MissingLink

Congrats to her. That's a significant accomplishment.

Nice looking stuff there. Someday I will finish some of my projects and post some pics.

Hivemind, I've seen you on the Dag forums as well (Erich MacKermak). As for the Archive, the general acceptance is it was only used as tournament armour during the period. For primary armour it has not been proven that is was ever in use extensively. I still like it though.

There is also some conjecture (nothing solid) that leather was added as rigid protection under maille. The possibility of hardened leather or buff leather to add protection to the shoulders, elbows, and forearms would make sense to protect areas where the bones are close enough to the skin to be an issue with flexible armor.

I have a copy or Mr. Waterer's book. There are some references to cuir bouilli armors from the Middle Ages. On p74, he states "in the accounts of the Windsor Tournament in 1278 we find that the thirty-eight cuirasses of cuir bouilli were made by Milo the Currier". There are also several references to effigies showing detailed designs on armor pieces prior to the time when iron armor was heavily decorated, though he does state that there is no way to confirm that these are leather from the effigy.

Hardening leather is discussed fairly thoroughly on armourarchive.org, but the common methods seem to be submersion in water at a temperature of about 180 degrees, soaking and then heating in your oven, or shaping then submersion in some kind of hardener such as acrylic floor polish. All three are described in more detail at the archive. -Link