching children. Tanning is an extremely STINKY craft, requiring equipment and chemical solutions which many folks probably preferred to have on the outskirts on the village. There is my 2 cents worth of speculation. A few years ago, I sewed a thick gambeson for my son to role-play in with tools and materials in my home in modern New England. It would have been bloody difficult for me to go find & kill a cow and tan its hide.
Bravo on a calm, logically response that respectfully acknowledges the opponent's position and valid points while clarifying and explaining your own position. Civil discussion at it's finest.
Shad reads through the comments, even months after the video was posted! What a great community! I'm enjoying the new fight scene analyses, I hope the Old Republic light saber battles (cinematic trailers) can get analyzed, they have some crazy battles.
This is the best part about history. There's so much information, and people interpret that information differently. Therefore, there's a lot of room for discussion.
I have noticed this pattern about highly informative channels that avoid oversimplification... They often become a target for irrational and close minded people. Calling someone arrogant when you're the meaning of arrogance. So funny.
I think it is largely to do with the sad fact that people can't listen, nor can they understand a complex viewpoint. I find that if you don't state something in a black and white manner people from both sides will attack you claiming that you had stated one of the two extremes when in reality, you had never stated either.
@@Hedgehog1039 The guy who wrote this reddit article actually created a followup mammoth reddit post which I've skimmed. It really looks like he's got a bee in his bonnet about "leather armour never existed" and is taking the defence of leather armour to the extremes. In effect, citing sources that talk about leather being used over metal armour (like a coat of plates) but ignoring the metal parts, claiming that leather armour was wildly used and then handwaving the fact it's never mentioned in any historical descriptions of ancient battles, and other "rose-tinted glasses" opinions on information regardless of what arguments people have brought up in the sequel thread. The guy is obviously passionate about history and a solid researcher. But this really seems like he's taken the historical enthusiasts' reactions to the Hollywood portrayal of leather armour (being thin and light enough to not even be good for a leather jacket!) and twisted it into some type of campaign he has to fight against in order to "get the truth out there."
@@Hedgehog1039 The funny thing is that the original response to Shad makes this mistake - misunderstanding our dear Shad's passion and enthusiasm for arrogance.
Excellent job Shad--you make a convincing argument, engage adequately with your criticisms, and most importantly, you provided sources in the video description. Well done!
It's similar to claiming rifles were widespread in the 1700s because rifles existed in the 1700s. While rifles did in fact exist in the 1700s, and were even deployed by some specialists even in the American Revolution, they were NOT in wide spread use as they were very costly and not yet standardized, which presents a ton of logistics issues. So yeah, they existed, but were far from prevalent in the 1700s.
I wouldn't put too much weight into that point. It is in the opening line of a fairly long article, basically when he tries to establish, why such a long article is valuable for him to write, and for others to read. He is trying to enter a dispute, and does it by attacking what he depicts as the "preconceived consense". He is somewhat missing the fact, that Shad is an actual person, and the ad hominem really is unnecessary, but I feel the length of the article shows, that his goal is not to be disrespectful.
I think he was writing it as if Shad wouldn't read it, or made any sort of reply to it. Definitely a bad behaviour, but many people are not exactly exemplary when talking behind someone's back.
when you start argument with personal ridicule with out being attacked first is a tactic used when not being able to address facts well. and you said things like, you don't see it a lot using words that aren't absolute. I love your videos 1 because you seem to try really hard to give great detail. 2 you are entertaining. you'd make a great teacher that guy in your video looks exactly like they in Penn and teller
This is true Quality! How many TH-camrs will go out of their way and confront a crititc this civil way? Not many, i tell yout his. Shad is beeing an extremly good role model here. ^^
Great discussion. I've been exploring this myself and it's a really difficult thing for historians since there are so few examples - since leather is a natural product and will often rot away. My findings is that leather will more often be used to cover plates or used in lamellar, or cuir bouillis or buff coats made from raw hide.
Offtopic : Hey Shad I started to read Brandon Sanderson's books because of you (in spanish of course). The experience has been amazing, thank you for the recomendation.
Shad is always so polite when dealing with critics. That is soooo great! Also that he is so ready to admit that he is maybe wrong. Shad you are awesome!
Shad. around 30:12 on this video, you said something and a light bulb kicked on. The tests he was speaking of where he proposed that leather would outperform Gambeson could also be flawed, as the professor giving the lecture on linen noted, as Modern Linen is not as sturdy or as durable as its medieval counterpart, so naturally if you test a modern leather armor piece with a Gambeson made of modern linen, the result would state leather outperformed. The test is compromised in my opinion, as the linen used was possibly not the same type of linen used in Medieval Gambeson. Not to mention the fact that wool is cheaper than leather and wool, as I saw in a video on castles a few days ago, was often used as a filler in Quilted armor, and Wool can be gathered without killing the sheep,whereupon Leather most certainly has to have a dead cow or other animal to be made. You made your point beautifully by the way. Love the channel.
In their tests they used both modern as well as traditional/authentic made linnen. They also shot at it front on, not a glancing sideways blow. Which makes the linnen both thicker (see Pythagorean theorem), but also, because it was layered the arrow can get caught between the layers - something leather can't - making it potentially even better. They didn't use medieval gambeson, indeed, that could perform different again, and the leather, they hadn't researched as thoroughly either. Their main objective was to test their glued linnen ancient greek armour.
At that point I was reminded of Shad's comments on comparing, for example, longswords to katanas. You can't really compare longswords to katanas easily, but you can only compare a specific sword to a specific katana.
This sort of test would require historical accuracy, and a large sample size of both (lots of cows shall die for such a test). I would say however that a sample size of 20 or so for each type should be enough to create a half decent baseline.
there is lots of destructive testing of leather against medieval weapons that you can watch on TH-cam. Leather has to be extremely thick and dense or it is useless. The stuff you'd get from most game animals won't provide any significant protection.
Yes. Arrogance makes itself known when the knowledge is challengesd or criticised. It isn't inherently present with knowledge at all (and anyone who thinks it is is intellectually insecure).
Hey Shad nice video. This reminds me off the use of Leather in military equipment in WW1. At the outbreak of WW1 most military equipment was made out of leather. Most armies wore boots made out of leather, belts made out of leather, pouches, suspenders, etc, and the German Imperial army wore of course their Pickelhaube (spicked helmets). When the war was a few months old most armies started to replace their leather equipment with either webbing our canvas. Mainly because it was to expensive and difficult to produce on massive wartime scale. And off course because it started to rot in the wet condition of the trenches. Noticeable is the german Picklehaube which was made from high quality South-American leather. Because of the leather shortage the army started to produce Pickelhaube made out of thin sheet metal. And in 1916 it would be replaced by the steel Stahlhelm. Leather is not a cheap easy to produce material, especially in wartime. So i don't really believe in the use of leather armour in a grand scale.
Take a foot-square chunk of leather, boil it, let it dry and cool, and you'll get a three-inch square chunk of that hardwood-tough long-wearing material that we make solid shoe soles out of. It has stopped wayward axes for me when I was splitting wood and missed, so I probably have a couple more toes than I would if it weren't good for making armor out of. Considering the relative costs and difficulty of manufacture I'd be astonished if it weren't often used for armor.
Coolly, calmly. and professionally done as always Shad. Your seemingly endless devotion to limiting your own personal bias and subjectivity is admirable and well appreciated.
I didn't know, that flax is originaly a warm-loving plant. My birth town, in southern, subalpine Germany, got quite rich by growing and processing flax and producing linen. That is in a climate, that is considered for example too cold to successfully cultivate cherry trees.
As far as I know leather armor DID exist in the medieval period but wasn't used by Europeans(leather is expensive duh) and it wasn't the fantasy version either. The nomads were using leather armor(for them leather is much more available) in the form of several layers of leather coats. Basically a leather gambeson. According to a colleague of mine who is in a tradition preserving(I have no idea of the English term and Google doesn't help me either) group(Hungarian) met Cuman groups who were using such armors and according to them it was lighter than a chainmail while being very protective form both piercing, slashing, and even blunt force. According to him it was indeed some cool and effective stuff.
BloodyPine ye a there were some, but not many. Have you listen to the video at all? Shad himself said that yes, there were some examples of European leather armour, but it was not the most common type of armour, it wasn’t as widespread as gambison, plate, and mail.
@Al Kirk Your reply is coming off to me like when someone tries to come up with some sort of quotable phrase or mantra, but it really doesn't mean much of anything. You cannot really know whether you are right with the facts that you KNOW, or if the other person's perception of the truth is correct without knowing the truth. And the way you worded it made it sound like you consider yourself always right, that other people only have a "perception of the truth" instead of being right. I'm not sure that you meant it that way though, so I could be wrong. Taking into account that both parties have a bias (perception of the truth), is always a good thing. I apologize for being blunt but that statement just comes off very pedantic to me because wanting to know the truth basically would give you that other information that you say you would like to know.
@Al Kirk I haven't heard of that "personal truth" stuff before. From some quick googling, it doesn't seem to be my type of thing. I haven't seen this video in a long time, but I don't think that's what he is talking about and certainly not what I was talking about. I and (I think) the video maker were using the word "truth" as an explanation for "correct"/verified facts. So I think we are all driving at the same thing. Just using different language. Though, I think that might be what you have issue with, the terminology we are using. Truth in this context to me has always meant objective, unbiased reality. Thank you for your perspective.
thing is you can't be right without knowing the truth.. it bugs me when people bash someone wanting to be right or thinking they're right.. by definition you have to think you're right. If you think something else is right, now that's what you think.
As always... a class act, Shad. Even if you had been wrong, you would have corrected yourself as you have before, you would still be in my rotation of viewing and you would still be one of the most engaging youtubers with your viewers and generally always have a cheerful, refreshing attitude which makes your videos pleasant to watch. You radiate an aura of NOT being arrogant, which is patently obvious through watching your videos. Have a lovely day, cheers!
Question: what would the restorative/repair techniques would there be for leather armor? Being armor, it would surely be damaged, but (being leather) wouldn't it be less repairable than metal (being more malleable)? If patches were used, it would become weaker AND more expensive to repair as it gets repaired more. Would it not make sense, therefore, to take leather armor that has taken serious damage and use the parts that are still integrally sound for other objects? I don't mean to say that this is so widespread it would substantially reduce the archeological record, but perhaps it could cause the records to fluctuate a little. This is all by thought experiment and with very little actual historical knowledge about leather and such.
Sheol_IK yes, it does, but with linen and metal armor the methods for repair may be more effective, as linen patches or re-sewings can be made to fit, or metal can be rewelded/reforged. Leather is unique because it is grown and has limited supply of that quality, meaning that instead of making a patch out of textile material or bending the metal back (because rending metal asunder is harder than denting it) you'd have to take a patch from a piece of fresh leather that then diminishes the usefulness of the rest of the hide. Obviously not by much, but when each hide is from another cow, the cost of a leather patch (either finding a quality scrap or pulling from a new hide=1 more cow lost) might be higher than a linen patch (sewing to length/size from materials) or beating on the metal for a few hours. Kind of like buying a whole new deck of cards to get a fresh 7 of clubs when you may as well use the new deck instead.
