Unnoticed equals un-necessary to me, Ian. Not worried about someone stabbing my foot in a fight. I worry more about movement & stablilty. My boots are either leather or a period-flaxen material are well-suited for durability without need for them. They don't look good on me anyways with my kit. I don't want my kit to reflect a 'renaissance-era' suit.
That's exactly my point. If they're made properly, they in no way affect movement or stability. It's pure value added, and no negative impact. Unnoticeable is not unnecessary, it means no fatigue, plus protection, that's awesome whenever you're talking armor. They're hardly a required item for a kit, but they are by no means clunky or bad for mobility or stability if you have a good pair made to your shoes and your feet. The only reason to not have sabatons is purely aesthetic or stylistic, which is a 100% valid reason in its own right.
I also don't understand what sabs have to do with making you appear renaissance. Plate sabs make their first appearance on English effigies by 1330 and become common place by the 1350's. That firmly puts plate sabatons in the heart of the late medieval period.
For Sir Nathan's kit, he can go either way. German effigies of his chosen decade are about 50/50 plate sabs vs just shoes.
Armor chat. Armor chat!!
As a fellow metal-shoer, I do agree with Ian. A properly made pair of sabatons is nearly unnoticeable. The time I notice mine is when the lace slips off my shoe and it starts to flop - when it's attached, I don't notice it at all. In my case, it serves a dual purpose - it also keeps my greaves from digging into the top of my feet. I use a historical centering pin system to keep my cuisses centered on my greaves, which puts additional weight on the greaves, and pushes them downward slightly - if I have the cuisses pulled up so high that it holds the greaves up completely, I'm unable to lift my arms above midpoint because there's no slack in the arming coat due to the leg harness tension. I've yet to test this with a separate pourpoint, though.
On a practicality note, no, we should in no way be worried about someone stabbing our foot in a fight. We don't fight with sharps, and we don't have any foot-stabbing techniques we'd use (that I'm aware of). On horseback, stirrups do provide an extra level of protection; but yet, many jousting armors included sabatons with them. The key to horse control is in the inner thighs, hence the lack of armor there with mounted combat harnesses.
We're also generally a "one on one" mindset; but throw yourself in the midst of a medieval battle, when there are potentially multiple combatants focused on you, with pole-axes swinging, a sky of raining arrows, and half-dead bodies littering the ground. Somebody's last ditch effort at combat could be stabbing at feet, while they lay nearly dead. A misplaced lower leg shot, or one at a moving leg, can easily become a foot shot. Of course, in SCA context, the lower leg isn't even a valid target, so if somebody hits your foot ... something went horribly wrong ... so there's doubled lack of incentive to wear sabatons for SCA battles, as feet are an invalid target and they wouldn't "count" as armor anyway. Historically, if there wasn't a use for sabatons (and they didn't sell), they wouldn't have made lots of them.
More importantly, as Ian said, sabatons are in no way "renaissance" gear. I've seen many instances where the first bits of armor to develop from mail to plate was from the bottom up, and limbs - feet and shins first, followed by vambraces, etc. Take Guillame Tirel:
http://effigiesandbrasses.com/static/monuments/original/guillaume_tirel_s115_r2058.jpg(Thanks Effigies and Brasses!)
The effigy is from 1360. Note the simple cervelliere skull cap, with mail aventail. Mail hauberk, with what looks to be splint vambraces - or potentially even just padding sewn in vertical rows. A simple partial coat of plates (or corrazina?) and a shield, but still with plate legs and sabatons. Well before the renaissance, and hundreds of years before Maximillian armor. There's probably other examples, maybe earlier, but I found that one in 2 minutes.
Be they plate or mail, sabatons are one of the very often overlooked, and often "final" bits, to finishing off a harness.
(stepping off my soapbox...)
