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by Kunz Lochner, c. 1540 (Livrustkammaren).|315x315px]] Plate armour is a historical type of personal body armour made from bronze, iron, or steel plates, culminating in the iconic suit of armour entirely encasing the wearer. Full plate steel armour developed in Europe during the Late Middle Ages, especially in the context of the Hundred Years' War, from the coat of plates (popular in late 13th and early 14th century) worn over mail suits during the 14th century, a century famous for the Transitional armour, in that plate gradually replaced mail.
In Europe, full plate armour reached its peak in the 15th and 16th centuries. The full suit of armour, also referred to as a panoply, is thus a feature of the very end of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance period. Its popular association with the "medieval knight” is due to the specialised jousting armour which developed in the 16th century.
Full suits of Gothic plate armour and Milanese plate armour were worn on the battlefields of the Burgundian Wars, Wars of the Roses, Polish–Teutonic Wars, Eighty Years' War, French Wars of Religion, Italian Wars, Hungarian–Ottoman Wars, Ottoman–Habsburg wars, Polish–Ottoman Wars, a significant part of the Hundred Years' War, and even the Thirty Years' War. The most heavily armoured troops of the period were heavy cavalry, such as the gendarmes and early , but the infantry troops of the Swiss mercenaries and the also took to wearing lighter suits of "three quarters" munition armour, leaving the lower legs unprotected. Example of an armour worn by pikemen Germany circa 1600, on view at Lennart Viebahn Arms & Armour
The use of plate armour began to decline in the early 17th century, but it remained common both among the nobility (e.g., the Emperor Ferdinand II, Louis XIII, Philip IV of Spain, Maurice of Orange and Gustavus Adolphus) and the cuirassiers throughout the European wars of religion. After the mid-17th century, plate armour was mostly reduced to the simple breastplate or cuirass worn by , with the exception of the Polish Hussars that still used considerable amounts of plate. This was due to the development of the musket, which could penetrate armour at a considerable distance. For infantry, the breastplate gained renewed importance with the development of shrapnel in the late Napoleonic Wars. The use of steel plates sewn into dates to World War II, and was replaced by more modern materials such as fibre-reinforced plastic, since the mid-20th century.
Mail armour is a layer of protective clothing worn most commonly from the 9th to the 13th century, though it would continue to be worn under plate armour until the 15th century. Chain mail was made from hundreds of small interlinking iron or steel rings held together by rivets. It was made this way so that it would be able to follow the contour of the wearer's body, maximizing comfort. Mail armour was designed mainly to defend against thrusting and cutting weapons, rather than bludgeons. Typical clothing articles made of mail at the time would be hooded cloaks, gloves, trousers, and shoes. From the 10th to the 13th century, mail armour was so popular in Europe, that it was known as the age of mail.
Single plates of metal armour were again used from the late 13th century on, to protect joints and shins, and these were worn over a mail hauberk. Gradually the number of plate components of medieval armour increased, protecting further areas of the body, and in barding those of a cavalryman's horse. Armourers developed skills in articulating the lames or individual plates for parts of the body that needed to be flexible, and in fitting armour to the individual wearer like a tailor. The cost of a full suit of high quality fitted armour, as opposed to the cheaper munition armour (equivalent of ready-to-wear) was enormous, and inevitably restricted to the wealthy who were seriously committed to either soldiering or jousting. The rest of an army wore inconsistent mixtures of pieces, with mail still playing an important part.
/ref> iron plate cuirasses ( tankō) and helmets were being made. Oriental Armour, H. Russell Robinson, Courier Dover Publications, 2002, page 167. Plate armour was used in Japan during the Nara period (646–793); both plate and have been found in burial mounds, and haniwa (ancient clay figures) have been found depicting warriors wearing full armour.
In Japan, the warfare of the Sengoku period (1467–1615) required large quantities of armour to be produced for the ever-growing armies of foot soldiers ( ashigaru). Simple munition-quality The Watanabe Art Museum Samurai Armour Collection, Volume I, Kabuto & Mengu , Trevor Absolon, page 130. chest armours (dō ) and helmets (kabuto'') were mass-produced.
