The medieval knight is one of the most romantic and embellished figures in the history of mankind. Hollywood films, historical novels, and, more recently, computer games have painted us a very colorful and fleur-wrapped charm of a warrior, galloping into the distance in glittering armor, from time to time battling with the same noble and honest opponents, or defeating the gangs without fail by the infamous and unpleasant robbers (unless it's Robin Hood, of course). Well, a strikingly beautiful and pious girl is waiting for her noble admirer in a high tower or, in extreme cases, languishes in a dungeon, waiting for deliverance.
In fact, the average knight is an extremely pragmatic and not too educated companion who is able, without special remorse, to turn his jaw to a servant who has served the cooled water, or to give his sister / daughter as a wife to an old and terrible neighbor for a piece of fertile land or a pair of thoroughbred stallions.
Cinematic Knights and their armor
The vast majority of films (including those claiming historicity) show a knight in full plate armor, with a deaf helmet like tophelm (full helmet) or arm with a reclining visor. And in this form, they courageously chopped in battles for several hours, and then, without taking off, sit down at the banquet table. One can imagine that this is exactly what the everyday clothes of the knights looked like. The description of the chroniclers suggests that this type of protective armor was used only for knightly tournaments, and only in the 14-15 centuries. It was by this time that metalworking technology had reached such a level when the weight of full plate armor (that is, made entirely of metal parts) dropped to an acceptable 40-50 kilograms. And with such a load, the knight could act effectively for an extremely short period of time. What were the actual armor of a medieval knight?
Early middle ages
The knight’s clothing in battle for this time is usually a long leather armor to the knee with metal inserts and stripes and a metal helmet with an open face. Legs were occasionally protected by leather or reinforced greaves. No less often there was quilted armor, or just quilted armor (in fact, just a lot of layers of fabric quilted together), or stuffed with horse hair. Strengthened such a "uniform", again, with metal stripes. Sometimes lamellar armor was used - made up of metal plates falling behind each other. More metal was used for its manufacture, and therefore only the most wealthy knights could afford it.
Classical Middle Ages
It used chain mail, a brigantine, and plate armor.
The chain mail consisted of many rings and was the easiest and most convenient armor. They used it everywhere, but it cost more than other types of protective clothing because of its complexity. Sometimes pieces of chain mail were simply sewn onto leather armor in the most vulnerable places. A haurbek is also used - a chain hood.
Chestplate is a type of lamellar armor. In this case, the knight’s usual clothing was reinforced from the inside with metal plates overlapping. Such armor was much heavier than chain mail, but it was cheaper and better protected from heavy weapons.
Full plate armor was used, as already noted, mainly for tournaments. In a real battle, after 10 minutes, even the most powerful knight would have fallen from exhaustion, and militias would have beaten him with sticks. In the battles, elements of plate weapons were used - mittens, greaves or bracers, a breastplate.
Late middle ages
Improvement of plate armor. The development of offensive weapons, especially crossbows, made chain mail and leather armor ineffective. At the end of the era, with the advent of firearms, the very concept of a knight as an effective combat unit capable of standing alone against groups of ordinary fighters goes into oblivion. The last attempt to resist gunpowder and bullets was a powerful convex cuirass - such, for example, was worn by the Spanish caballero - conquistadors - during the development of the New World.
Knight civilian clothing
In the early Middle Ages, the knight's main clothing consisted of two tunics - the upper, cotta, and the lower, kamiza. The lower one most often had long sleeves, and the upper one, made of good fabric and richly decorated, was short or completely dispensed with. The tunics were certainly belted, and a cloak was dressed on top. Unlike the bare-footed Antiquity, the clothing of the knights of the Middle Ages certainly included trousers - either just narrow or tight-fitting (leg).
The serious change that knights wear in the Middle Ages underwent occurred at the turn of the 13th century. The emergence of permanent trade routes and interaction with other peoples (especially with the East) and the development of technology have led to the emergence of many new cuts and the use of a variety of fabrics.
To the invariable cotta, which has also undergone changes, purpuen was added - a short jacket, to which narrow sleeves were sewn, and equally narrow stockings - chosses. Blio and katardi - caftans with different cuts. Amice - a raincoat with a hole in the middle for the head. On the screens he is almost completely dressed in the knights of Christ - the Templars, hospitals and others.
Further evolution of the amramic led to the emergence of a surco - amamic with stitched sidewalls. Surprisingly, for most of what men wear today, the clothing of the knight served as a prototype. The name of many types of men's wardrobe also comes from all the same knightly outfits.
The appearance of such a phenomenon as “mi-parties” also belongs to the classical Middle Ages. Its essence was that the costume was divided into color zones in accordance with the coat of arms of the knight - vertically into two halves or, further, into four parts.
Add some medieval Japan
Japan has always been a bit of a “thing in itself”, but before meeting the “southern barbarians,” the Portuguese, in 16th century, the inhabitants of the Land of the Rising Sun were almost completely culturally isolated from the rest of the world.
This allowed them to create their own, completely unique culture, including in the military environment. An analogue of a medieval knight in Japan was a samurai. The Japanese "knights" wore sophisticated armor made by the type of brigantine. Metal plates were quite difficult to combine, varnished, laced, leather and fabric. Metal helmets were skillfully decorated and, as a rule, equipped with "anatomical" masks.
The civilian clothing of the knight of Japan consisted of three main parts - kimono, hakama (wide pants of different lengths) and haori capes.