Hmm. So it might not be as prevalent in archeological finds due to people recycling it... I think that hinges on how easily reworked cured leather is, which I have no clue of. Still interesting food for thought. :)
A gambison can be patched - leather has to be repaired. The difference is that a leather piece is remade to replace the damaged part where a piece can be added to cover the damage on a gambison. Both are a pain in the backside to do (gambisons are HECK to sew through) and leather would probably need to go back to the armorer. Properly repaired, leather probably didn't degrade as Shad believes. Improper repairs and multiple re-attachments would cause degradation over time, however. It just means that leather is more costly to maintain than a gambison, which might explain the lower prevalence as well. My suspicion is that someone who could afford leather was probably getting close to being able to afford metal - personally, I'd hang on to the gambison a while longer and save up for the plate if that were so. A point Shad didn't cover is that leather armor requires more skill to make. I think he's mistaken that most people couldn't tan - they likely could and did for some hides. However, tanning is time consuming and really smelly - which is why the were happy to let the tanner do most of that work, preferably on the outskirts of town. The expense with leather armor probably came from the forming as much as the material. Hide and thick leather have to be molded - it's not that easy and only an armorer would keep the necessary jigs. A commoner could do the job but it would not be nearly as good as that of an armorer - if you're investing in hide/leather, why would you then not invest in craftsmanship?
I agree that leather armour would probably be harder and more costly to repair. But how relevant that is, depends largely on the frequency a person gets into fights. To people who have to keep armour around for the unlikely case they might actually need it but don't regularly wear it, leather might be the more economic choice, particularly in the medieval that was ridden with pests. Getting your armour out in times of need only to realizes moths ate half of it is big bummer, and pests that eat hardened leather are much rarer than pests that eat textiles.
I just thought about something, I don't think I've seen gambison armor being brought up too much outside of your videos, there's been a few exeption sure, but pop culture seems to ignore it completely
It probably has less to do with being sexy than looking defensive. (I mean, full plate isn't sexy, either, nor is most leather armor seen onscreen. Except sometimes on women.) We know leather is tough from everyday experience, but gambeson looks like a fluffy overcoat.
Can't show off your physique when wearing a puffy coat. IMO, that's why movies never use gambisons. The leather armour they use tends to be body hugging and even when they use plate, it doesn't have the big flaring chest that real plate had.
I think that it's in part because you really don't see gambesons being worn because it's being covered by armor. So it appears, to the unitiated, that a person is wearing armor directly over their clothes in historical paintings and manuals and often when depicted it tends to look just like normal clothes. So that's what Hollywood sees and goes for when depicting armor wearing people.
An aspect not often spoke of in linen vs leather is breathability. All the activity required will cause ALOT of sweat. Leather absorbs sweat and sweat damages leather. Linen allows sweat to evaporate, and air to circulate between fibers. It's interesting how layering clothing for weather equates to layering for combat.
Well I'm definitely impressed with how well you handled this, Shad. Not everyone manages to respond to that kind of harsh criticism with this level of dignity and respect. The internet (and really the world at large) could definitely use more of this kind of approach. Also, completely unrelated: I just now noticed that your glasses look almost exactly like mine. I feel special now :)
Never attack the person, always attack the argument. That's something I was told from childhood in Norway, do I always remember that? No, but a good lesson.
I would like to see a video specifically on leather armor, what it would of looked like, functioned, when it would have been common and when it would be appropriate to use in storytelling.
I would personally say any group of people who have access to leather easily, so nomadic herders or people who's heard animals are rather large. Or if they have a way to make leather cheaply. Leather is pretty durable, Skall has a great video of some stupid durable stuff, and so it isn't bad for armor, it's just more ablative than gambeson.
Replying to a two year old comment I know but I was literally just looking into this for a project: if you want places where leather is fairly commonly used for armour and shields Africa is very much a place to look. Lot of pastoralist societies; also a lot of wild animals that you can make good armour out of. Oryx, buffalo, elephant, hippo, and crocodile hides are all among the things that were or may have been used.
Another point to observe is that leather is very useful in small sturctural pieces like straps, belts, scabbards and such where linen versions don't work as well. To me this implies a higher demand for leather thus higher cost. This in turn favors the low income masses using linen for the large area body coverings.
This isn't debate club though. Pointing out fallacies is "the fallacy fallacy" If I say "you're a big dumb idiot and i can't believe you're saying dogs have scales and that's why i'm right when i say 2+2=4" you can point out the many fallacies in that statement all day, but two plus two does actually equal four.
Maybe in your country. In my country we are taught to write only arguments that are possible to give examples to from mandatory reading books. After every argument we write what happened in a mandatory reading book and how is that tied to our point. The part about what happened in in the books is more important than an argument making sense. It doesn't even teach to give sources to what we want to prove because we don't use quotes nor correct bibliography.
Very true!! Leather is plenty good enough to protect the skin against scrapes, pokes, and some blunt trauma. Just not sharp metal blades that can slice well!
@@KickyFut Even motorcycle armour usually has other materials for reinforcement. Plastic, rubber, carbon fibre, metal - even cotton, synthetics and wool.
That "In this context" thing works really well as a sort of stop sign, telling the listeners; "Hey, pay attention to the exact wording, don't make me repeat myself". Good choice.
You were never unclear about anything. Some people just need to find stuff to be controversial about because they have nothing better to do with their lives...
Leather would be great as a water proofing covering for gambeson, and it would help keep the wearer comfortable in adverse weather without having to change his armor at all.
I think this is a case of a guy wanting attention by purposefully not listening to what you said to "prove" what he's saying. Excellent researched reply, Shad!
I was going to comment something similar, the badhistory subreddit is mostly for misconceptions that Hollywood propagates like studded leather armor for example. To criticize a historical TH-camr like Shad and even call him arrogant in that subreddit is just begging for attention. Now the redditor did have some fair points and I'm glad Shad made this video to clarify things, just goes to show his humility.
Drax the Warlock Titan For the record, no, I wasn't looking for attention, just annoyed that Shad had ignored my previous attempts to alert him to the possibility that he might be wrong, entirely unfamiliar with his channel and the times where he has admitted to being wring, and not used to his bombastic style. Calling him arrogant was a mistake, and one I regret and have apologized for, but posting to /r/badhistory and going into detail on the points where Shad was wrong is not.
Jonathan Dean sorry if it seems I mislabeled you as just an attention grabber. you were right in criticising someone especially someone in a position of influence like Shad. It is not wrong and in fact Shad encourages it. And his style can take some getting used to so I can see where you're coming from. Your argument was well thought out and well written you made great points and I appreciate you having references to back your claims. I'm thankful you decided to write the essay, it was a good read and this was a good video in response to it. I love seeing these debates because it helps us all get closer to the truth of the matter.
Jonathan Dean the problem is that your article assumes and propagates the idea that Shad holds certain views that he does not. So, should Shad write a Bad History article about your article, since anything in the past is history? Shad has clarified his beliefs, though personally I understood his stance when I watched his videos the first time, I know that not everyone think the same way or picks up on the same points of information. Part of being members of the human race. But since Shad clarified, wouldn't it be fair of you to edit your article to do the same and take the truth of his views into account? Rather than painting him as someone who runs roughshod over history with intentional misinformation? Or did I misread that implication?
Geno Breaker I don't believe that Shad is deliberately riding roughshod over history or deliberately distorting history (at least until he decided to ignore medieval price data in favour of theoretical prices from 800-900 years before the period under discussion, which were in turn 600-800 years younger than the context in which they were being applied. Yeah, I have some issues with Aldrete), I just don't think he does sufficient research for his videos. And I won't edit my original post, but I will acknowledge and discuss that my reply to this video.
Point of correction, they didn't just stack shirts to make gambeson. It was quilted with wool that wasn't suitable for spinning. There's a series of you tube videos that shows castle building, and life in the medieval times, and they cover this.
Hey Shad long time fan but hope you see this, first of all im an tradtional tanner, and first using natural substances its not super difficult to make a really hard thick leather , would not be suitable for much except a flat chest piece and or shield but tis easy to make, second if you drop hide in warm water it change to a very thick version that can easily crack but is kinda tough (this you dont need to tan to obtrain) second i agree fully it wasnt common, but an argument i myself have used and many use is "not many finds" well you know a funny thing is i live in sweden and its "common knowledge" about the vast use of chainmail, but actyually have very little findings of chainmail, (compared to other regions) one of the more keen findings is the visby harness from gotland wich is actually a leather coat of plates sortof, i think depends on were you are from anbd the uses you need, here in the north we would need alot of fabric and flax and such for sails, clothes, canvas, but i agree that gambeson were used but i wouldnt be surprised if many used "simplier gambesons" made out of layered wool, casue wool was even more common and something almsot every household did have :) hope i gave more food for thought for you, thanks for a nice video :)
You have to love when somebody starts an argument by pointing out your arrogance. As if pointing out someone's arrogance was an act of humility. I see from the pinned comment that it took him a week to figure out how to spin the fact he blatantly misrepresented your position. The video clips were quite clear; there's a massive semantic difference between "weren't many" and "weren't any".
Essentially, not unheard of but not common. Like how not everyone in the military gets a Handgun issued to them but that doesn't make it strange to see someone wearing one on their hip. Maybe closer to seeing a lever action cartridge firing Winchester repeating rifle during the American Civil War when black powder rifles was the only standard issue rifle. It existed but few had them. If you want argue usefulness maybe a sabre in WWI or WWII when some officers still had them in combat but was less than ideal.
Gungriffen Actually, usage of melee weapons was pretty prominent in WWI. Since trenches permeated throughout many of the fronts of the war, a lot of battles revolved around trying to capture the enemy trench lines. Once you get in close, it pays to have some method of doing consistent damage without having to reload a bolt action rifle or pistol (especially if you run out of ammo). In those cases, many soldiers even used improvised weapons (sticks with nails or sharpened shovels, for instance) for melee combat. Imagine how effective a saber would have been considering you’d have greater reach than many improvised weapons, on top of the fact that armor was very rare!
Not to mention that maces were also rather prominent in trench warfare. And the close confines of a trench are not the best environment for a sword, especially because of the amount of people involved in these attacks.
Jamthis I’d be interested to know how effective a cutlass would have been, considering it was designed to be better suited to tight quarters than sabers
A few points: "Like how not everyone in the military gets a Handgun issued to them but that doesn't make it strange to see someone wearing one on their hip." FWIW, most handguns issued by most militaries are more a symbol of rank than anything. I can attest that the typical handgun training given by the US military is absolutely worthless. The terrible training goes hand in hand with their feeling the need to issue a DA/SA pistol that also has a safety, and now a striker-fired pistol that also has a safety. Hundreds of thousands of people carry a pistol of either type daily in the US WITHOUT a safety like the M9 or M17 has without a problem (the civilian and police version of the M17 is the P320). Even cops don't generally bother with safeties, and their training is only slightly better than the usual military training, which is to say absolutely terrible. There are exceptions to the rule - I know folks who've been in SOF roles and they would wear pistols out in training by shooting 1000 rounds/man/day during a typical training cycle. One of them said their armorer had a crate full of M9 locking blocks and slides, because both would fail frequently under that kind of stress. "Maybe closer to seeing a lever action cartridge firing Winchester repeating rifle during the American Civil War when black powder rifles was the only standard issue rifle." Winchester lever rifles came along post-Civil War. Henry rifles were extant and issued in small amounts, though. IIRC, that idiot Custer's Civil War unit used them. Not all were issue; many were privately purchased (as with many handguns by Germans in WWII). Also, the early lever action rifles - both Henry and Winchester - used black powder cartridges. Even the Winchester 1892 (the rifle in almost every old Western, and used by John Wayne in every one of his Westerns) was only available in blackpowder cartridges. Later, those cartridges would be loaded with smokeless powder, yes, but they were all created for blackpowder. "Which is the reason why bajonetts where extremely widespread in WW1" Trench warfare in WWI made even fixed bayonets unwieldy. Specialized clubs/maces, specialized knives, etc. were very popular because the trenches were rarely straight, but would zigzag to reduce fatalities in case of an artillery hit, and in case someone with a rifle jumped in the trench - they wouldn't have a clear line of fire down a packed trench. Add to that the fact that rifles during that war were on the very long side by today's standards. The widespread use of bayonets goes back a LOOOOONG time to the early days of firearms. For example, the British dominated many battles in the American Revolution because they were better at bayonet fighting. By and large, the Americans were the better marksmen, but with single-shot muzzle loaders, a lot of fights were decided by turning your musket into a pike and getting dirty. In WWII, the Soviets were so backwards that the main issue rifle was sighted in with the bayonet attached, and the doctrine demanded that bayonets be fixed to rifles at all times except in garrison or transport. Basically, the widespread use of bayonets in WWI had nothing to do with the type of fight it was, and the fact that they were a carry over from centuries past. "I’d be interested to know how effective a cutlass would have been, considering it was designed to be better suited to tight quarters than sabers" They're the same weapon (unless you count the non-saber cavalry sabers of the US and UK of the WWI era). The original pattern for a naval cutlass was taken from an infantry saber. Cavalry sabers were (understandably) longer and heavier. Compare a military cutlass and infantry saber of the same era, and almost the only difference is the guard.