In 1543, the Portuguese brought matchlock firearms ( tanegashima) to Japan. Tanegashima: the arrival of Europe in Japan, Olof G. Lidin, Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, NIAS Press, 2002. As Japanese swordsmiths began mass-producing matchlock firearms and firearms became used in war, the use of Lamellar armour ( ō-yoroi and dō-maru), previously used as samurai armour, gradually decreased. Japanese armour makers started to make new types of armour made of larger iron plate and plated leather. 日本の甲冑 Costume Museum This new suit of armour is called tōsei gusoku (gusoku), which means modern armour. Samurai: The Weapons and Spirit of the Japanese Warrior, Clive Sinclaire, Globe Pequot, 2004, page 32. The Grove encyclopedia of decorative arts, Volume 1, Gordon Campbell, Oxford University Press US, 2006, page 36. The Hutchinson dictionary of ancient & medieval warfare, Matthew Bennett, Taylor & Francis, 1998, page 145. Samurai: The Weapons and Spirit of the Japanese Warrior, Clive Sinclaire, Globe Pequot, 2004, page 49. The type of gusoku, which covered the front and back of the body with a single iron plate with a raised center and a V-shaped bottom like plate armour, was specifically called nanban dou gusoku ("Western style gusoku) and was used by some samurai. Japanese armour makers designed bulletproof plate armour called tameshi gusoku ("bullet tested"), which allowed soldiers to continue wearing armour despite the heavy use of firearms in the late 16th century. The Watanabe Art Museum Samurai Armour Collection, Volume I, Kabuto & Mengu, Trevor Absolon, page 78.
In the 17th century, warfare in Japan came to an end, but the samurai continued to use plate armour until the end of the samurai era in the 1860s, with the known last use of samurai armour occurring in 1877, during the Satsuma rebellion. Samurai: The Weapons and Spirit of the Japanese Warrior, Clive Sinclaire, Globe Pequot, 2004, page 58.
A complete suit of plate armour made from well-tempered steel would weigh around . The wearer remained highly agile and could jump, run and otherwise move freely as the weight of the armour was spread evenly throughout the body. The armour was articulated and covered a man's entire body completely from neck to toe. In the 15th and 16th centuries, plate-armoured soldiers were the nucleus of every army. Large bodies of men-at-arms numbering thousands, or even more than ten thousand men (approximately 60% to 70% of French armies were men-at-arms and the percentage was also high in other countries), were fighting on foot, wearing full plate next to archers and crossbowmen. This was commonly seen in the Western European armies, especially during the Hundred Years War, the Wars of the Roses or the Italian Wars.
European leaders in armouring techniques were Northern Italians, especially from Milan, and Southern Germans, who had somewhat different styles. But styles were diffused around Europe, often by the movement of armourers; the Renaissance Greenwich armour was made by a royal workshop near London that had imported Italian, Flemish and (mostly) German craftsmen, though it soon developed its own unique style. Ottoman Turkey also made wide use of plate armour, but incorporated large amounts of mail into their armour, which was widely used by shock troops such as the Janissary Corps.
The evolution of plate armour also triggered developments in the design of offensive weapons. While this armour was effective against cuts or strikes, their weak points could be exploited by thrusting weapons, such as , poleaxes, and . The effect of and crossbow bolt is still a point of contention with regard to plate armour. The evolution of the 14th-century plate armour also triggered the development of various . They were designed to deliver a strong impact and concentrate energy on a small area and cause damage through the plate. Maces, , and pollaxes (poleaxes) were used to inflict blunt force trauma through armour. Strong blows to the head could result in concussion, even if the armour is not penetrated.
Fluted plate was not only decorative, but also reinforced the plate against bending under striking or blunt impact. This offsets against the tendency for flutes to catch piercing blows. In armoured techniques taught in the German school of swordsmanship, the attacker concentrates on these "weak spots", resulting in a fighting style very different from unarmoured sword-fighting. Because of this weakness, most warriors wore a mail shirt (haubergeon or hauberk) beneath their plate armour (or coat-of-plates). Later, full mail shirts were replaced with mail patches, called gousset, which were sewn onto a gambeson or arming jacket. Further protection for plate armour was the use of small round plates called , that covered the armpit area and the addition of and with "wings" to protect the inside of the joint.
As firearms became better and more common on the battlefield, the utility of full armour gradually declined, and full suits became restricted to those made for jousting which continued to develop. The decoration of fine armour greatly increased in the period, using a range of techniques, and further greatly increasing the cost. Elaborately decorated plate armour for royalty and the very wealthy was being produced. Highly decorated armour is often called parade armour, a somewhat misleading term as such armour might well be worn on active military service. Steel plate armour for Henry II of France, made in 1555, is covered with meticulous embossing, which has been subjected to blueing, silvering and gilding.
