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My Harness...almost complete :)

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merc3065:
I had figured that there was about 100 years rolled into one.
For living history, I would have a hard time "justifying" all of these parts rolled into one harness as you've mentioned.

I have 2 periods that I am very interested in, one is 1300-1325, the other is 1350-1400.
I love my helmet too much to change it out.
But I also love the style of the breastplate and faulds to change it out, so I am thinking of expanding into 2 separate kits.

To match the helmet's time period of around 1300-25, I am guessing a coat of plates, maille haubergeon with full sleeves, couters for elbows and knees? Padded maille chausses for the legs and padded maille mittens?  Or can you get away with a plated arm harness and hourglass gauntlets in addition to the coat of plates?

To match the breastplate:
Is there a bascinet that fits in with the 1350-75 range that does not involve the pointed hound/pig snout visor?  Absolutely detest that style...
I didn't know Al made 14th C legs, only ever saw the 15th century ones for sale.  I'll have to ask him about those.
Would you know where to find a good set of hourglass gauntlets to be used for WMA with steel?

Mostly I use this harness for steel sparring and wandering various events where my local group does displays.
My arm harness is too tight to fit over top my padded gambeson and maille shirt so I'd have to try it with the revival gambeson. I believe it's a bit thinner than my current one.

Sitting down with the faulds is quite easy as they collapse into each other and are quite flexible.
Not sure about horse back riding though.  Not about to try!

Ian:
Your helmet is more a harness of maille style helmet.  With that helmet I would put you in a full maille hauberk with maille chausses and strap some knee poleyns and elbow cops on you, and then cover you in a long heraldic surcoat.

You could in theory wear an open faced bascinet with your 1375ish era kit.  No visor required!  You could also go with a klappvisor style shovel-face visor, which would be more regionally associated with Germany that late in the century.  You'd also need a shorter maille haubergeon to go with that breastplate.

These two eras would also have very different style arming clothes underneath.

merc3065:
Thanks for the information, this is very helpful and should allow me to piece together what I need to make the 2 distinct styles.

What would the differences be with the arming clothes?
I assume that the maille would be heavily padded to handle the impacts of blows whereas the plated harness would more likely be thinner as there is less requirement for maille due to the plates being able to absorb a lot of the impact.

Ian:
Under an all maille harness, you'd be looking at something like this:



Under a plate harness of the late 14th century specifically, you'd be looking at something like I wear.  Arming garments become much trickier under plate, because it becomes an anchoring point for a lot of the plate bits, making the arming garments tailoring requirements go way up.  Since the Late 14th century arming cotte suspends a leg harness, the grand assiette sleeve design prevents you from having to lift your cuisses up every time you pick up your arms.  With a normal sleeve like on all modern clothing, every time you lift your arms  you will also be trying to lift your leg armor.

I wrote this for another website, but this is a little primer on supporting a leg harness properly:

--- Quote ---The weight of the garment is really up to the maker. I elected to make this particular one fairly lightly padded. It's lighter in the padding than the gambeson you saw me put on in my video. Also, when you consider this pourpoint has replaced the two garments you saw my wear in that videol, this set up is much lighter and more comfortable than what I was previously wearing.

As far as the fit goes, I tried to make this garment as tight as possible to match the function I was getting out of the vest. This was the key factor in making the CdB Pourpoint, because I wanted it to pull double-duty as that vest and the gambeson all-in-one like I believe a true 14th century arming cotte would have. Once I had the muslin prototype completed I started tweaking the pattern a little bit to achieve that really tight fit through the waist and hips. Once I got it to the point where it would provide the same girdling effect as the vest, I took the muslin garment apart and traced it over the paper pattern to show what I had cut away so that when I cut the real thing from linen it would achieve the same result.

There are two other factors in getting the proper leg suspension besides it being tight in the right areas. We know that in order to support the legs without excess fatigue, the weight of the legs should be supported by the hips and waist, and not the shoulders. So when the garment is tightly fitted and being pulled down by the legs, the goal is that it can't move further down because your waist is theoretically the narrowest part of your body, and since your hips are wider than your waist, the garment is 'stuck' in the vertical plane and can't shift lower. To prevent any weight from going to the shoulder however, you need to ensure that the torso of the garment is long enough, that when the legs pull downward and the garment is locked in to position, that the top of the garment is not pulling on the shoulders at all. It just needs the smallest amount of excess up top and it will work just fine.

The last part to the proper fit is that the garment in my opinion should use spiral lacing and not buttons. Buttons will work if your garment is perfectly tailored and you never change size. Spiral lacing allows more flexibility in the fit and function of the garment. If you get bigger for instance, you can still lace it nice and tight. There may be a slight gap in the front closure, but the garment will still function appropriately, and truly that is all that matters with an arming cotte.

So, the too-long did not read version:
Ensure the garment is tight enough to firmly girdle the hips and waist
Ensure the garment's torso is long enough that when supporting a leg harness it does not put tension on the shoulders
Preferably use a spiral laced closure instead of buttons to control how tight the garment is

If you achieve those three things, than the cotte will serve you just as well as the modern vest solution in properly suspending a leg harness. The bonus here is of course that I got to shed a full layer of clothing, and I was in full control of how padded my garment is. All of this was driven by a desire to have a more historically appropriate set of arming clothes, and shed a little unnecessary bulk.
--- End quote ---

Sir James A:
Hey, welcome back. Sir Ian covered everything I could think of, and more.

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