In a past life, I distinctly remember wearing a full sized Gambeson under the mail, another over the mail, plate over that, and wielded two shields. The enemy wasn't going to shoot me, crush me, stab me, slice me or fold me.
So they rolled me into a river.
how do i favorite comments?
I played a game of D&D with a guy who was a half orc cleric who insisted on using two tower shields. If things got hairy he would put one shield behind him, one on front, kneel down, and "clamshell" them together, becoming pretty much impervious to harm.
Then he decided he was going to turn on my paladin character because I always prevented him from robbing shops and killing random NPCs. The fight quickly went in my favor so he "clamshelled" thinking I couldn't hurt him.
I wrapped my rope around him, trapping him inside his shell then picked him up and threw him into a lake.
lmao
Sellsword Luet?
Rasputin?
Shad's not arrogant. He's Australian. There's a subtle difference.
Yeah one involves throwing a frisby to crocodiles.
Lol that is actually true.
Probably something to do with our better public education....
Been hangin around the wrong Americans :P but seriously, I find the majority of British and Australian accents to be more pleasant.
I snorted
Only the ignorant believe they know everything.
After 30 years as an archaeologist im always learning something new.
@midgetydeath Doubtful. I counter it with this:
If armor was so useful against firearms it would have rendered firearms useless and we wouldn't have used them at all.
Armor became irrelevant because back in the day it took time and expertise to make which made it expensive. Taking only the cost of the materials of a smartphone it's only worth about 50 to 100 dollars.
But then the expertise factors in. Someone had to design it. Someone had to make it (a factory more specifically) and it took power to do so, transportation and more.
Armor is expensive and even then an early firearm will go through mail and sometimes even plate armor. Moreover it can easily knock someone off a horse at close range meaning it can be quickly followed up with a bayonet.
Modern firearms, especially rounds such as a 5.56 NATO FMJ round which are known for their penetrating power can easily go through plate armor AND more importantly can still whallop the horse of a knight leading to the same earlier situation.
Ergo it is more cost efficient to employ lighter ("lighter". Modern armor weighs about the same as plate) to field a dozen soldiers with rifles and relatively minimal training to take out a handful of armored targets. Sure you can argue the heavy armor guy will kill double his weight in combat against lighter targets with lesser training but on the other hand they are cheaper to replace and thusly by the time an enemy has one heavy armor guy again you've replaced your forces three fold.
@@RascaldeesV2 if you think 5.56 NATO is famed for it's penetrative power you need to study firearms a wee bit more. Also cost may not be the only thing that factors into guns supplanting armored melee infantry. Musketeers are much more maneuverable on the tactical, operational, and strategic levels of warfare for one and with massed fires you are quite likely to hit something vulnerable whilst your accompanying pikemen keep the enemy at bay.
@@josephahner3031 not just 5.56 he said 5.56 fmj
@@cheesestyx945 in other words standard 5.56mm ammunition. FMJ stands for full metal jacket which means the lead bullet is copper or brass plated. Most modern ammunition has this feature except for hollow points, soft nose hunting rounds, and other specialty ammunition.
@@josephahner3031 yeah I did more research after this but lost the comment. My gun knowledge is less than my medieval knowledge. I do think his point still stands though, a musket during the American revolution were powerful enough to rip someone's arm off at close range so it's safe to assume you'd rather be more agile than be wearing armor which may not fully protect you.
I never understood why people think that a reliable source makes one mistake, that makes EVERYTHING they said unreliable, and try to find ways to discredit everything they do.
wait, the news being the one who discredits or the news being the one discredited?
Most Likely Dead Yes
Immaturity, mostly.
Most Likely Dead exactly
Shad told me bikini armor is not as good for protection as full plate, clearly his massive ego is clouding his judgement as all Skyrim players know the skimpier the armor the better it works.
In this context
Sleepy .Time - you know, I've been noticing that myself, in Skyrim. I wince every time I see the fantasy armor that offers so little coverage, thinking that it just ruins the immersion by breaking with realism. An arrow in the belly button has got to hurt, and there are no doctors in Skyrim to even try to perform the difficult surgery needed to repair a perforated gut. Reality check, Bethesda!! Shame on you!
@Lukas - Well in defense of Bethesda they did not make the fantasy armor, modders do. The easiest thing to do is if you play on PC just open the Creation Kit or Tes5Edit and remove most of the armor rating from any of the skimpy armor sets that you like the look of but do not think should rival Ebony armor for protection. Mages run around with just some cloth covering their vital bits, being naked is hardly much worse.
It's important that you run Better Bodies as well, more curves, better protection.
SKYRIM BELONGS TO THE NORDS!
The fact that he was able to respond like this shows maturity. He didn't get defensive, he respected the person's difference of opinion, he conceded that he may have been wrong and stated that he was willing to change his opinion if he was, and he explained himself without being mean.
lord knows we wouldn't want to be mean.
Yeah, but he is still kinda sexist in an LDS sort of way.
@@mashadarii do you know him personally? Because I didn't hear any LDS sexism come from him.
He pointed out that, in general, men don't like to sew.
I know this for a fact because I am a man, I do like to sew, and when I tell other men this they often show surprise.
Women as a group tend to have preferences and strengths just as men as a group tend to have preferences and strengths. You can call that sexism if you want. I call it quite natural, normal, and completely unoffensive.
What can be offensive is people who attack other people because they don't like the fact that the other person recognizes standard roles from gender to gender.
@@mashadarii Must people always be so touchy about political correctness?
@@watch7966 how is being low key sexist in an LDS cult sort of way related to political correctness? I am still a huge fan of this guy's work.
"Sometimes it is better to know the wrong thing about the subject than nothing about it at all because often times knowing the wrong thing will lead to you learning the right." - Shad
Sometimes it's easier to learn afresh than to unlearn.
True
sometimes it's easier to not learn at all
^^ nice
It's really cool to see that Shad knows when to correct himself when he has mistakes, "Correct a wise man and he will thank you, correct a fool and he will get mad at you." Props to you, Shad. Great video!
... but what about Dragons?
Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.
when he mentions the leather piece that was too thin to be standalone armor, all I could think of was: "maybe they were sewing Leather onto Gambison/Padded Armor?" it kinda makes sense. both are 'fairly' easy to harvest, and Leather can keep water out of Gambison during rain and storms, among other, more dangerous situations.
Apparently, I've heard gambisons are stronger when a lil wet.
Probably really heavy, but when you're used to plate armor, I don't think it'd be that big of a deal.
@@trashtrash2169 Honestly. regular leather just seems to be more of a supplimental to 'real' armor. like when you have cloth or leather padding between yourself and, say, Chainmail, or Plate.
It's not difficult to harden leather to the point that, when backed with gambeson, it can effectively dampen cutting attacks from swords and other edged weapons. Also, it's very likely that our popular interpretation of "studded leather" comes from a type of brigandine or strip-metal armour which used a leather vest or coat to contain the more protective elements. Wear _that_ over some gamebson and you've got some pretty damn effective armour that can probably be made a little cheaper and plenty quicker than a good chain shirt.
A lot of people in the medieval period were adept as sewing, even if gambeson was more expensive, they could repair it themselves, saving costs. Leather armour and requiring the ability to cure leather to repair it would make leather armour much more expensive in the long term.
Do you know what it takes to cure a hide based textile? It depends on what sort of curing you mean, as there are two stages in processing a hide where the term curing is used. In the first you just need salt. You skin the animal, flesh the hide, then coat the flesh side of the hide with a liberal application of salt that you spread around and rub into the skin really well. This just helps to both prevent bacterial growth and speed up the removal of moisture from the hide for skins that can't be processed right away and need to be stored. These cured hides will keep just fine for several months easily, and in the right conditions they can last for years before they need to be further processed into a finished material.
In the other case, where you are taking something like finished rawhide and looking to make it weatherproof, all it takes is some fat and a camp fire. You rub the rawhide down with the fat, and let it sit near a fire to help the fat soften and penetrate deeper. That's about it, for best results though you'll want to use a rendered fat like tallow so it doesn't spoil on you and start to stink.
Alternatively, in some cases you can also choose to smoke a skin instead, such as is commonly done with buckskin in order to make the finished product washable without worrying about it turning into rawhide after it gets wet. This process is also sometimes referred to as curing. It just requires you to gather some punky hardwood to get a nice thick smoke going and a bit of hide glue to temporarily hold the buckskin in a bag shape that you suspend over the fire to capture the rising smoke, in order to force it through the fibers.
Repairs are really simple too in most cases. You take some thread made from either rawhide or sinew, bind the hole shut with it, and then let it dry. If you want you can also take some hide glue and really work it down in there for further reinforcement (on items that should be more rigid).
Even someone with almost no skill at all can do these things and they cost almost nothing, as all the supplies mentioned here aside from the salt and punk wood are usually created with hide scraps and other commonly available waste materials from the animals you get the hides from. The repair tools are pretty simple too and shouldn't have been all that hard to come by - a heavy duty leather sewing needle and possibly a hole punch in the case of things like rawhide and thicker leathers.
I've made quite a fair bit of buckskin over the years, and a ton of rawhide for a friend who makes tribal drums. Most textile work related to animal skins are really simple to pick up and most of it can be done at home with primitive tools. They do however usually require a fair bit of endurance and some arm strength though.
Ian S I forgot to mention the tanning that would need to take place and high amounts of tannin obtained from oak would not have been cheap and tanning was a noxious unpleasant process. Most people wouldnt be able to tan the hides after the curing. I should have mentioned that rather than jist the curing, plus its the time required to make the leather to repair the armour whereas linen to repair gambeson would be more easily and quickly obtained. Good info on the curing process though, i knew some but not the entirety of it.
I'm still not convinced most "leather armor" was made with actual leather, it just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Rawhide is very simple to make and far more tough and rigid. It can even be built up in layers for further protection, just by spreading out hide glue between the layers before stretching them out over a form to dry into the desired shape. I never bothered to look into the history of what medieval folks did, so I can't say for sure how much of that is relevant. But regardless - whether we're talking leather, buckskin, or rawhide - they can all be mended fairly easily with an animal based thread made from rawhide or sinew. They should've been very common back then and you just need a couple of basic leather working tools to use them to sew up any sort of rips or tears.
Did some reading around just now, and it seems one of the more common hide based materials used back then for things like the outer face of wooden shields, helmets and other stuff is something called boiled leather (that wasn't actually boiled). It seems to be something similar to rawhide that was often pressed into molds to get fancy embossed patterns. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiled_leather
'loricis minoribus' written by Gerald of Wales it differentiates between the 'lorica' and maille. Set that alongside occasional references to 'leather jerkins' or 'hides' being worn as armour in wales.
Walter Map, another Welshman writing in 1180 or thereabouts, only in this case he's describing the Brabançons.
