Illustrations of women's armor from Paris around 1410
The early 15th century was a good time for manuscripts. Some texts were produced many times, like Boccaccio’s De mulieribus claris, several books by Christine de Pizan, and many works…
The early 15th century was a good time for manuscripts. Some texts were produced many times, like Boccaccio’s De mulieribus claris, several books by Christine de Pizan, and many works surveying European history.
Some of these popular texts included descriptions of women warriors, often Amazons, goddesses, or queens.Illustrations accompanying those descriptions provide evidence of medieval ideas about armor for women— something that is very poorly represented in the archaeological record.
Fashion, art, and armor trends can vary widely across places and times, but the proliferation of illustrated manuscripts in the early 15th century makes it easier to find numerous examples that were created in the same region at around the same time. What follows are illustrations from manuscripts that were all made in Paris around the year 1410.
First is a battle scene in which an Amazon army (left) clashes with an army of men (right). The Amazons wear practical armor with notable feminine elements. Their dresses, including a mail fauld, are nearly ankle length, while the men wear knee-length garments. The Amazons also have unmistakable breast motifs on their chests that have no protective function; while the warrior in blue has metal domes on the front of her dress, her companion in red merely has two circles that look like textile decoration. It’s interesting that the Amazons seem to favor very open helmets, while most of the men shown have fully enclosed faces.
This illustration is from Christine de Pizan’s Epitre de Othea a Hector, a collection of legends and historical sketches presented with accompanying allegory and gloss highlighting important lessons for young leaders. Here, two aspects of the goddess Athena— Pallas, for war, and Minerva, for knowledge— appear to their separate groups of followers. The followers are most likely all men, and those praising Pallas are wearing fashionable armor, mixing elaborate textiles with metal articulation. Interestingly, Pallas herself wears armor in a slightly different style, without such impressive sleeves. In addition to plate defenses for her arms and a mail standard at her neck, her torso is protected by a brigandine, which has metal plates riveted between textile layers.Typical brigandines stop above the knees, but Pallas’s descends to become a full-length skirt. The geometric pattern of rivets is continued for the whole length, though the soft draping of the cloth suggests it’s not armored all the way down.
This example of full-length feminine armor, worn by Queen Tomyris is more closely aligned with non-combat fashion for women, with an elegant dress of striking solid red with an integrated ermine-lined cape. Her undersleeves are sleek, fully-enclosed arm defenses with brass accents matching the hilt of her single-handed sword and the decorations of her belt and dress. Under the dress, she wears a high mail collar and a full-length mail fauld. It’s possible these elements are meant to suggest a complete mail dress, but surviving artifacts suggest that separate mail components were fairly common. Note that the corpse of the defeated King Cyrus, at her feet, shows masculine versions of many of the same elements, like the mail underlayer, the gold trim on cloth, and the large brass rondels at the shoulders.
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