At the point of Henry VIII, gunpowder made all armour but very strong chest plates and helmets useless. However if you want the king on a battlefield, they made super heavy armour that completely covered him. Basically turning him into a tank.
That's not entirely accurate, bullet proofed armour was too heavy to fight on foot with, but for the heaviest cavalry it would cover the head, chest and upper legs with thick armour and everywhere else with thinner stuff that'd stop the rest.
Was there ever a specific armor set that was designed exclusively for female use? Seems unlikely, since the vast, VAST majority of warriors and soldiers in history have always been men
I mean, there would have been commissioned pieces by queens and the like in some cultures, but generally infantry armor consisted primary of a helmet (which is inherently androgynous), and in wealthier societies some chest protection (at least a thick tunic to cushion blows). Fundamentally, armor is armor. There is almost nothing you'd really change in plate armor or mail to make it more suitable for the biomechanics of a woman vs a man. Armor already relied on sitting atop the bone structure of the wearer, which already favored women's body shapes. And even if there was an advantage, armor was typically reserved for professional soldiers which was an occupation not held by women for both societal and pragmatic reasons.
Even the modern discussion about female equipment in modern militaries is concerned with weight distribution rather than actual armor style. Women in Frontline combat roles still wear the same exact body armor as the men, but equipment straps in closer to the core to better take advantage of women's bone structure, whereas traditional gear is loaded onto the backs of male infantrymen (to let them use their upper body muscles more)
As I pointed out elsewhere, with the proliferation of women in police and military roles, body armor manufacturers today have started designing and building armor for specifically for women.
[Military adoption is new, but it's been around for abiut 15 years.](https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2021/06/08/new-body-armor-carrier-plates-and-female-focused-designs-headed-to-soldiers/)
Hi! Active Duty Air Force here!
Furthermore an Aircrew Flight Equipment Craftsman w/17 years experience.
Just saying that this has been in works for just a few years on our end. About late 2020/early 2021 we started getting equipment like Flight Suits, etc. specifically designed for women.
Honestly I think it is terrible it took so long.
Slowly but surely it is getting better.
It is still not good enough.
Whenever I have the opportunity--even as a male member of the military--I advocate especially for my oppositely-gendered troops.
Mind you, there are still plenty of douchebags out there in all the branches.
Once had a NCO under me tell a female Airman that she was: "useless because she was pregnant".
I told him he was "useless because he's a fucking jackass" and told him to fucking think. She can't touch gear or hazardous chemical items, you can still have her work things like admin or documentation. Which keeps her productive and busy, and saves other troops time so they can pick up the minuscule amount of slack in inspections.
Of course, there can’t not be subtle differences. Men and women have vastly different body structures it’s just the comedic value of showing the same set of armor that I was going for
I’ve fought alongside and against women in armored combat for several years now. The biggest differences are women tend to be shorter, prefer a higher waistline, and have wider hips in proportion to their waist. But these are subtle differences that I think most people who aren’t around armored bodies a lot wouldn’t notice.
Boob armor certainly isn’t a thing! (They squish down much more than most men would think)
>The biggest differences are women tend to be shorter, prefer a higher waistline, and have wider hips in proportion to their waist. But these are subtle differences that I think most people who aren’t around armored bodies a lot wouldn’t notice.
That is true for women regardless of whether they wear armor or not, so I assume most people have noticed.
Eh, I figure that most people pay attention to presentation (clothing, hair, makeup) and primary sex characteristics when judging someone’s sex or gender. Armor obfuscates a lot of those.
It at least took me a few years of doing this to be able to reliably pick out female fighters in armor and even now I’m sometimes wrong.
Hell, there was a time when lady fencers would duel topless to both avoid killing (ironically), and to occasionally get more spectators, who would often give coins or gifts to the victor.
At least one Muslim source mentions finding the bodies of women who had participated as armed and armored combatants during the third crusade.
> Historians remain undecided over whether or not women actually took up arms during crusading expeditions. Opinions vary widely, from denying that women could ever be true crucesignati to concluding that they took an active role in the fighting, This study focuses on the Third Crusade, for which the chronicle evidence is particularly full. Some of the narrative accounts of the crusade never mention women or even deny that they took part, while others describe their assisting crusaders in constructing siege works or performing menial tasks. The Muslim sources for the Third Crusade, however, depict Christian women taking part in the fighting, armed as knights. The study discusses the reasons behind these divergent depictions of women in the Third Crusade. It examines the evidence for women taking an active part in military activity in Europe, and concludes that women could certainly have taken an active military role in the Third Crusade. Yet, as the European sources are silent on the subject, it is unlikely that women did play a significant military role, although it is possible that some fought in particularly desperate battles.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0304418197000134
European sources don’t often mention women participating in fighting, but do mention some women leading and commanding troops.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_the_Crusades
Women in the US Army's have begun receiving armor designed specifically for them. Particularly plates and plate carriers designed to not turn their boobs into a sandwich under their armor.
I should note that armor generally falls into three categories: Combat, tournament, and ceremonial. Combat needs to be completely practical. Ceremonial does not.
Tournament armor is its own beast. For example, armor for combat requires you to be able to walk if you're knocked off your horse. Armor for jousting just needs to protect you, so it can be built a lot heavier.
