Re: arming doublet and mail pictures

["Ivo Malz"]

Hello.

> Rather suspicious. The pic with mail being worn over puffed shoulders is
> quite clearly showing some antique/exotic scene- many pieces of armour and
> clothing look quite strange. While I do not claim any expertise I'd
suggest
> that mail worn over puffed shoulders is an element of exotic stylisation.

The men wearing these "mail shirts over puffed sleeves" arangement show not
only puffed shoulders but as well quite muscular backs. I´d tend to
interpret this as stylization as well. The general shape of the armour on
the bodies depicted reminds me somewhat of the Prince Valiant comic books,
whreer every muscle was vivible underneath the mail armour;o)

> And, as I've said at the very beginning, this solution is not very
> 'wearer-friendly'.
> People wearing something that looks like a full mail shirt under other
> pieces of torso (jacks, brigandines, braestplates) armour are not that
rare in
> iconography. A mail shirt by itself is, however, much rarer, if not
> exceptional. Most probably a mail shirt was easier to come by than a
tailor-made
> arming doublet with mail gussets (made for knights and men-at-arms). What
> do you think about such a look?

Separate mail sleeves and "skirts" were not that unfamiliar in the 15th
century. The museum at Schloss Büdingen has two fine examples of sleeves,
which are, if I remember correctly, dated to the late 15th/early 16th
centuries.
Apart from that I think that mail is one of the most underestimated types of
armour, especially because most reconstructional attempts mostly are made up
of rectangular elements or pieces widening in circles by inserting two rings
into one every now and then. 
Reading the articles on Erik D. Schmidt´s home page left me quite mind-
boggled because it seems most western mail was more or less "knitted" in
questions of fitting it to the shapes of the human body. Unfortunately this
site seems to be down, at least it was when I checked the other day.

In short, I am not sure whether interpreting contemporary art will really
get us any further than the study of extant examples. 
And so far I was only able to find evidence for the "knit- style" fitting
technique, but couldn´t find any example of this technique or any other used
to create puff- sleeved mail. To allow for sufficient space and movement the
latter would ask for quite a bit of tailoring to fit as snugly as the
paintings suggest, or would require very spacious sleeves that would be very
wide and baggy.

Regards

Ivo

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