What makes you think people would have to skin, tan etc, a hide to obtain leather? Do you think they did that to obtain every pair of shoes or leather bag they owned? Of course not. There were people who did this for a living then just as now. The same goes for textiles. Most people wouldn’t grow their own flax then harvest and produce their own linen. Just as not everyone would own sheep and make wool and woollen clothes, blow their own glass, own bees and make candles and so on
One has to marvel at the unbridled nerdiness of this channel.
One might even DC if they were to get too deep. *smirk*
Victor García I sometimes watch a bunch of shadiversity videos in a row when I want to escape everyday life (and learn something new while doing that).
The Post Apocalyptic Inventor I really enjoyed your videos on universal motors, washing machine motors. Great channel and nice workshop.
I can't even watch Shad's videos around my wife. She doesn't say anything, but I feel like I'm being judged.
I love that he has a lightsaber hanging on the wall with the rest of his swords
Thanks for the tip, now people will backlash at Shad saying stuff like "OH why do you have non-historical bla blah blah"
Ehat have you done to poor old Shad
@@dekay1428 to be fair that would hurt their argument.
True data but TH-cam is full of those people
Hunter Hall Its possible that it’s one of the collapsible one.
@@Sheenulus the best kind.
Apparently, most of the "leather armor" debate is due to the not-so-clear distinction between "rawhide" and "leather" in several languages; and the fact that ceremonial/tournament/training gear wasn't always listed in separate sections in the armory inventories. Tanned leather "armor" did exist in significant quantities, but it usually served very different functions, it was not something you'd choose to wear on a battlefield when rawhide is both a cheaper and harder material. *However, both leather armor and rawhide armor were called "armure de cuir"* in the _lingua franca._
Most historical hide armor was actually made of rawhide, not tanned hide (not even vegetable-tanned). Rawhide is the rigid plastic-y stuff that dog chew toys are made of. Hardened leather is worse than rawhide or hardened rawhide as a main armoring material, and was more expensive. Tanning serves to keep the hide flexible when dry, it has nothing do with armoring performance. To make rawhide armor, you take raw hide and work it on a shape or "convex mold" while it's wet and flexible. Then you make it dry on a rigid shape to take that shape (usually, lamellar pieces). Once dry, you lacquer the rawhide to seal it and make it waterproof. An alternative is to boil rawhide in wax and/or oil, in a similar way as how tournament/training armor could be made from boiling tanned leather to harden it. *It is arguable that historical **_cuir bouilli_** was actually made from wax-boiling rawhide, not leather, which explains why modern attempts at reproducing cuir bouilli by boiling leather rarely come close to its alleged historical performance.* Bonus points: boiling rawhide is how hide glue is made. Armor made of boiled rawhide is essentially closer to polymer or resin than it is to leather, even to the so-called "boiled leather" of modern reproduction attempts.
Of, course, leather was still very useful as a main material for constructing armor, but as I said, it was not used for what people think. A lot of the *ceremonial equipment* and *training/practice gear* was made of leather or hardened leather, because tanned leather requires less maintenance than raw hide. Which is the whole point of the tanning process, we tan hide so that it stays softer and flexible when dry. Tanning a hide that needed to hold up well against blades would be counter-productive.
Now, for the language part. : The French word "cuir" denotes any sort of "tough skin", not just leather specifically, it is semantically metaphorical and can apply to steel armor in the sense that _any_ armor is a "tougher skin" that you put on top of your body. Rawhide is also called "cuir cru" in French. We unfortunately don't clearly differentiate untanned hide from leather in French; one is "cuir cru" (crude leather) while the other is "cuir tanné" (tanned leather). This lead to a lot of misconceptions over time. Many people still tend to think that dog chew toys are made of tanned leather, when it's usually raw hide... and they tend to think that historical battlefield armor was made of shoe-grade "cuir" like biker saddles.
A "cuirasse" could be made from pieces of hard rawhide forming a shell, but it could also be made with leather as a base if it was reinforced with steel. In French, when we think about a "cuirasse", we usually picture steel or iron, not leather. This word is equivalent to what anglophones think of with the word "ironclad". The word for an ironclad warship in French is "cuirassier", even though these ship hulls were obviously not reinforced with leather.
Also, you have to check the cost of *wool,* not just linen, for pricing a poor man's gambeson. Low-quality wool was probably comparable in price to linen, so it could have been cheaper than low-quality rawhide, let alone tanned leather. Coarse linen was preferred also because it's not as hot as wool for the same amount of protection. This is a very important advantage in the summer. People may have preferred wool gambesons for winter and linen for summer, if they could afford to be picky.
Now, about the "clearly-identifiable leather armor", the examples shown could still be steel armor covered in dyed fabric or painted. Many medieval armors were painted, and many medieval armors were covered with a layer of textile or rawhide, which was then lacquered to seal it and prevent drawing in moisture. Lacquered rawhide is waterproof, very hard, and _very_ scratch-resistant; unlike _any_ tanned leather.
To my (limited) knowledge, there are about as many historical sources for lacquered rawhide armor or boiled rawhide armor as there are for any sort of leather armor. The sources and finds for rawhide armor also seem to be a lot more oriented towards use in actual combat; they're less likely to be indicative of tournament or training usage. There's also the fact that many existing rawhide armors in collections nowadays tend to be incorrectly labeled as being "leather", for various reasons. Notably, not all museums and collectors do chemical analysis on their organic collection pieces when they can just look at it, call it "leather", and be done with it. Pretty much everybody is familiar with the idea of using leather in armoring, but not so much with the idea of rawhide. People, even well-educated ones, tend to think of rawhide as something that decomposes quicky and doesn't even last a couple years, let alone centuries. But they usually forget that lacquer existed since antiquity and that tanning was not the only method used to preserve hides.
And people tend to forget what type of steel was used to make armor. Their regular mid-to-low carbon steel was more likely to rust very fast because of how close it is from pur iron (although the type of rust was more likely to be a protective shell we still found on rough iron these days instead of the ugly pitting we see on modern steel). So, in order to be able to carry your armor around without having to take care of it too often, you need to protect it in some way. This shows the importance of the rawhide, leather or paint backing you are talking about.
Hmm, wool gambeson.
I try to look at historical arms and armor from a soldier's perspective. Looking at the linen gambeson from that point of view, the first thing that springs to my mind is how much wearing it would suck once it got wet. Wool would be a lot more tolerable in a rainy climate.
immikeurnot agreed. And wool was still a prominent fabric as a great deal of peasants (in England, the Scottish Highlands, and in many regions of France, for sure) were Shepherds, and so wool was already the go-to hard-use and somewhat affordable fabric of the medieval era. Although linen is a better fabric when dry (because air flows better trough it) wool is so much better when wet. I did fought wearing a gambeson, I can tell you that even when it doesn't rain, it does get sweat-soaked pretty fast on the inside layers...
With this in mind, I think linen would be great for the external parts of the gambeson because of the the better air flow, but the core of the gambeson should be heavy weight wool, as it absorbs shocks better on top of all.
Thank you so much for all this information about rawhide vs tanned leather! My textiles professor is going to drool over your explanation and probably reference it in a lesson.
Also, I never thought of rawhide as being used for anything other than dog toys today. I wonder if it could have any other practical uses today?
one practical use is, to use it as reinforcement of the rim of a viking era round shield ;).
I would hardly call you arrogant... you have repeated admitted errors... quite graciously actually. You always leave open the possibility of discussion and critique.
Ya arrogant is the last thing I would think of when trying to describe Mr Shad
I'll still read their criticism, unless said attacks continue. Just because they attacked me initially doesn't mean that they don't have anything worthwhile to say, but often it does mean that I won't be able to have a proper discussion with them as they will continue to attack me in the future.
I would say that Shad IS arrogant when he's stating things as if they're strict fact when they've been more in the realm of opinion, BUT he also admits errors, repeatedly, as you said. *shrug*
Except that he always has added the qualifier on it. So, no I think you are digging there Kain.
Not always, no. I've actually had to offer some corrections myself to some of his statements of fact over the past year. But, as I said, when he has realized this he has admitted his error, too.
Hey, French here, a cuirasse doesn't have to be in leather, we call battleships "cuirassés", but they're not made in leather. It's the origin of the word but we use it to designate pretty much everything that do a protec.
but a leather battleship would be made from a renewable resource, potentially organic, *and* it would be biodegradable!
Coriaceus = leathery
Hmm...thanks for the info. It was quite interesting. The more you know right? Lol
@@arthas640 But what about the cows that would die for the ship?
@@iainjones537 it can also mean the "leather" or skin of a nut wich is made of wood sort of. A similar word to shell (like of a clam)
i feel this is a case of "A Little knowledge is a dangerous thing" and the reddit poster having a case of hearing and seeing only what he wanted to hear and see to prove his point. Great reply as always Shad.
I think the term youre looking for is 'confirmation bias'. And this reddit user is suffering from a terminal case of it lol
Even after his persona and his work are being attacked he keeps his composure, his manners and calmly replies with facts and proofs rather than lashing out and transverse other's arguments. That's a true gentleman! Something the Internet desperately needs in bulk these days.
It would be best to identify the salient points of the article and bring them to the fore, arguing that first. Then defending himself against the little kid-spat of context and ad-hominem, etc. The article was unfair, I get it, but filter it out and distill the substance of the article to grab the audience's attention, because rehashing and explaining those spats can be a turn off, especially when it's used to open the video content. I understand he wanted to start out point-by-point about what he felt was misrepresented, in order to give his viewers context of his past arguments; the problem is that it's boring and uninteresting. Better to grab his audience's attention and go through his own substance and current conclusions about Leather Armor, then go through the substance of the article, and then when he's made his argument of the merits and given his conclusion, THEN go ahead and defend yourself if you are inclined. First rule of debate: , "Present your opponent's viewpoint better than he can". IMO it would make the video more watchable; I appreciate Shad trying to be humble, but he's trying too hard and he doesn't need to. It's "CRINGING" to listen to, not to mention see it displayed in the title. He should probably continue to do so, perhaps, I'm not saying he should change his personality and style (as if anyone should listen to me), but I think these kinds of "Was I wrong" episodes would be better if he filtered out what I think is hand-wringing out of the opening and middle, leaving it for the end AFTER he's made his conclusions. Get straight to the "substance", then you can worry about "style", where he can tick off all the points about why the article was just a little unfair and unnecessarily antagonistic (and it was).
Transverse other's arguments? What?
While I am also impressed by Shad's excellent record of responding fully and with dignity to those who call out his conclusions, I think it's wrong to think of the reddit post as an 'attack'. Only once did the OP use the word 'arrogant' in his very long, comprehensive post. Granted, I agree with Shad's logic on Leather Armor, especially after the clarifications and corrections he made in this video. But at the same time, the redditor in question used sourced information in his arguments against Shad's position and by-in-large focused on Shad's conclusions rather than the man himself, even if the sources were not representative of the overall distribution of findings and evidence and despite the fact that he came to certain conclusions that did not necessarily follow from the evidence he presented.
I just want to add that "proofs" is not a word. Proof is just proof. Just like you don't go to the bank to get monies and generators don't generate electricities you don't have proofs either. :)
Reaper in the mathematical context, proofs is considered a word. For example: "Today in math class, we had to complete three proofs for homework." So while it is incorrect to say something like "The detective gathered plenty of proofs", proofs is a perfectly acceptable when referring to a type of mathematical problem.
Some decades ago my friend was visiting my home dressed in hollywood leather armor. He got hurt by common houseplant, whose pointy sawbladelike leaves stung just through it like nothing. The plant is called in my language [the mother of wife]'s tongue.
Anopinkieli?
Kyllä (Yes)
How funny! We call it the same! “Mother in Law’s Tongue!
That'd be "lengua de suegra" in Spanish
You had me at "I might be wrong."
Good for you. TH-cam is trending towards Ego, this sector of TH-cam (the Historical Dark-web of You Skal, Lindy, Scholar, Thengn and others) are all about exploring the possibilities and historical evidences behind the arms, Armour and warfare of the medieval period. For which I think I can speak for all your viewers, we thank all of you very much.