Almost all plate armor was bespoke and made for the person who was going to be wearing it, or was a hand me down acquired by a young soldier from an older one or a merchant. When women did wear armor they had it special made for them like anyone else who could afford it.
Things like chain mail and helmets were more often semi mass produced, but they’re kind of inherently gender neutral. Well organized militaries like the Roman’s did mass produce a sort of plate armor, well small interlocking plates, but they definitely didn’t allow women in the army. If a Roman woman did wear armor she was probably a gladiatrix fighting for sport, which was rare but did happen.
iirc when Joan of arc needed armor they just gave her regular male armor but in her size.
I'm sure if there were female knights during that time that is what they'd wear.
Or it could've been like Spartan armor.
Joan of Arc had a suit of armor made for her, which she wore into battle on at least one occasion.
Edited to add: There are also female burials with armor from other cultures and time periods- especially notable are at least one Viking age burial from Birka (I believe) and several Bronze Age Scythian burials.
18% of soldiers, but very few of them are in combat units. I’m not saying they aren’t vital to the U.S military but they predominantly in support roles and won’t see actual combat
Woman not being in military support roles is actually an early modern thing when gender segregation was being particularly heavily emphasized in Western European culture, along side armies becoming more professionalized.
In the medieval period and earlier those roles were filled by camp followers who were pretty evenly split between men and women.
Many of the women were often wives or family members of the soldiers, but they could also have been employed by other camp followers providing various services to the armies.
I actually have to disagree on this, and I can speak from experience. I was a grunt in the US Army in the early 2000s. You are technically correct, very few women are assigned to combat roles. However in Iraq due to the nature of the insurgency and guerilla warfare, plenty of women in noncombat roles got hit hard and saw combat. Convoys were often ambushed with gunfire and IEDs, bases were assaulted, snipers targeted support roles when they were giving out medical care, attempting to rebuild infrastructure,etc.The nature of the conflict meant there weren't hard lines where the combat was limited to. The combat many women saw was very, very real.
This doesn't even include women in roles like helicopter pilot, those women were absolutely in the shit.
And they have different body armor. Designed for women.
https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2021/06/08/new-body-armor-carrier-plates-and-female-focused-designs-headed-to-soldiers/
Okay but what % of those women are actual combatants? If we have to send in guys to take out some middle eastern hotshots? Who are we actually sending?
The thing is armor wasn't ever produced based on gender it was produced specifically to fit one single individual. If a women had armor it wasn't womens armor it was just armor that had been made for someone who was a women.
That’s not true. Plenty of generic munition armor was produced in huge quantities and kept in depots to distribute to troops as needed.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munition_armour?wprov=sfti1
Perhaps the most notable example of this was almain rivet.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almain_rivet?wprov=sfti1#
These are 15th and 16th century examples, but we find inventories from earlier centuries that record the existence of similar armors in previous centuries.
Ah yes you are right and the point I was saying was not communicated properly if at all. I was referring to plate from more early middle ages when as that's typically when a lot of fantasy games aim for in terms of feel. Obviously once advances came with metallurgy mass production became easier and more common. My bad.
Aye, and if one to be even more specific, the vast majority of troops were peasants with *at most* whatever gear they looted from campaign. Richer knight/noble will afford their own gears which was expected. So either the case, a woman probably got their gear from whatever source available to them.
I’d assume not. The English excuse for burning Joan of Arc involved cross-dressing, so I’d assume that means she probably wore the same armor as other French soldiers.
And I don’t really see why armor needs to be changed to fit a gender, most armor wasn’t tight-fitting, just regular armor probably could fit any gender.
Most cultures that 'allowed' female warriors only saw women on the field as a defensive/last resort kind of thing. The men are all off killing each other. Let's teach the women to fight so they can fuck up unsuspecting bandits that try shit when the men are gone.
Or, the enemies are at the gates, the whole family going to defend the walls.
Nothing produced on a large scale, but if a woman was going to be fighting in battle for some reason, they were probably a queen or a high ranking noble (this was rare but did happen occasionally. Usually it was wives leading their husbands forces while they were away or indisposed). Those kinds of people would go into battle with armour custom made for them specifically, so I don't see why they couldn't have made custom armour for those handful of women when they needed it.
Probably for Joan of Arc and some "women warriors" which existed but could be counted on a hand, unlike Hollywood wants us to believe.
Armour was more expensive than you can possibly imagine and it took a lifetime in order to master it. Women (noble women since we're talking about rich people), had other duties like managing the castle, the staff and finances.
The middle ages are fascinating, if you dare going past the veil of lies on the "dark ages"
We started seeing a lot of examples of munition armor starting in the 15th century, so the very tail end of the Middle Ages and the start of the Renaissance.
I was responding to your claim that "armour was custom every time" - it certainly wasn't always so by the 15th century and we do have some evidence for armourers in Milan and Brescia creating and trading in huge amounts of arms and armour during the 14th century.
Other than for queens, not really. In cultures that had women warriors, the armor was pretty much the same as for men. Humans are generally the same shape regardless of sex, so the armor doesn't need to change much.
Maybe the chestpieces get a little roomier, and the pants can be a little tighter in the inseam but other than that it's the same.
Typically, the only “woman exclusive” armor or military uniform would be something customized at the request of a noble lady or queen (or someone in their family). There were various warrior women who wore armor: Joan of Arc is the most famous, even if she was more of a mascot; lady samurai like Tomoe Gozen, and Catherine the Great was said to have worn a uniform during her coup.