Such work required armourers to either collaborate with artists or have artistic skill of their own; another alternative was to take designs from and other prints, as was often done. Daniel Hopfer was an etcher of armour by training, who developed etching as a form of printmaking. Other artists such as Hans Holbein the Younger produced designs for armour. The armourer Filippo Negroli, from a leading dynasty of armourers, was the most famous modeller of figurative relief decoration on armour.
The medieval joust has its origins in the military tactics of heavy cavalry during the High Middle Ages. Since the 15th century, jousting had become a sport ( hastilude) with less direct relevance to warfare, for example using separate specialized armour and equipment.
During the 1490s, emperor Maximilian I invested a great deal of effort in perfecting the sport, for which he received his nickname of "The Last Knight". Rennen and Stechen were two sportive forms of the joust developed during the 15th century and practiced throughout the 16th century. The armours used for these two respective styles of the joust were known as Rennzeug and Stechzeug, respectively. The Stechzeug in particular developed into extremely heavy armour which completely inhibited the movement of the rider, in its latest forms resembling an armour-shaped cabin integrated into the horse armour more than a functional suit of armour. Such forms of sportive equipment during the final phase of the joust in 16th-century Germany gave rise to modern misconceptions about the heaviness or clumsiness of "medieval armour", as notably popularised by Mark Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.
The extremely heavy helmets of the Stechzeug are explained by the fact that the aim was to detach the crest of the opponent's helmet, resulting in frequent full impact of the lance to the helmet.
By contrast, the Rennen was a type of joust with lighter contact. Here, the aim was to hit the opponent's shield. The specialised Rennzeug was developed on the request of Maximilian, who desired a return to a more agile form of joust compared to the heavily armoured "full contact" Stechen. In the Rennzeug, the shield was attached to the armour with a mechanism of springs and would detach itself upon contact.
Full plate armour was expensive to produce and remained therefore restricted to the upper strata of society; lavishly decorated suits of armour remained the fashion with 18th-century nobles and generals long after they had ceased to be militarily useful on the battlefield due to the advent of inexpensive muskets.
The development of powerful firearms made all but the finest and heaviest armour obsolete. The increasing power and availability of firearms and the nature of large, state-supported infantry led to more portions of plate armour being cast off in favour of cheaper, more mobile troops. Leg protection was the first part to go, replaced by tall leather boots. By the beginning of the 18th century, only , commanders and royalty remained in full armour on the battlefield, more as a sign of rank than for practical considerations. It remained fashionable for monarchs to be portrayed in armour during the first half of the 18th century (late Baroque period), but even this tradition became obsolete. Thus, a portrait of Frederick the Great in 1739 still shows him in armour, while a later painting showing him as a commander in the Seven Years' War (c. 1760) depicts him without armour.
Plate armour was also famously used in Australia by the Kelly Gang, a group of four led by Edward "Ned" Kelly, who had constructed four suits of improvised armour from plough mouldboards and whose crime spree culminated with a violent shootout with police at the town of Glenrowan in 1880. The armour was reasonably effective against bullets and made Kelly seem almost invincible to the policemen, who likened him to an evil spirit or Bunyip with one constable reporting that "I fired at him point blank and hit him straight in the body. But there is no use firing at Ned Kelly; he can't be hurt", however it left sections of the groin and limbs exposed; during the infamous "Glenrowan Affair", gang member Joe Byrne was killed by a bullet to the groin, Kelly was captured after a fifteen-minute last stand against police (having sustained a total of 28 bullet wounds over his body), and the remaining two members are thought to have committed suicide shortly after. Although the recovered suits were almost immediately mismatched, they have since been reorganized and restored and today remain as a powerful symbol of the Australian outback.
In 1916, General Adrian of the French army provided an abdominal shield which was light in weight (approx. one kilogram) and easy to wear. A number of British officers recognised that many casualties could be avoided if effective armour were available.
The first usage of the term "flak jacket" refers to the armour originally developed by the Wilkinson Sword company during World War II to help protect Royal Air Force (RAF) air personnel from flying debris and shrapnel. The Red Army also made use of ballistic steel body armour, typically chestplates, for combat engineers and assault infantry.
After World War II, steel plates were soon replaced by vests made from synthetic fibre, in the 1950s, made of either boron carbide, silicon carbide, or aluminium oxide. They were issued to the crew of low-flying aircraft, such as the UH-1 and UC-123, during the Vietnam War. The synthetic fibre Kevlar was introduced in 1971, and most ballistic vests since the 1970s are based on kevlar, optionally with the addition of to reduce the risk of blunt trauma injury. Such plates may be made of ceramic, metal (steel or titanium) or synthetic materials.
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