Keep up the great work.
From QLD,
Sam.
I mean, Shad makes perfect sense. He never said he thinks leather armor didn't exist at all, just not how fantasy and Hollywood presents it. Personally, I think the idea of leather armor in fantasy is not that big a deal since fantasy is entitaled to some anacronisms and creative liberty.
But if the idea is to depict a technology or culture based in European medieval history, then it makes sense to treat it in a historical context. Texile armor would be more prevelant due to cost effectiveness, ease of manufacture and all that, but if a sell sword or lower class noble had the money, but not for steel plate or mail, then it makes sense that they would consider leather. I agree with Shad that leather would be a step up, in cost and utility, than textile armor. I've never heard Shad just outright say "No leather armor was never a thing and it's stupid".
The way Hollywood usually treats leather armor is just a way to show peoples' abs without having them go naked. It's not real armor, more like a fashion statement.
Movies like to have leather armor because it is way easier on the actors to have a jacket modified to look like light armor than a Thicc Gambison.
At least. For making movies.
Its probably because leather armour looks more durable to a casual observer and is easier to make form fitting than a thick gambeson so it doesn't make your star actors look fat.......... sorry thick when wearing it.
Also because it just looks cooler to most people
I don't think Gambeson makes you look fat, unless you were already fat in the first place. It looks very schwifty which isn't something people expect from the medieval time period.
Looks cool, cheaper than full plate.
@@jakublulek3261 You don't actually need to have real full plate though. A fake one can do just as well for the purposes of a movie.
But really, I myself don't like leather armour. So I'm quite biased against it.
"Arrogantly asserting his case with poorly thought out thought experiments"... WHAT?
If there is one thing you cannot say about this man is that he is arrogant, nor that he arrogantly asserts anything.
If one thing Shad is the antithesis of arrogance. A man who fails to realise that to me automatically fails in his assesment of the world.
He clearly has a mind which overlaps personal hatred and preferences with secular facts and THAT is a dangerous mind.
Is it really so difficult to be professional and just critique the man in a costructive way without having to use attacks ad personam? I get those all the time Shad, so I obviously sympathise and commend your ability to remain calm and polite. Keep it up you are a great example for all.
Greetings Metatron, I did not expect to see you here. Its nice to see you Raff.
To be fair, he does come across as arrogant with limited exposure. His method of speech, how he emphasis and his assertiveness of opinion. If one is unfamiliar with his work and, more importantly, his passion on the subject matter it is a fairly easy mistake to make.
Brian Hensley wut m8?
Being well informed and presenting scripted material with confidence equals arrogance now.
Bragging about being arrogant? Really? Ok, it must be a millennial thing.
Shad may be gruff at times but he knows his stuff. That’s why he made this channel, to dispel common myths and get to the most accurate historical truth he possibly can. Attacking someone like this, even mildly by calling him arrogant, is just bad form, logically fallacious and, well, rude. No need to defend someone like that.
@Brian Hensley Throne not thrown. I personally don't see why you're so focused on it as it's just a chair.
Shad is not arrogant. Arrogance is having an overinflated sense of self. Shad has never displayed this in ANY video.
To call someone arrogant in a video where they are responding to an opposing view reasonably and not rudely or brashly, is just foolish. If anything the only one here that has displayed arrogence is you.
Jake And if one is unfamiliar with his work then they shouldn't dare to quickly jump to conclusions. Who is the arrogant now?
*Hey Shad, you ever just realize that gambeson was basically medieval kevlar? Strong interwoven strands with a viscous (the waxy matrix in this case) medium to increase it's strength, think of say shear thickening fluid in modern stab-ballistic comvinations vests.*
*There's also a similar relation to kevlar and steel (ceramic doesn't really fit into this comparison) plates to that pf gambeson and steel plate. The gambeson/kevlar fills the roll of a lighter more flexible armor that doesn't lend all too much protection (relative to it's competitor, being steel plates) but is far more comfortable, easy to wear and way more cost effective. Steel in both the modern ballistic and historical suit forms severed the purpose of heavy armor that can take several shots from the most dangerous thing on the battle field. The same reason applies to why we don't give GI's kevlar. They're engaged in high damage symmetrical warfare.... or at least that's what they're equiped for.*
*On the far other end of the scale insurgency groups won't even bother to armor themselves because they don't intend to be in direct symmetrical battles. Not unlike say, kelts. The time line isn't quite accurate but the idea is still the same.*
*I just think this whole repeating themes in armor is an interesting phenomenon, one that possibly warrants a video?*
*For a name drop of course ;) love the content my guy!*
I don't find you to be arrogant in the slightest. You are very well informed, and go to great lengths to research and present your opinions with sound evidence in backing. I feel that possibly some people take your confidence and descriptiveness as pedantry when they already have an axe to grind. I appreciate you and your humility, and the fact that you have the professionalism, courtesy, and respect to give your critics' arguments a fair shake.
Let's all say it together...
CONTEXT!!!
In the grand scheme of global human history, leather armor was fairly widespread. We have buff coats, lamellar, and hide shields (not common in Europe) just to name a few.
However, in the specific context of medieval Europe, leather armor, that is armor made entirely or primarily of leather, was rare. Flax was commonly grown, and quality steel was relatively common, so gambeson, mail, and plate were preferred.
Move to an area with limited access to good steel, and leather armor, like lamellar, becomes much more common because the steel is reserved for weapons.
Move to a hotter climate, and lighter weight armor becomes desirable.
If we're discussing a nomadic or semi-nomadic people, non metallic armor rises in popularity due to reduced weight.
It's all about...
CONTEXT!!!
Also, if you're a nomadic people, such as the Mongols or Huns, you would have more excess animals available, but much less access to plant-based materials.
As an artisan leather worker, I find it frustrating that archaeologists and historians make baseless assumptions about tradesman tools and materials. There are leather working tools in museums today incorrectly labeled as pole arms, when they are actually a multi purpose tool that had an awl, a round knife blade, and a hammer on a small wooden handle. The modern leather workers round knife is based on this design. Knowing the evolution of a trade is common among tradesmen, yet we are rarely consulted. Cuir bouilli is not a historical method of hardening leather. The term actually comes from an experiment in hardening leather by baking it in a straw oven. The result was a very hard, but very brittle substance that had no apparent use. Water hardened leather was used for vessels, decoration, and occasionally as a temporary repair for timber frame beams. Wax hardened leather is a modern method. Beeswax and pitch were historically used to seal the flesh side of the leather to resist water, not to harden the leather. Leather was almost never used in armor as the sole defensive material. It has always been accompanied by metal, wood, textile, or lacquer-like coating. Hardening leather through any means will weaken it. Marrying the flexibility and durability of leather with a more rigid material makes them both stronger and more useful as armor.
One of your statements is incorrect:
Although in general leather does not survive long burial, and excavated archaeological evidence for it is rare, an Irish shield of cuir bouilli with wooden formers, deposited in a peat bog, has survived for some 2,500 years.[8]
It has been used continuously since then, though in varying amounts and purposes.
The method is well-described in medieval texts.
As an artisan leather worker, specifically in cuir bouilli...hard disagree.
The process of "jacking" leather, for the manufacture of jack-boots, black-jacks, costrels, flackets, flagons, and the like *is* the cuir bouilli process, we've scads of linguistic, textual, and artistic evidence for those products. Thus, circumstantial evidence for the (light, hard, and inexpensive) armours in question. It was the plastic of the time, and nearly as ubiquitous.
To make it, truly, you need (historically more common) half-tanned leather, which is most widely used in modern times for prosthetic and orthotic medical devices...as it holds shape well after heat and water forming.
Reference: Master armourer Chris Dobson of the Royal Armouries, "As Tough As Old Boots?Essays on the Manufacture & History of Hardened-Leather Armour" chris-dobson.com/cuir-bouilli-armor.html
I would love to see videos on this kind of stuff made by actual tradesmen who have the tools necessary to demonstrate. Do you know any in your craft who run such channels?
I know a guy who hardens his own leather and I always gave him crap because I didn't think leather would be very protective. Then he showed me one of his leather gauntlets. It was a regular glove sewn into a hardened leather shell covering the wrist and outer hand up to the knuckles. It was harder than wood but was fairly light. While I don't think it would stand up to a sword or axe without being severely damaged I also don't think a person could casually cut through it with a one handed weapon either. So as far as protecting a medieval conscript's hand from a mistake on the battlefield I think there is an argument to be made about this technology.
I love how shad just slowly burns down counter arguments without being "mean" it is like art
I mean... I haven't ever really seen him "burn down" counter arguments. Most of the time he is just doubling down on his bad history. If that is not the case, then he merely claims "I simply misspoke or was not undersrood correctly." His vids are fun to watch, but his history is quite frankly terrible.
@@commiecowboy3386 Claiming he was mis-understood in this case is correct, though. It is clear in his original video that he acknowledges the existence of leather armour.
@@commiecowboy3386 terrible? I'm sorry he's not the best but he's a lot better at history than a number of people out there, terrible is way too much of an exaggeration.
@@ozkan576 he is terrible though. It's very clear he doesn't research, but instead goes conclusion shopping. And once again, instead of accepting criticism and actually learning why his arguments and conclusions are often bad, he just doubles down and then says "let me prove it to you with this demonstration which has very little historical evidence to support it as to why I am right because I can make it happen today."
I'll say it again. Fun to watch. Bad history.
It's actually, on the other hand, incredibly obvious that he researches. Are you dumb? He literally cited many sources in this video alone and he does so in every video, what, do you think the sources just fall into his lap? You are incorrect. I have seen "Terrible History™" used numerous times in this comment section now, should we make it a slogan?
Some youtubers delete comments that they dont like Shad puts links in the description you utter Madman
Flint-Von-Lock legend
People often confuse arrogance with being assured in your point of view.
Because all arrogant people are assured of their point of view. Confusing, right?
@@yzfool6639 this lol. I actually agree with Shad here and don't think leather armor was very common, but Shad is really bad at arguing, mostly because he brings no evidence to the table, including in this video...... It's just more rambling of him stating reasons for 35 minutes of why HE THINKS it is this way, but he doesn't show us any real evidence.
The problem is that while I agree with Shad here, because he offers no real evidence in his arguments it makes it extremely easy to counter argue him.
For example, he says there are belts, scabbards, and leather clothing in abundance that have survived since the medieval period, but not really many pieces of leather armor.
That argument isn't very logical, because armor compared to common items like clothing, even metal armor, was already extremely rare in comparison. Thus we can conclude it would make sense if there was little/no remaining evidence of leather armors, even IF they were prevalent. He also fails to address that there really aren't THAT many surviving metal specimens of armor either, especially not ones in good condition relative to common items like clothing, pots, etc. In some cases there are even museums out there holding the ONLY piece of armor or sword of its kind that wasn't destroyed to time.
It's clear to see he is really biased in his arguments, even if they make sense for the most logical reasons and even IF I personally agree with them. The issue is him just rambling and showing his face, where Shad should have been showing us the art in a reel, and evidence from texts showing us what we know about armor. Because they exist, and he was lazy and just failed to show them to us.
@@escapetherace1943 I'm not sure what evidence we would want though. A writing from the 15th century, where someone states: "Oh yeah, we don't really use leather armor. It sucks compared to a gambeson"? He can only bring up evidence that's available - and, the fact is, more metal armor survived than leather armor, and artwork and literature mentions plate, mail and cloth much more often than leather.
People calling you arrogant is for the same reason people claim Lily Peet is "Arrogant" ... you speak in a clear, direct voice and have confidence in your assessment and opinions, as well as a willingness to back up your thoughts with evidence. That's all it takes. So long as you do anything other than a simpering "Well, this is just my opinion" at every turn while talking in a submissive tone, people are going to get upset at how emotionally stable you happen to be.