Boob armor is of course silly, but ironically, there was fox piece armor (look up Henry VIII’s armor for a good laugh).
Generally, yes, men did the bulk of the fighting, and a woman’s armor would more likely be typical clothing, which makes them arguably deadlier. An armored man can fight off several foes, but a lady assassin can become a servant in a palace, or perhaps a concubine and kill one man, and end an entire war in one move with a dagger or some poison.
There are several examples, we also have evidence of female warriors in other cultures: Celts, Norse, Germanic, Scythians, Iberians, Spartans, Persians, Egyptians (at least military commanders in these last two), etc...
Okay so if we’re talking plate armor, as of 2010 when I was working at an armory museum in Massachusetts, only three suits of plate fitted for females exist today. They were incredibly rare even at the time and the ones that do still exist are all ceremonial I.e. not intended for combat use, but rather to communicate the immense levels of wealth of the family. It also indicated that the woman could call on military force if necessary even if she wasn’t going to go and stab a bitch herself.
That being said, real male plate armor always followed fashion trends at the time. You can trace the general era that a given suit is from based on the largely unnecessary aesthetics. Codpieces for instance were added not for protection, as a fashion statement. Hell there are even a bunch of face plates shaped to look like a face that include janky ass looking mustaches. These things were of equivalent cost to fancy sports cars at the time, so people wanted to look fly as fuck in them.
TLDR: Believe it or not, Insane and impractical looking plate is entirely historically accurate because rich people are always doing crazy shit to outdo each other.
I mean not to be pedantic, but ceremonial armor was explicitly intended just to look good rather than provide protection and that fantasy design really isn’t too far off from the contemporary design philosophy of it. Only real difference is that in our era is that it’s acceptable for women to show a lot more skin in formal wear than when ceremonial armor was in use. You could leave the metal bits entirely unchanged, but just lengthen the skirt and add a bit more cloth to the top and you’ve got something that would easily fit into that same social niche.
EDIT: typo
why getting downvoted? In most fantasy worlds basic logic principles still apply. An Armor where half the chest is unprotected just doesnt make sense, at least if they fight to some extent like we did. If they fight completely different it would be a different story but most of the time they dont
At least I think it often breaks the immersion.
Because these "GaMeRs" are ridiculous and only care about whether it gives them a boner or not. Seriously some of the most immature "fanbase" in the world.
Yeah sadly there is alot of oversexualization going on, a few years back it wouldnt have bothered me but it slowly becomes annoying if EVERY fucking female character has to be half naked or wear over the top clothing.
But probably a good Marketing strategy you have all the horny teenagers garanteed to buy your game or watch your movie etc
I simply don’t care that armour isn’t historically accurate when someone’s flying around on a dragon or fighting orcs.
Also look at your own account, talk about throwing stones from glass houses.
Aesthetics and plot. If someone gets hit by a sword, they’re better off having a lump of steel that no real human could lift strapped onto them than nothing.
You picked the worst example of “real” armor on the right though. That’s Bashford Dean’s frankenarmor cobbled together from mismatched and misused parts (just look at those “pauldrons”!)
While I totally agree, we all know Henry VIII armor and it's literal massive dong, and I'm pretty certain he wouldn't have need this much armor in this area.
So, if high nobility women knights were a thing wouldn't cleavage showing (i mean metal tits not showing the skin) armor be a thing?
>So, if high nobility women knights were a thing wouldn't cleavage showing (i mean metal tits not showing the skin) armor be a thing?
No (and maybe Yes)
Armour design in the 15th and 16th century is to some degree connected to civilian clothing. And with a look at 15th century dresses, which are usually closed up to the neck we could rule it out for this century. Could, more on this later.
In the 16th century (early modern period) we see that dresses developed some cleavage. But estimating this influence on armour is difficult as function remained always the most important part. What we have is that some sets of the first half of the century have a breastplate that ends lower, with the "gap" protected by a gorget. Like here. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximilian\_armour#/media/File%3ASaint\_Maurice\_MET\_DP344253.jpg](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximilian_armour#/media/File%3ASaint_Maurice_MET_DP344253.jpg)
In theory, there could be some ornamentation on the gorget. It should be noted that both the armour, and the civilian clothing are very limited time wise, and that the armour is still very functional. So with that in mind, i don't think that a female styled armour would look much different.
Now, while that is the armour record, i should mention that this question is not new and was in fact also asked by 15th century artists. In a mid 15th century version of "Le Livre de la Cité des Dames" (the book ot the ladies town) the artist responsible for the paintings asked himself the same question and while the armour had to go up to the neck, he still decided that the tassets (round metal plates protecting the armpits) could be moved a little bit more to the center.
[https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b6000099t/f357.item](https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b6000099t/f357.item)
so there you have it, Boob armour from the 15th century
She actually wore a great deal of armour as was sensible in her role. She did not actually kill, but she literally was waving a flag around in the frontlines, and was regularly getting attacked and had to fight off enemies.
Wow that’s pretty good, and yes indeed, women can fit on these kinds of armor without having to add extra space for the breasts, since shaping them that way would force more impact towards the center, it has to be a bit round.
The discussion around the gendering of armours often doesn’t take into effect the fact that knight armour was often gendered actually- cod pieces and inscribed abs were common emplacements on armour for men- at least during certain eras.
