Although horse-armour had been known in Persia since ancient times, it does not seem to feature in illustrations of this period before c.1340. Thereafter, however, it appears with increasing regularity until, early in the 15th century, some 50% of all Persian cavalry depicted in contemporary mss. ride barded horses, though in some sources they are restricted to the leaders. These horse-armours were of several different forms of construction, predominantly lamellar or scale, also chequered fabric, but apparently never mail (except occasionally in India). The lamellae were usually either iron or lacquered leather, and one source mentions copper. Josafa Barbaro describes horse-armour amongst Uzun Hasan’s army in 1474 thus: of 20,000 ‘horses of service. .. there were 2,000 covered with certain armour of iron, made in little squares and wrought with gold and silver, tacked together with small mail, which hung down in such manner to the ground, and under the gold [edge?] it had a fringe. The rest were [also] covered, some with leather after our [ie, the Italian] manner, some with silk and some with quilted work so thick that an arrow could not have passed through it.’
Persian horse-armours comprised a chanfron, neck-piece, peytral, large flanchards and a broad crupper. Only the horse’s nose, ears and lower legs were usually visible, though some mss. show the bard reaching down only as far as the horse’s belly and chest, thus leaving the legs entirely exposed. In addition the neck-piece was tied at the back but often left the throat exposed, while the bard itself was sometimes split at the front and sometimes not. The various constituents of the armour can be clearly seen in the two figures included here. 158 dates to c. 1440-45, though identical armour appears in other pictures dating back to at least c.1375. The armour portrayed comprises steel lamellae or laminae with gilt bands running between the rows, plus an iron chanfron and a red ribbon binding the neck-piece along the back of the neck; the saddle is tan with inlay, the saddle-flap red with gold decoration, and the cloth blue. Frequently, if not usually, such laminated or lamellar armour was painted, either uniformly or with alternate rows in a different colour. Borders too might be in a different colour. Such painted armours could be virtually any colour — for example, a single
Miniature depicting a battle between Tamerlane and the sultan of Delhi in 1398 shows 5 lamellar bards, one each of which is coloured magenta, orange, red, blue and dark green. The iron chanfron, however, was normally left unpainted.
Chequered fabric armour (described as ‘quilted silk’ in most sources), such as that of 159, appears in a considerable number of pictures throughout much of this period. That depicted here dates to c.1420. It was most often red and white, but occasionally appears in other colour combinations such as blue and white, blue and yellow or dark green and light green. Both Barbaro and Caterino Zeno regarded such quilted armours as arrow-proof.
Although these pictures are both of Persian provenance, it is clear that such horse-armour was in widespread use throughout the Moslem world. Indeed, many such armours described as ‘Persian’ or ‘Turkish’ to be found in museums round the world are now believed to be of Mamluk origin, which confirms that all three were basically indistinguishable. Tamerlane’s troops are described as mounted on horses wearing ‘iron armour’ like that of 158 at Kondurcha in 1391, and it is this same type of armour that is intended by the Ottoman term gugal or cuqal, to which Janus Lascaris is doubtless referring when he mentions that ‘a small number’ of the Ottoman household cavalry rode barded horses. A similar small number of the feudal sipahis fielded by subashis and sancakbeys (about one in every 50 or 60) were required to ride armoured horses. In Moslem India such armour was in widespread use, still appearing in Indian art virtually unchanged as late as the 18th century.
World History