Lol Hergrim! I've had an argument on Reddit with him before! He's the one who actually motivated me to go to University for Medieval Studies rather than just watch TH-cam videos.
how was the argument?
Heck, Me and my class made linen in elementaryschool. Just waddle out in the field and start picking flax. It is obvious that any household could make linen armour.
@Andrew Gray Any gambeson is better than no gambeson, and when your life is on the line you do your absolute best to make it as good as possible. It may not be the quality of shads gambeson, but it certainly will help.
@@IReallyLikeMyNamexD yup exactly. Thing about gambeson is "when in doubt, add more layers".
Victor Millen yep or as grey says GOTTA ADD MORE ZEROS
Like tanning wouldn't take an even greater amount of skill and specific resources? You're missing the point entirely.
@@trashtrash2169He is saying that it is easy to make linen what do you mean?
I see "In this context" becoming a bit of an inside joke for the channel, and a good way to just show what you're saying is specific to the video.
RayRaven sounds like the next t-shirt line!!
I think that Shad has a long ways to go before he can become the king of context, that title currently belongs to Matt Easton, he uses context in a lof of his videos.
A bit like TIK's
"But is this really the case?"
Matt Easton would sue Shad out of history for that.
RayRaven a shadiversity meme lol
You're response was restrained and respectful, well done.
You sir are a gentleman and a scholar.
"Hey Google, is leather armor more effective than gambeson?"
"Well, I have one million results that say it's not, and one result that says it is."
"I knew it!"
"JUST BECAUSE I HAVE IT DOESN'T MEAN IT'S TRUE!"
If Google is a guy?
@@victormillen8393 Just add 'bro' at the end of everything.
I Would much rather wear hardened scabbard butt leather armor than a crusty ass gambeson. Speaking from personal experience
@@bloodypine22 Well I'd rather wear a warm, thick, silky, comfortable, protective, maneuverable gambeson than stiff, ratty, cracked, crumbling leather.
@@Jrez Have you actually worn either?
Shad Fact: Shad is one of the few in the world legally licensed, by all the countries that matter(get out of here New Zealand), to own and operate his own doomsday device.
But what about Dragons?
i havn watched the video yet but just for you know i love whenever you adress critics and mistakes (like the last one about stone being good isolator) and create a good standard to speak criticly and constructivly without falling in coment wars, pride or such, you are an example to follow
In regards to gambeson's ability to stop arrows, I'll always remember back in middle school when I was reading a book about medieval arms and armor, and there was a photo of an illustration from a medieval manuscript depicting a crossbowman wearing gambeson with about a dozen arrows sticking out of it, calmly drinking from a waterskin.
I feel for you shad. I to am often surprised by the interpretation of my words by people who are not paying sufficient attention or lack the linguistic skill to properly follow my wording.
It's Reddit. Close-mindedness and general tendency toward libel is a requirement for posting in that echo chamber.
tygonmaster so true. Any time I disagree with an OP or comment on Reddit, i get shouted down and told to 'never post here again.' Doesnt stop me though
Sheldon Robertson oh please. It's not like it's Tumblr. Just go ahead and try to disagree with anybody there.
Sometimes it's legitimate honest misinterpretation, but very often it's not. People intentionally ignore the full context of statements all the time simply because it's very easy to disprove the misrepresented statement and then claim a victory. It's a form of straw man argument that is prolific in any debate setting.
I'll bet you made a good missionary, Shad. It's halariously relatable how that opening you offered about sharing your views was so much like missionary work.
I’m glad to see an adult response, it’s refreshing in the youtube cesspool of childish reactions.
I'm trying to make a tabletop role playing game and these videos are really proving useful! It's set on a medieval period so knowing what kind of clothing peasants wore would increase the immersion for the players. Amazing video Shad.
Number of Chromosomes Don't forget, people liked being colourful back then. (So, everyone wasn't wearing just brown, black, and etc.)
Edit: Also, love the Ed profile pic.
U wot mate!
I once tried to add more realistic elements to my D&D game, but for some reason the players couldn't wrap their minds around the idea of armor granting damage reduction. Also they didn't want to play anything that wasn't D&D.
Fleem Q Swipes Well yeah damage reduction via armor can make things kinda unbalanced, I can tell just from the amount of times I struggled trying to figure out how the players may break the game. A little tip from me would be adding equipment durability, kinda solves this issue.
Fleem Q Swipes third edition has alternate rules for armor as damage reduction, but there are also way of boosting damage crazy high... I've always just worked it that HP represents stamina more than injury and an attack that kills was a vital hit while hits that damage may actually be minor nicks or scrapes, or even just stressful close calls that push a character a little closer to collapse, or failing to stop that all important LAST hit. Just my take lol
"samurai swords can't cut through tanks"
Reddit: "This guy is saying the samurai never existed!"
@Brian Hensley You're funny! :)
continuation to that chain of logic. *Shows a painting with a samurai posing with his sword* after looking at this picture I think its safe to assume that at one point 99% of humanity were samurais!
You can really tell Shad is annoyed in this one..
But props for keeping it cool and level-headed.
Can't blame him. The article completely twisted his words and points.
Love that you give a civil response to a not completely civil criticism.
you are so right
adam alton Shad is too classy to be uncivil, especially in a video on the internet. Just sad he's a mormon though 😭
Most people I see on the internet who dislike you seem to purposefully take your words out of context and/or mishear them. I think your video about hema and blindly following manuals is a great example of a video I see many people take out of context even now.
These people probably decided they didn't like you the first 2 minutes they watched you, and from that moment on they continued watching the video incredibly biased. It's sad that's how the human psyche works, but HEY it's their loss.
Just in this video I noticed that among all these medieval swords in the background there's also a lightsaber :D
It seems so out of place, yet so fitting at the same time, cool ;)
Now I see it... Lmao🤣😂🤣
Well it is a long time ago in a galaxy far far away
I truly believe that the Hollywood/fantasy concept of studded leather armor is people confusing brigandine or jack armor with studded leather.
Same, i have been suspecting it for a long time. Cant believe they have been making a huge for many years and no one correct them, i mean there must be an expert or to on this kind of matter right?
Leather armor would be poor armor.
Studded leather would be even worse.
Hollywood people tend to look at fantasy armor vs real historical stuff. The Real stuff never looks as "Cool" and that what they are going for Visual appeal vs actually effective.
Shad - my manly-man soldier brother sews very well. In fact, he sewed a winter coat for me years ago. The Y chromosome doesn’t prevent one from learning to sew, LOL.
I suspect that few women became tanners (unless the men in their family were already tanners) because so many women of the peasant class worked & manufactured items on their own family’s property/home while watching children. Tanning is an extremely STINKY craft, requiring equipment and chemical solutions which many folks probably preferred to have on the outskirts on the village. There is my 2 cents worth of speculation.
A few years ago, I sewed a thick gambeson for my son to role-play in with tools and materials in my home in modern New England. It would have been bloody difficult for me to go find & kill a cow and tan its hide.
Bravo on a calm, logically response that respectfully acknowledges the opponent's position and valid points while clarifying and explaining your own position. Civil discussion at it's finest.
Shad reads through the comments, even months after the video was posted! What a great community! I'm enjoying the new fight scene analyses, I hope the Old Republic light saber battles (cinematic trailers) can get analyzed, they have some crazy battles.
This is the best part about history. There's so much information, and people interpret that information differently. Therefore, there's a lot of room for discussion.
Look, Shad, the Dungeon Master's Guide quite clearly says that leather has a much better Armor Class than cloth, so... Checkmate, sir. Checkmate.
Good grief... Don't get me started on the errors in the D&D PHB...😅
DynamicAlteration cHeAtEr
Yeah but at least my cloth armor gives bonus AC against crits
I have noticed this pattern about highly informative channels that avoid oversimplification...
They often become a target for irrational and close minded people. Calling someone arrogant when you're the meaning of arrogance. So funny.
Maggie ZM Yes, text book cases of projection.
I think it is largely to do with the sad fact that people can't listen, nor can they understand a complex viewpoint. I find that if you don't state something in a black and white manner people from both sides will attack you claiming that you had stated one of the two extremes when in reality, you had never stated either.
@@Hedgehog1039 The guy who wrote this reddit article actually created a followup mammoth reddit post which I've skimmed. It really looks like he's got a bee in his bonnet about "leather armour never existed" and is taking the defence of leather armour to the extremes. In effect, citing sources that talk about leather being used over metal armour (like a coat of plates) but ignoring the metal parts, claiming that leather armour was wildly used and then handwaving the fact it's never mentioned in any historical descriptions of ancient battles, and other "rose-tinted glasses" opinions on information regardless of what arguments people have brought up in the sequel thread.
The guy is obviously passionate about history and a solid researcher. But this really seems like he's taken the historical enthusiasts' reactions to the Hollywood portrayal of leather armour (being thin and light enough to not even be good for a leather jacket!) and twisted it into some type of campaign he has to fight against in order to "get the truth out there."
@@morlath4767 Ah I see... people do get caught up in things easily, don't they... passion can lead to arrogance sometimes.
@@Hedgehog1039 The funny thing is that the original response to Shad makes this mistake - misunderstanding our dear Shad's passion and enthusiasm for arrogance.
Excellent job Shad--you make a convincing argument, engage adequately with your criticisms, and most importantly, you provided sources in the video description. Well done!
Wow! I just loved that fact traditional linen is stronger than modern linen due to the waxy residue. Interesting detail!
It's similar to claiming rifles were widespread in the 1700s because rifles existed in the 1700s. While rifles did in fact exist in the 1700s, and were even deployed by some specialists even in the American Revolution, they were NOT in wide spread use as they were very costly and not yet standardized, which presents a ton of logistics issues. So yeah, they existed, but were far from prevalent in the 1700s.
i like the fact that the reddit post accuses you of being unreliable and arrogant, but then continues by being arrogant and misrepresenting you
Yeah, those parts of the article were. . . disappointing
"I'm not mad. Just disappointed."
I wouldn't put too much weight into that point. It is in the opening line of a fairly long article, basically when he tries to establish, why such a long article is valuable for him to write, and for others to read. He is trying to enter a dispute, and does it by attacking what he depicts as the "preconceived consense".
He is somewhat missing the fact, that Shad is an actual person, and the ad hominem really is unnecessary, but I feel the length of the article shows, that his goal is not to be disrespectful.
I think he was writing it as if Shad wouldn't read it, or made any sort of reply to it. Definitely a bad behaviour, but many people are not exactly exemplary when talking behind someone's back.
Thomong Brilliant! I never noticed that till you pointed it out!
Listening is a skill many people don't practice.
Huh?
First Last what?
First Last yup some people love to only hear your words while they listening to the script they assigned you in their head.
Nani?
Probably because speech is the only one available. Sadly it's crap aswell, so I prefer to smith out my response.
when you start argument with personal ridicule with out being attacked first is a tactic used when not being able to address facts well.
and you said things like, you don't see it a lot using words that aren't absolute.
I love your videos 1 because you seem to try really hard to give great detail. 2 you are entertaining. you'd make a great teacher
that guy in your video looks exactly like they in Penn and teller
This is true Quality! How many TH-camrs will go out of their way and confront a crititc this civil way? Not many, i tell yout his.
Shad is beeing an extremly good role model here. ^^
Great discussion. I've been exploring this myself and it's a really difficult thing for historians since there are so few examples - since leather is a natural product and will often rot away. My findings is that leather will more often be used to cover plates or used in lamellar, or cuir bouillis or buff coats made from raw hide.
One of my favorite things with you Shad, is that you address your critics pretty honestly.
Offtopic :
Hey Shad I started to read Brandon Sanderson's books because of you (in spanish of course). The experience has been amazing, thank you for the recomendation.