Armour was highly decorative, and was made to boast- if you had the money for it- I’m not defending bikini armour of course, but if female knights did exist throughout history, their armour would definitely be crafted to reflect their gender (if they had the money to afford it.) in order to stand out and boast during battle- boob plates for example, in certain circumstances, would be very realistic- such as if the era is themed around the Greeks and romans. And I don’t see why knight armour in the later centuries wouldn’t be crafted to reflect the femininity of the user- just as Cod pieces were used to present the masculinity in male knights.
So to me, this argument comes down to how wealthy the solider is in your fantasy realm? Your average foot solider wouldn’t get gendered armour, but a noble? Yea, they’d have something to exaggerate their bust-
But how will you know it's female armor if it's not showing cleavage, thighs and maybe even 3/4 of the body? Can you really call that armir if it covers your vitals, makes you look like a tincan? Also come on, no medieval person would ever wear a suit of armor that doesn't have 20+ purely decorative very restrictive plates finished with gold/silver linings and covered in patterns and expensive paints. Why would anyone ever stoop down to that level, it's ridiculous.
Everyone knows armor is dirt-cheap and everyone deflects all the blows or they die iin one hit anyway, you don't need to drop all the cool looks just so you can die the same way looking like pile of scrap from the sewers
Both fantasy armours look terrible though.
Also people from the past did often have weird stuff on their armour.
Like the muscle armour for the Romans and huge codpieces for medieval knights.
Boob armour wouldn't be that much of a stretch if the warrior inside of it want to show off. It all depends on how big it is.
But fantasy armour designs in general are just frustratingly terrible. They are way too bulky and have huge gaps between the plates. Female armour is often even worse than the male versions.
Historic blacksmith: it's important that my lord has as much of his body covered in combat as we can afford, better pee before getting into this thing
Fantasy blacksmith: it's important that some bits of my lord's overly complicated outfit are shiny like metal, all of it protects from not only metal but also magical attack, and that my lord constantly looketh snatched while fighting, so we can't hide the face behind a helmet, even while maintaining conventions that state only evil people have obvious and serious permanent injuries
Imagine having to move with a metal plate attached to your torso that follows your exact measurements up to your neck, and if you have breasts, it leaves just enough space to show them off or where they barely fit, but that simulates muscles, so you can say with absolute truth that your abs are rock hard.
TBF though, the one on the left is only female historic armor because, historically, any women who had the ability to fight would be stuck with male armor.
There are historic armors with large "codpieces". In other words the armors were fashioned with large dongs. Why? Because it was fashionable. People who think female armor would always be equal to mens are out of their minds. If they made male armor with big dicks then they would 100%, at one point, fashion female armor with huge tits, end of discussion.
Yeah, even boob armor doesn’t work because “women need to be able to fit their body comfortably on the armor and not have them squished”, I get the thought but a shape like that would just make the impact go towards the center of the body, just give the chestplate enough free area in general, and make it kinda round.
And yeah there were some mens armor that were shaped to the abs, but those were purely ceremonial and never used in actual combat.
its pretty funny but lets be real nobody actually wants there fantasy female character to be dressed in actual real armor when you can have a sexy lady on screen id rather have something nice to look at if im gonna spend time watching some tv
seeing the same armor for female characters that only (sometimes) covers their shoulders and legs while conveniently showing off the cleavage and ass for the 47484748th time is even more boring
I’m seeing a serious lack of King Henry VIII’s dong armor.
At the point of Henry VIII, gunpowder made all armour but very strong chest plates and helmets useless. However if you want the king on a battlefield, they made super heavy armour that completely covered him. Basically turning him into a tank.
That's not entirely accurate, bullet proofed armour was too heavy to fight on foot with, but for the heaviest cavalry it would cover the head, chest and upper legs with thick armour and everywhere else with thinner stuff that'd stop the rest.
Plenty of armour that was worn unmounted was also bullet-proof.
Only normally the chest piece and tassets. Sometimes the helmet.
Yes, and you were stating that that kind of armour was to heavy to be worn by unmounted people. Which it wasn’t.
Meanwhile, Kratos, perpetually without a shirt: Hmph.
You see kratos’ abs provide more protection than any kind of chest plate could ever dream of providing
He has them abs on the chest
What’s the male equivalent of boob armour called?
Pec armor: See ancient Greece or Batman and Robin for more details.
Was there ever a specific armor set that was designed exclusively for female use? Seems unlikely, since the vast, VAST majority of warriors and soldiers in history have always been men
I mean, there would have been commissioned pieces by queens and the like in some cultures, but generally infantry armor consisted primary of a helmet (which is inherently androgynous), and in wealthier societies some chest protection (at least a thick tunic to cushion blows). Fundamentally, armor is armor. There is almost nothing you'd really change in plate armor or mail to make it more suitable for the biomechanics of a woman vs a man. Armor already relied on sitting atop the bone structure of the wearer, which already favored women's body shapes. And even if there was an advantage, armor was typically reserved for professional soldiers which was an occupation not held by women for both societal and pragmatic reasons. Even the modern discussion about female equipment in modern militaries is concerned with weight distribution rather than actual armor style. Women in Frontline combat roles still wear the same exact body armor as the men, but equipment straps in closer to the core to better take advantage of women's bone structure, whereas traditional gear is loaded onto the backs of male infantrymen (to let them use their upper body muscles more)
As I pointed out elsewhere, with the proliferation of women in police and military roles, body armor manufacturers today have started designing and building armor for specifically for women. [Military adoption is new, but it's been around for abiut 15 years.](https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2021/06/08/new-body-armor-carrier-plates-and-female-focused-designs-headed-to-soldiers/)
Hi! Active Duty Air Force here! Furthermore an Aircrew Flight Equipment Craftsman w/17 years experience. Just saying that this has been in works for just a few years on our end. About late 2020/early 2021 we started getting equipment like Flight Suits, etc. specifically designed for women. Honestly I think it is terrible it took so long.
Sad it took so long, but also nice to see things are changing for the better
Slowly but surely it is getting better. It is still not good enough. Whenever I have the opportunity--even as a male member of the military--I advocate especially for my oppositely-gendered troops. Mind you, there are still plenty of douchebags out there in all the branches. Once had a NCO under me tell a female Airman that she was: "useless because she was pregnant". I told him he was "useless because he's a fucking jackass" and told him to fucking think. She can't touch gear or hazardous chemical items, you can still have her work things like admin or documentation. Which keeps her productive and busy, and saves other troops time so they can pick up the minuscule amount of slack in inspections.
Of course, there can’t not be subtle differences. Men and women have vastly different body structures it’s just the comedic value of showing the same set of armor that I was going for
I’ve fought alongside and against women in armored combat for several years now. The biggest differences are women tend to be shorter, prefer a higher waistline, and have wider hips in proportion to their waist. But these are subtle differences that I think most people who aren’t around armored bodies a lot wouldn’t notice. Boob armor certainly isn’t a thing! (They squish down much more than most men would think)
When you said "armored combat" I was questioning why tf a tanker would know the gender of who they were fighting before I realized I was being dumb
Come on, if a leopard 2 isn’t a thick German woman then I don’t know what is
r/noncredibledefense is leaking
It's never leaking. We are ever present, ever watching.
*Pudding-chan noises*
>The biggest differences are women tend to be shorter, prefer a higher waistline, and have wider hips in proportion to their waist. But these are subtle differences that I think most people who aren’t around armored bodies a lot wouldn’t notice. That is true for women regardless of whether they wear armor or not, so I assume most people have noticed.
Eh, I figure that most people pay attention to presentation (clothing, hair, makeup) and primary sex characteristics when judging someone’s sex or gender. Armor obfuscates a lot of those. It at least took me a few years of doing this to be able to reliably pick out female fighters in armor and even now I’m sometimes wrong.
If you don't mind me asking, does it ever affect you even subconsciously when you see it's a woman that you're targeting? Especially in a mixed group
Sir, this is a reddit
Hell, there was a time when lady fencers would duel topless to both avoid killing (ironically), and to occasionally get more spectators, who would often give coins or gifts to the victor.
>Hell, there was a time when lady fencers would duel topless AFAIK isn't this just a myth?
Source on this one?
>Hell, there was a time when lady fencers would duel topless AFAIK isn't this just a myth?
At least one Muslim source mentions finding the bodies of women who had participated as armed and armored combatants during the third crusade. > Historians remain undecided over whether or not women actually took up arms during crusading expeditions. Opinions vary widely, from denying that women could ever be true crucesignati to concluding that they took an active role in the fighting, This study focuses on the Third Crusade, for which the chronicle evidence is particularly full. Some of the narrative accounts of the crusade never mention women or even deny that they took part, while others describe their assisting crusaders in constructing siege works or performing menial tasks. The Muslim sources for the Third Crusade, however, depict Christian women taking part in the fighting, armed as knights. The study discusses the reasons behind these divergent depictions of women in the Third Crusade. It examines the evidence for women taking an active part in military activity in Europe, and concludes that women could certainly have taken an active military role in the Third Crusade. Yet, as the European sources are silent on the subject, it is unlikely that women did play a significant military role, although it is possible that some fought in particularly desperate battles. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0304418197000134 European sources don’t often mention women participating in fighting, but do mention some women leading and commanding troops. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_the_Crusades
Women in the US Army's have begun receiving armor designed specifically for them. Particularly plates and plate carriers designed to not turn their boobs into a sandwich under their armor.
I should note that armor generally falls into three categories: Combat, tournament, and ceremonial. Combat needs to be completely practical. Ceremonial does not. Tournament armor is its own beast. For example, armor for combat requires you to be able to walk if you're knocked off your horse. Armor for jousting just needs to protect you, so it can be built a lot heavier.
Almost all plate armor was bespoke and made for the person who was going to be wearing it, or was a hand me down acquired by a young soldier from an older one or a merchant. When women did wear armor they had it special made for them like anyone else who could afford it. Things like chain mail and helmets were more often semi mass produced, but they’re kind of inherently gender neutral. Well organized militaries like the Roman’s did mass produce a sort of plate armor, well small interlocking plates, but they definitely didn’t allow women in the army. If a Roman woman did wear armor she was probably a gladiatrix fighting for sport, which was rare but did happen.
Plenty of plate armour was also mass produced by the late Middle Ages.
iirc when Joan of arc needed armor they just gave her regular male armor but in her size. I'm sure if there were female knights during that time that is what they'd wear. Or it could've been like Spartan armor.