Adrien Lasbleiz si si, I also like sisi.
*deep distorted voice* "IN THIS CONTEXT"
Supertracker007
Almost as epic as the high-pitched "machicolatioooooonnnnssss!"
*M A T T E A S T O N*
Specific wording... Oh yes, i know this problem. And I am feeling with you when it comes up to it.
ＩＮ ＴＨＩＳ ＣＯＮＴＥＸＴ
That is excellent meme material.
What dose u name mean
@@jacobmclemore6599 Google says it means Bear in Serbian. Pronounced "Medved".
Play it at 0.25
I'd say more "passionate" than "arrogant"...
I would even say frantic at times, but it no longer bothers me. Ive grown to accept it.
Shad is always so polite when dealing with critics. That is soooo great! Also that he is so ready to admit that he is maybe wrong. Shad you are awesome!
Shad. around 30:12 on this video, you said something and a light bulb kicked on. The tests he was speaking of where he proposed that leather would outperform Gambeson could also be flawed, as the professor giving the lecture on linen noted, as Modern Linen is not as sturdy or as durable as its medieval counterpart, so naturally if you test a modern leather armor piece with a Gambeson made of modern linen, the result would state leather outperformed. The test is compromised in my opinion, as the linen used was possibly not the same type of linen used in Medieval Gambeson. Not to mention the fact that wool is cheaper than leather and wool, as I saw in a video on castles a few days ago, was often used as a filler in Quilted armor, and Wool can be gathered without killing the sheep,whereupon Leather most certainly has to have a dead cow or other animal to be made. You made your point beautifully by the way. Love the channel.
In their tests they used both modern as well as traditional/authentic made linnen. They also shot at it front on, not a glancing sideways blow. Which makes the linnen both thicker (see Pythagorean theorem), but also, because it was layered the arrow can get caught between the layers - something leather can't - making it potentially even better. They didn't use medieval gambeson, indeed, that could perform different again, and the leather, they hadn't researched as thoroughly either. Their main objective was to test their glued linnen ancient greek armour.
At that point I was reminded of Shad's comments on comparing, for example, longswords to katanas. You can't really compare longswords to katanas easily, but you can only compare a specific sword to a specific katana.
This sort of test would require historical accuracy, and a large sample size of both (lots of cows shall die for such a test). I would say however that a sample size of 20 or so for each type should be enough to create a half decent baseline.
there is lots of destructive testing of leather against medieval weapons that you can watch on TH-cam. Leather has to be extremely thick and dense or it is useless. The stuff you'd get from most game animals won't provide any significant protection.
Im pretty sure leather is fire poof but does anyone want to put on some oil soak gambies
There's a difference between knowledgeable and arrogant although they look similar
I'd further add passionate. Shad is very passionate about his arguments, as well as knowledgeable, but he's hardly arrogant.
@@faolan2174 yeah definitely
Yes. Arrogance makes itself known when the knowledge is challengesd or criticised. It isn't inherently present with knowledge at all (and anyone who thinks it is is intellectually insecure).
from my carefull educated analysis i have concluded that your comment is not relevant to my interest
Hey Shad nice video.
This reminds me off the use of Leather in military equipment in WW1.
At the outbreak of WW1 most military equipment was made out of leather. Most armies wore boots made out of leather, belts made out of leather, pouches, suspenders, etc, and the German Imperial army wore of course their Pickelhaube (spicked helmets).
When the war was a few months old most armies started to replace their leather equipment with either webbing our canvas. Mainly because it was to expensive and difficult to produce on massive wartime scale. And off course because it started to rot in the wet condition of the trenches.
Noticeable is the german Picklehaube which was made from high quality South-American leather. Because of the leather shortage the army started to produce Pickelhaube made out of thin sheet metal. And in 1916 it would be replaced by the steel Stahlhelm.
Leather is not a cheap easy to produce material, especially in wartime. So i don't really believe in the use of leather armour in a grand scale.
Also the Picklehaube was a shiny, spottable target in trench warfare lol
Are we insulting Shad? This is my chance! I don't like your Ace Ventura wannabe haircut. HAH! take that!
Take a foot-square chunk of leather, boil it, let it dry and cool, and you'll get a three-inch square chunk of that hardwood-tough long-wearing material that we make solid shoe soles out of. It has stopped wayward axes for me when I was splitting wood and missed, so I probably have a couple more toes than I would if it weren't good for making armor out of. Considering the relative costs and difficulty of manufacture I'd be astonished if it weren't often used for armor.
Coolly, calmly. and professionally done as always Shad. Your seemingly endless devotion to limiting your own personal bias and subjectivity is admirable and well appreciated.
I didn't know, that flax is originaly a warm-loving plant. My birth town, in southern, subalpine Germany, got quite rich by growing and processing flax and producing linen. That is in a climate, that is considered for example too cold to successfully cultivate cherry trees.
As far as I know leather armor DID exist in the medieval period but wasn't used by Europeans(leather is expensive duh) and it wasn't the fantasy version either. The nomads were using leather armor(for them leather is much more available) in the form of several layers of leather coats. Basically a leather gambeson.
According to a colleague of mine who is in a tradition preserving(I have no idea of the English term and Google doesn't help me either) group(Hungarian) met Cuman groups who were using such armors and according to them it was lighter than a chainmail while being very protective form both piercing, slashing, and even blunt force. According to him it was indeed some cool and effective stuff.
They had far more animals than sedentary peoples. Nomadic lifestyle doesn't lend itself to mining, so metal was much scarcer.
majungasaurusaaaa or agriculture
You're wrong. There are artistical, textual, and existing examples of european leather armor.
As FaR aS i KnOw
BloodyPine ye a there were some, but not many. Have you listen to the video at all? Shad himself said that yes, there were some examples of European leather armour, but it was not the most common type of armour, it wasn’t as widespread as gambison, plate, and mail.
“I’d much rather know the truth than be right.” A man after my own heart.
@Al Kirk Your reply is coming off to me like when someone tries to come up with some sort of quotable phrase or mantra, but it really doesn't mean much of anything. You cannot really know whether you are right with the facts that you KNOW, or if the other person's perception of the truth is correct without knowing the truth. And the way you worded it made it sound like you consider yourself always right, that other people only have a "perception of the truth" instead of being right. I'm not sure that you meant it that way though, so I could be wrong. Taking into account that both parties have a bias (perception of the truth), is always a good thing. I apologize for being blunt but that statement just comes off very pedantic to me because wanting to know the truth basically would give you that other information that you say you would like to know.
@Al Kirk I haven't heard of that "personal truth" stuff before. From some quick googling, it doesn't seem to be my type of thing. I haven't seen this video in a long time, but I don't think that's what he is talking about and certainly not what I was talking about. I and (I think) the video maker were using the word "truth" as an explanation for "correct"/verified facts. So I think we are all driving at the same thing. Just using different language. Though, I think that might be what you have issue with, the terminology we are using. Truth in this context to me has always meant objective, unbiased reality. Thank you for your perspective.
The reason it's so perfect is because it's born out of a desire to always be right or as I prefer, as accurate as possible
thing is you can't be right without knowing the truth.. it bugs me when people bash someone wanting to be right or thinking they're right.. by definition you have to think you're right. If you think something else is right, now that's what you think.
As always... a class act, Shad. Even if you had been wrong, you would have corrected yourself as you have before, you would still be in my rotation of viewing and you would still be one of the most engaging youtubers with your viewers and generally always have a cheerful, refreshing attitude which makes your videos pleasant to watch. You radiate an aura of NOT being arrogant, which is patently obvious through watching your videos. Have a lovely day, cheers!
"Hey buddy, I think you've got the wrong door, the leather club's two blocks down."
your avatar pic of the Fluttershy Stare fits that comment perfectly
Gambesons and brigandine are protective. Leather (especially studded) is kinky.
Question: what would the restorative/repair techniques would there be for leather armor? Being armor, it would surely be damaged, but (being leather) wouldn't it be less repairable than metal (being more malleable)? If patches were used, it would become weaker AND more expensive to repair as it gets repaired more. Would it not make sense, therefore, to take leather armor that has taken serious damage and use the parts that are still integrally sound for other objects? I don't mean to say that this is so widespread it would substantially reduce the archeological record, but perhaps it could cause the records to fluctuate a little.
This is all by thought experiment and with very little actual historical knowledge about leather and such.
GoldenPhoenix all of those issues are applied to linen armour. And, frankly, metal armor too.
Sheol_IK yes, it does, but with linen and metal armor the methods for repair may be more effective, as linen patches or re-sewings can be made to fit, or metal can be rewelded/reforged. Leather is unique because it is grown and has limited supply of that quality, meaning that instead of making a patch out of textile material or bending the metal back (because rending metal asunder is harder than denting it) you'd have to take a patch from a piece of fresh leather that then diminishes the usefulness of the rest of the hide. Obviously not by much, but when each hide is from another cow, the cost of a leather patch (either finding a quality scrap or pulling from a new hide=1 more cow lost) might be higher than a linen patch (sewing to length/size from materials) or beating on the metal for a few hours. Kind of like buying a whole new deck of cards to get a fresh 7 of clubs when you may as well use the new deck instead.
Hmm. So it might not be as prevalent in archeological finds due to people recycling it... I think that hinges on how easily reworked cured leather is, which I have no clue of. Still interesting food for thought. :)
A gambison can be patched - leather has to be repaired. The difference is that a leather piece is remade to replace the damaged part where a piece can be added to cover the damage on a gambison. Both are a pain in the backside to do (gambisons are HECK to sew through) and leather would probably need to go back to the armorer.
Properly repaired, leather probably didn't degrade as Shad believes. Improper repairs and multiple re-attachments would cause degradation over time, however. It just means that leather is more costly to maintain than a gambison, which might explain the lower prevalence as well.
My suspicion is that someone who could afford leather was probably getting close to being able to afford metal - personally, I'd hang on to the gambison a while longer and save up for the plate if that were so.
A point Shad didn't cover is that leather armor requires more skill to make. I think he's mistaken that most people couldn't tan - they likely could and did for some hides. However, tanning is time consuming and really smelly - which is why the were happy to let the tanner do most of that work, preferably on the outskirts of town.
The expense with leather armor probably came from the forming as much as the material. Hide and thick leather have to be molded - it's not that easy and only an armorer would keep the necessary jigs. A commoner could do the job but it would not be nearly as good as that of an armorer - if you're investing in hide/leather, why would you then not invest in craftsmanship?
I agree that leather armour would probably be harder and more costly to repair. But how relevant that is, depends largely on the frequency a person gets into fights. To people who have to keep armour around for the unlikely case they might actually need it but don't regularly wear it, leather might be the more economic choice, particularly in the medieval that was ridden with pests. Getting your armour out in times of need only to realizes moths ate half of it is big bummer, and pests that eat hardened leather are much rarer than pests that eat textiles.
I just thought about something, I don't think I've seen gambison armor being brought up too much outside of your videos, there's been a few exeption sure, but pop culture seems to ignore it completely
This is the very reason I try to promote it so much.
Wonder if it's because gambison doesn't look sexy on screen. Leather bondage gear is sexier than wearing an oversized oven mitt.
It probably has less to do with being sexy than looking defensive. (I mean, full plate isn't sexy, either, nor is most leather armor seen onscreen. Except sometimes on women.) We know leather is tough from everyday experience, but gambeson looks like a fluffy overcoat.
Can't show off your physique when wearing a puffy coat. IMO, that's why movies never use gambisons. The leather armour they use tends to be body hugging and even when they use plate, it doesn't have the big flaring chest that real plate had.
I think that it's in part because you really don't see gambesons being worn because it's being covered by armor. So it appears, to the unitiated, that a person is wearing armor directly over their clothes in historical paintings and manuals and often when depicted it tends to look just like normal clothes. So that's what Hollywood sees and goes for when depicting armor wearing people.