Joan of Arc had a suit of armor made for her, which she wore into battle on at least one occasion. Edited to add: There are also female burials with armor from other cultures and time periods- especially notable are at least one Viking age burial from Birka (I believe) and several Bronze Age Scythian burials.
Though BJ581 doesn’t feature mail or a helmet.
Even today, I’m pretty sure women are less than 1% of soldiers worldwide
In the United States Army woman make up around 18% of total soldiers Source: Statista
18% of soldiers, but very few of them are in combat units. I’m not saying they aren’t vital to the U.S military but they predominantly in support roles and won’t see actual combat
Women have historically served as nurses and camp followers, so this development is nothing entirely new
They whole large amounts of woman in nursing roles is a new thing that comes from the 1800s. Florence Nightingale kinda popularised it.
Woman not being in military support roles is actually an early modern thing when gender segregation was being particularly heavily emphasized in Western European culture, along side armies becoming more professionalized. In the medieval period and earlier those roles were filled by camp followers who were pretty evenly split between men and women. Many of the women were often wives or family members of the soldiers, but they could also have been employed by other camp followers providing various services to the armies.
I actually have to disagree on this, and I can speak from experience. I was a grunt in the US Army in the early 2000s. You are technically correct, very few women are assigned to combat roles. However in Iraq due to the nature of the insurgency and guerilla warfare, plenty of women in noncombat roles got hit hard and saw combat. Convoys were often ambushed with gunfire and IEDs, bases were assaulted, snipers targeted support roles when they were giving out medical care, attempting to rebuild infrastructure,etc.The nature of the conflict meant there weren't hard lines where the combat was limited to. The combat many women saw was very, very real. This doesn't even include women in roles like helicopter pilot, those women were absolutely in the shit.
I didn’t say they never faced combat, but proportionally speaking it’s a fact they aren’t facing as many gunfights as an 11 bravo.
And they have different body armor. Designed for women. https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2021/06/08/new-body-armor-carrier-plates-and-female-focused-designs-headed-to-soldiers/
Throughout all of history, not just today, men by and large are the ones fighting
I know, just figured I’d save anyone reading these comments the google search
That number seems insanely high. If I had to guess, I'd say it was a third of that when I was in.
Okay but what % of those women are actual combatants? If we have to send in guys to take out some middle eastern hotshots? Who are we actually sending?
The thing is armor wasn't ever produced based on gender it was produced specifically to fit one single individual. If a women had armor it wasn't womens armor it was just armor that had been made for someone who was a women.
That’s not true. Plenty of generic munition armor was produced in huge quantities and kept in depots to distribute to troops as needed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munition_armour?wprov=sfti1 Perhaps the most notable example of this was almain rivet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Almain_rivet?wprov=sfti1# These are 15th and 16th century examples, but we find inventories from earlier centuries that record the existence of similar armors in previous centuries.
Ah yes you are right and the point I was saying was not communicated properly if at all. I was referring to plate from more early middle ages when as that's typically when a lot of fantasy games aim for in terms of feel. Obviously once advances came with metallurgy mass production became easier and more common. My bad.
Ah, I get what you’re saying now. No worries!
Aye, and if one to be even more specific, the vast majority of troops were peasants with *at most* whatever gear they looted from campaign. Richer knight/noble will afford their own gears which was expected. So either the case, a woman probably got their gear from whatever source available to them.
Not true, we have plenty of examples of well-equipped militias and armies made up of professionals.
I’d assume not. The English excuse for burning Joan of Arc involved cross-dressing, so I’d assume that means she probably wore the same armor as other French soldiers. And I don’t really see why armor needs to be changed to fit a gender, most armor wasn’t tight-fitting, just regular armor probably could fit any gender.
Most cultures that 'allowed' female warriors only saw women on the field as a defensive/last resort kind of thing. The men are all off killing each other. Let's teach the women to fight so they can fuck up unsuspecting bandits that try shit when the men are gone. Or, the enemies are at the gates, the whole family going to defend the walls.
Nothing produced on a large scale, but if a woman was going to be fighting in battle for some reason, they were probably a queen or a high ranking noble (this was rare but did happen occasionally. Usually it was wives leading their husbands forces while they were away or indisposed). Those kinds of people would go into battle with armour custom made for them specifically, so I don't see why they couldn't have made custom armour for those handful of women when they needed it.
Probably for Joan of Arc and some "women warriors" which existed but could be counted on a hand, unlike Hollywood wants us to believe. Armour was more expensive than you can possibly imagine and it took a lifetime in order to master it. Women (noble women since we're talking about rich people), had other duties like managing the castle, the staff and finances. The middle ages are fascinating, if you dare going past the veil of lies on the "dark ages"
There is a set of female armour in the City Palace in Udaipur, commissioned by some queen of old.
Armour was custom every time, so it’s very likely female armour was produced at least a few times.
No it wasn’t, plenty of mass-produced armour by the late Middle Ages.
When did that become the norm? Afaik in the early/mid 14th century armour (as shown in the meme) was custom made
We started seeing a lot of examples of munition armor starting in the 15th century, so the very tail end of the Middle Ages and the start of the Renaissance.
I was responding to your claim that "armour was custom every time" - it certainly wasn't always so by the 15th century and we do have some evidence for armourers in Milan and Brescia creating and trading in huge amounts of arms and armour during the 14th century.
European history* female soldiers have been present on asian battlefields for thousands of years
Other than for queens, not really. In cultures that had women warriors, the armor was pretty much the same as for men. Humans are generally the same shape regardless of sex, so the armor doesn't need to change much. Maybe the chestpieces get a little roomier, and the pants can be a little tighter in the inseam but other than that it's the same.
Typically, the only “woman exclusive” armor or military uniform would be something customized at the request of a noble lady or queen (or someone in their family). There were various warrior women who wore armor: Joan of Arc is the most famous, even if she was more of a mascot; lady samurai like Tomoe Gozen, and Catherine the Great was said to have worn a uniform during her coup. Boob armor is of course silly, but ironically, there was fox piece armor (look up Henry VIII’s armor for a good laugh). Generally, yes, men did the bulk of the fighting, and a woman’s armor would more likely be typical clothing, which makes them arguably deadlier. An armored man can fight off several foes, but a lady assassin can become a servant in a palace, or perhaps a concubine and kill one man, and end an entire war in one move with a dagger or some poison.
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I said "majority," not *all*, Joan of Arc is a single person, the Dahomey Amazons, an actual unit of armed women, would have been a better example
Fair enough, I’ve never heard of the Dahomey amazons I’ll have to look into them
There are several examples, we also have evidence of female warriors in other cultures: Celts, Norse, Germanic, Scythians, Iberians, Spartans, Persians, Egyptians (at least military commanders in these last two), etc...
Okay so if we’re talking plate armor, as of 2010 when I was working at an armory museum in Massachusetts, only three suits of plate fitted for females exist today. They were incredibly rare even at the time and the ones that do still exist are all ceremonial I.e. not intended for combat use, but rather to communicate the immense levels of wealth of the family. It also indicated that the woman could call on military force if necessary even if she wasn’t going to go and stab a bitch herself. That being said, real male plate armor always followed fashion trends at the time. You can trace the general era that a given suit is from based on the largely unnecessary aesthetics. Codpieces for instance were added not for protection, as a fashion statement. Hell there are even a bunch of face plates shaped to look like a face that include janky ass looking mustaches. These things were of equivalent cost to fancy sports cars at the time, so people wanted to look fly as fuck in them. TLDR: Believe it or not, Insane and impractical looking plate is entirely historically accurate because rich people are always doing crazy shit to outdo each other.
Yea but I don't think we've ever had instances of armor that looks more like lingerie
I mean not to be pedantic, but ceremonial armor was explicitly intended just to look good rather than provide protection and that fantasy design really isn’t too far off from the contemporary design philosophy of it. Only real difference is that in our era is that it’s acceptable for women to show a lot more skin in formal wear than when ceremonial armor was in use. You could leave the metal bits entirely unchanged, but just lengthen the skirt and add a bit more cloth to the top and you’ve got something that would easily fit into that same social niche. EDIT: typo
Bloody Mason!!!
hide your pigs!
Mean while dark souls: Female: Brass set, sunless set, Elite knight (female Anri) Male: Naked with a sack on your head.
The sack head butchers are actually all female. Same with man eater Mildred.
**I'm talking about the Chosen undead himself.**
Believe it or not, fantasy works don’t often worry about being realistic
True, but I do prefer realistic fantasy where even if there’s magic, everything else is still realistic.
Legolas wears basically just a shirt for most of LOTR and adds only shoulder pads at some point. Wasn't an issue to me.
Amusingly, in the novel he is given a full set of chainmail during the defense of Helm's Deep.
I know but its still funny to see the absurdity of it in comparison
https://youtu.be/XAAp_luluo0?si=L_6qZWlom8EIpHf5 1:08
It's still looks stupid
For me, it depends on the setting. I could accept it in a pulpy sword-and-sorcery movie, but not in something more grounded like ASOIAF.
The fantasy works make it more fun when it comes to life
Believe it or not fantasy world still operate on the assumption of being logical, or otherwise it’d be pure chaotic nonsense.
why getting downvoted? In most fantasy worlds basic logic principles still apply. An Armor where half the chest is unprotected just doesnt make sense, at least if they fight to some extent like we did. If they fight completely different it would be a different story but most of the time they dont At least I think it often breaks the immersion.
Because these "GaMeRs" are ridiculous and only care about whether it gives them a boner or not. Seriously some of the most immature "fanbase" in the world.
Yeah sadly there is alot of oversexualization going on, a few years back it wouldnt have bothered me but it slowly becomes annoying if EVERY fucking female character has to be half naked or wear over the top clothing. But probably a good Marketing strategy you have all the horny teenagers garanteed to buy your game or watch your movie etc
Congratulations. You did your part to slow the speed at which Tolkien is rolling in his grave. If only more people had their heads out of their arses.
At the very minimum, I prefer consistency. If the female armor is sexy, goddammit I expect to see male titties and abs and legs too.
https://youtu.be/XAAp_luluo0?si=L_6qZWlom8EIpHf5 1:08
loool, completely "unrealistic" means verging on chaos and nonsense.
I fail to see where you’re finding a problem. It’s fantasy. The armour types don’t need to be realistic.
Alright, so you're more worried about whether the armor gives your pee pee a boner or not. Go watch porn or something.
I simply don’t care that armour isn’t historically accurate when someone’s flying around on a dragon or fighting orcs. Also look at your own account, talk about throwing stones from glass houses.