An aspect not often spoke of in linen vs leather is breathability. All the activity required will cause ALOT of sweat. Leather absorbs sweat and sweat damages leather. Linen allows sweat to evaporate, and air to circulate between fibers. It's interesting how layering clothing for weather equates to layering for combat.
Well I'm definitely impressed with how well you handled this, Shad. Not everyone manages to respond to that kind of harsh criticism with this level of dignity and respect. The internet (and really the world at large) could definitely use more of this kind of approach.
Also, completely unrelated: I just now noticed that your glasses look almost exactly like mine. I feel special now :)
I think you nailed it shad, great vid
Never attack the person, always attack the argument.
That's something I was told from childhood in Norway, do I always remember that? No, but a good lesson.
I would like to see a video specifically on leather armor, what it would of looked like, functioned, when it would have been common and when it would be appropriate to use in storytelling.
I would personally say any group of people who have access to leather easily, so nomadic herders or people who's heard animals are rather large. Or if they have a way to make leather cheaply.
Leather is pretty durable, Skall has a great video of some stupid durable stuff, and so it isn't bad for armor, it's just more ablative than gambeson.
Replying to a two year old comment I know but I was literally just looking into this for a project: if you want places where leather is fairly commonly used for armour and shields Africa is very much a place to look. Lot of pastoralist societies; also a lot of wild animals that you can make good armour out of. Oryx, buffalo, elephant, hippo, and crocodile hides are all among the things that were or may have been used.
Another point to observe is that leather is very useful in small sturctural pieces like straps, belts, scabbards and such where linen versions don't work as well. To me this implies a higher demand for leather thus higher cost. This in turn favors the low income masses using linen for the large area body coverings.
Aaaaand this is why we are taught logical fallacies in school folks!! Great work Shad.
This isn't debate club though. Pointing out fallacies is "the fallacy fallacy" If I say "you're a big dumb idiot and i can't believe you're saying dogs have scales and that's why i'm right when i say 2+2=4" you can point out the many fallacies in that statement all day, but two plus two does actually equal four.
Maybe in your country. In my country we are taught to write only arguments that are possible to give examples to from mandatory reading books. After every argument we write what happened in a mandatory reading book and how is that tied to our point. The part about what happened in in the books is more important than an argument making sense. It doesn't even teach to give sources to what we want to prove because we don't use quotes nor correct bibliography.
Leather armor is wonderful stuff. I wouldn't ride a motorbike without it.
Very true!! Leather is plenty good enough to protect the skin against scrapes, pokes, and some blunt trauma. Just not sharp metal blades that can slice well!
But plate armour is way better for biking, especially with gambeson!
@@KickyFut Even motorcycle armour usually has other materials for reinforcement.
Plastic, rubber, carbon fibre, metal - even cotton, synthetics and wool.
That "In this context" thing works really well as a sort of stop sign, telling the listeners; "Hey, pay attention to the exact wording, don't make me repeat myself". Good choice.
You were never unclear about anything. Some people just need to find stuff to be controversial about because they have nothing better to do with their lives...
Leather would be great as a water proofing covering for gambeson, and it would help keep the wearer comfortable in adverse weather without having to change his armor at all.
I wonder how many of the gambesons we see in artwork are actually covered with a layer of soft leather.
I think this is a case of a guy wanting attention by purposefully not listening to what you said to "prove" what he's saying. Excellent researched reply, Shad!
I was going to comment something similar, the badhistory subreddit is mostly for misconceptions that Hollywood propagates like studded leather armor for example. To criticize a historical TH-camr like Shad and even call him arrogant in that subreddit is just begging for attention. Now the redditor did have some fair points and I'm glad Shad made this video to clarify things, just goes to show his humility.
Drax the Warlock Titan For the record, no, I wasn't looking for attention, just annoyed that Shad had ignored my previous attempts to alert him to the possibility that he might be wrong, entirely unfamiliar with his channel and the times where he has admitted to being wring, and not used to his bombastic style.
Calling him arrogant was a mistake, and one I regret and have apologized for, but posting to /r/badhistory and going into detail on the points where Shad was wrong is not.
Jonathan Dean sorry if it seems I mislabeled you as just an attention grabber. you were right in criticising someone especially someone in a position of influence like Shad. It is not wrong and in fact Shad encourages it. And his style can take some getting used to so I can see where you're coming from. Your argument was well thought out and well written you made great points and I appreciate you having references to back your claims.
I'm thankful you decided to write the essay, it was a good read and this was a good video in response to it. I love seeing these debates because it helps us all get closer to the truth of the matter.
Jonathan Dean the problem is that your article assumes and propagates the idea that Shad holds certain views that he does not. So, should Shad write a Bad History article about your article, since anything in the past is history?
Shad has clarified his beliefs, though personally I understood his stance when I watched his videos the first time, I know that not everyone think the same way or picks up on the same points of information. Part of being members of the human race. But since Shad clarified, wouldn't it be fair of you to edit your article to do the same and take the truth of his views into account? Rather than painting him as someone who runs roughshod over history with intentional misinformation? Or did I misread that implication?
Geno Breaker I don't believe that Shad is deliberately riding roughshod over history or deliberately distorting history (at least until he decided to ignore medieval price data in favour of theoretical prices from 800-900 years before the period under discussion, which were in turn 600-800 years younger than the context in which they were being applied. Yeah, I have some issues with Aldrete), I just don't think he does sufficient research for his videos.
And I won't edit my original post, but I will acknowledge and discuss that my reply to this video.
Point of correction, they didn't just stack shirts to make gambeson. It was quilted with wool that wasn't suitable for spinning. There's a series of you tube videos that shows castle building, and life in the medieval times, and they cover this.
I appreciate that you don't attack hergrim as a person and just address his point.
Hey Shad long time fan but hope you see this, first of all im an tradtional tanner, and first using natural substances its not super difficult to make a really hard thick leather , would not be suitable for much except a flat chest piece and or shield but tis easy to make, second if you drop hide in warm water it change to a very thick version that can easily crack but is kinda tough (this you dont need to tan to obtrain) second i agree fully it wasnt common, but an argument i myself have used and many use is "not many finds" well you know a funny thing is i live in sweden and its "common knowledge" about the vast use of chainmail, but actyually have very little findings of chainmail, (compared to other regions) one of the more keen findings is the visby harness from gotland wich is actually a leather coat of plates sortof, i think depends on were you are from anbd the uses you need, here in the north we would need alot of fabric and flax and such for sails, clothes, canvas, but i agree that gambeson were used but i wouldnt be surprised if many used "simplier gambesons" made out of layered wool, casue wool was even more common and something almsot every household did have :) hope i gave more food for thought for you, thanks for a nice video :)
HighCoastGamer HCG Great share! The coat of plates was lined in linen.
You have to love when somebody starts an argument by pointing out your arrogance. As if pointing out someone's arrogance was an act of humility.
I see from the pinned comment that it took him a week to figure out how to spin the fact he blatantly misrepresented your position. The video clips were quite clear; there's a massive semantic difference between "weren't many" and "weren't any".
Essentially, not unheard of but not common.
Like how not everyone in the military gets a Handgun issued to them but that doesn't make it strange to see someone wearing one on their hip.
Maybe closer to seeing a lever action cartridge firing Winchester repeating rifle during the American Civil War when black powder rifles was the only standard issue rifle.
It existed but few had them.
If you want argue usefulness maybe a sabre in WWI or WWII when some officers still had them in combat but was less than ideal.
Gungriffen Actually, usage of melee weapons was pretty prominent in WWI. Since trenches permeated throughout many of the fronts of the war, a lot of battles revolved around trying to capture the enemy trench lines. Once you get in close, it pays to have some method of doing consistent damage without having to reload a bolt action rifle or pistol (especially if you run out of ammo). In those cases, many soldiers even used improvised weapons (sticks with nails or sharpened shovels, for instance) for melee combat.
Imagine how effective a saber would have been considering you’d have greater reach than many improvised weapons, on top of the fact that armor was very rare!
Not to mention that maces were also rather prominent in trench warfare. And the close confines of a trench are not the best environment for a sword, especially because of the amount of people involved in these attacks.
Jamthis I’d be interested to know how effective a cutlass would have been, considering it was designed to be better suited to tight quarters than sabers
A few points:
"Like how not everyone in the military gets a Handgun issued to them but that doesn't make it strange to see someone wearing one on their hip."
FWIW, most handguns issued by most militaries are more a symbol of rank than anything. I can attest that the typical handgun training given by the US military is absolutely worthless. The terrible training goes hand in hand with their feeling the need to issue a DA/SA pistol that also has a safety, and now a striker-fired pistol that also has a safety. Hundreds of thousands of people carry a pistol of either type daily in the US WITHOUT a safety like the M9 or M17 has without a problem (the civilian and police version of the M17 is the P320). Even cops don't generally bother with safeties, and their training is only slightly better than the usual military training, which is to say absolutely terrible.
There are exceptions to the rule - I know folks who've been in SOF roles and they would wear pistols out in training by shooting 1000 rounds/man/day during a typical training cycle. One of them said their armorer had a crate full of M9 locking blocks and slides, because both would fail frequently under that kind of stress.
"Maybe closer to seeing a lever action cartridge firing Winchester repeating rifle during the American Civil War when black powder rifles was the only standard issue rifle."
Winchester lever rifles came along post-Civil War. Henry rifles were extant and issued in small amounts, though. IIRC, that idiot Custer's Civil War unit used them. Not all were issue; many were privately purchased (as with many handguns by Germans in WWII). Also, the early lever action rifles - both Henry and Winchester - used black powder cartridges. Even the Winchester 1892 (the rifle in almost every old Western, and used by John Wayne in every one of his Westerns) was only available in blackpowder cartridges. Later, those cartridges would be loaded with smokeless powder, yes, but they were all created for blackpowder.
"Which is the reason why bajonetts where extremely widespread in WW1"
Trench warfare in WWI made even fixed bayonets unwieldy. Specialized clubs/maces, specialized knives, etc. were very popular because the trenches were rarely straight, but would zigzag to reduce fatalities in case of an artillery hit, and in case someone with a rifle jumped in the trench - they wouldn't have a clear line of fire down a packed trench. Add to that the fact that rifles during that war were on the very long side by today's standards.
The widespread use of bayonets goes back a LOOOOONG time to the early days of firearms. For example, the British dominated many battles in the American Revolution because they were better at bayonet fighting. By and large, the Americans were the better marksmen, but with single-shot muzzle loaders, a lot of fights were decided by turning your musket into a pike and getting dirty.
In WWII, the Soviets were so backwards that the main issue rifle was sighted in with the bayonet attached, and the doctrine demanded that bayonets be fixed to rifles at all times except in garrison or transport.
Basically, the widespread use of bayonets in WWI had nothing to do with the type of fight it was, and the fact that they were a carry over from centuries past.
"I’d be interested to know how effective a cutlass would have been, considering it was designed to be better suited to tight quarters than sabers"
They're the same weapon (unless you count the non-saber cavalry sabers of the US and UK of the WWI era). The original pattern for a naval cutlass was taken from an infantry saber. Cavalry sabers were (understandably) longer and heavier. Compare a military cutlass and infantry saber of the same era, and almost the only difference is the guard.
This is an excellent comment and I want to be able to find it again later. Don't mind me ;)
I mean we have evidence of people wearing double mail shirts...
It isn't a long stretch to assume that a full sized gambeson might be worn.
the armored snuggy?
I've never heard of double mail hauberks. I've heard of a mail skirt over a mail hauberk (pretty popular in Italy).
I was just wondering if anyone ever wore two mailles.
Shad's accent alone makes him correct. How can you argue with that?
no