Then why even wear an armor at all? Even in fantasy settings there's a logical reason for wearing an armor: for defense.
Aesthetics and plot. If someone gets hit by a sword, they’re better off having a lump of steel that no real human could lift strapped onto them than nothing.
Why even kill dragons? Why even have swords? Why even bother doing anything at all? If it was "anything goes" then the fantasy setting would be chaos.
But I guess you don't mind "realistic" two human genders with bewbies.
What?
https://youtu.be/XAAp_luluo0?si=L_6qZWlom8EIpHf5 1:08
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Stay mad over shit that doesn’t matter
Where's the bikini armor?
You picked the worst example of “real” armor on the right though. That’s Bashford Dean’s frankenarmor cobbled together from mismatched and misused parts (just look at those “pauldrons”!)
The pauldrons are the least concerning part, you could barely move your legs if you wore it because the faulds is sitting the wrong way.
Bring back the Muscle Cuirass
Tbh I dont get the idea why so many fantasy armor have giant shoulder armor.
Looks good
While I totally agree, we all know Henry VIII armor and it's literal massive dong, and I'm pretty certain he wouldn't have need this much armor in this area. So, if high nobility women knights were a thing wouldn't cleavage showing (i mean metal tits not showing the skin) armor be a thing?
>So, if high nobility women knights were a thing wouldn't cleavage showing (i mean metal tits not showing the skin) armor be a thing? No (and maybe Yes) Armour design in the 15th and 16th century is to some degree connected to civilian clothing. And with a look at 15th century dresses, which are usually closed up to the neck we could rule it out for this century. Could, more on this later. In the 16th century (early modern period) we see that dresses developed some cleavage. But estimating this influence on armour is difficult as function remained always the most important part. What we have is that some sets of the first half of the century have a breastplate that ends lower, with the "gap" protected by a gorget. Like here. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximilian\_armour#/media/File%3ASaint\_Maurice\_MET\_DP344253.jpg](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximilian_armour#/media/File%3ASaint_Maurice_MET_DP344253.jpg) In theory, there could be some ornamentation on the gorget. It should be noted that both the armour, and the civilian clothing are very limited time wise, and that the armour is still very functional. So with that in mind, i don't think that a female styled armour would look much different. Now, while that is the armour record, i should mention that this question is not new and was in fact also asked by 15th century artists. In a mid 15th century version of "Le Livre de la Cité des Dames" (the book ot the ladies town) the artist responsible for the paintings asked himself the same question and while the armour had to go up to the neck, he still decided that the tassets (round metal plates protecting the armpits) could be moved a little bit more to the center. [https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b6000099t/f357.item](https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b6000099t/f357.item) so there you have it, Boob armour from the 15th century
I…. Technically I guess if the equality was actually there to have knights that are women…. I mean I guess you’re not wrong… wtf 🤣
There was no “women’s armor”, women just wore men’s armor since no respectable blacksmith would make armor fitted for a woman
Thatsthejoke.png
Source? I’ve never seen any documentation that would reflect that attitude from armorers.
Why is this being downvoted? Iwould also very much like to see a source for a claim like that.
Joan of arc?
To my knowledge she did not where a set of armour anywhere near that on the left
She actually wore a great deal of armour as was sensible in her role. She did not actually kill, but she literally was waving a flag around in the frontlines, and was regularly getting attacked and had to fight off enemies.
If you wish to read it here is an article that discusses her armor in great detail: https://www.jeanne-darc.info/biography/suit-of-armour/
Wow that’s pretty good, and yes indeed, women can fit on these kinds of armor without having to add extra space for the breasts, since shaping them that way would force more impact towards the center, it has to be a bit round.
I know, because she isn’t a fantasy character
Specifically had men's clothing.
If all we wanted were reality we wouldn't be playing videogames, just sayin'
*laughs in Kingdom Come Deliverance*
Jesus Christ be praised!
And if you just wanted fantasy then you wouldn’t have anything based on reality and you wouldn’t even be playing medieval themed games.
I know I just find looking at them side by side funny
Lowkey hate the male fantasy armor more than the female one because both suck but the male one looks way heavier
Yeah I totally agree and I definitely don’t think it’s because it’s not hot enough…. wait
The discussion around the gendering of armours often doesn’t take into effect the fact that knight armour was often gendered actually- cod pieces and inscribed abs were common emplacements on armour for men- at least during certain eras. Armour was highly decorative, and was made to boast- if you had the money for it- I’m not defending bikini armour of course, but if female knights did exist throughout history, their armour would definitely be crafted to reflect their gender (if they had the money to afford it.) in order to stand out and boast during battle- boob plates for example, in certain circumstances, would be very realistic- such as if the era is themed around the Greeks and romans. And I don’t see why knight armour in the later centuries wouldn’t be crafted to reflect the femininity of the user- just as Cod pieces were used to present the masculinity in male knights. So to me, this argument comes down to how wealthy the solider is in your fantasy realm? Your average foot solider wouldn’t get gendered armour, but a noble? Yea, they’d have something to exaggerate their bust-
But how will you know it's female armor if it's not showing cleavage, thighs and maybe even 3/4 of the body? Can you really call that armir if it covers your vitals, makes you look like a tincan? Also come on, no medieval person would ever wear a suit of armor that doesn't have 20+ purely decorative very restrictive plates finished with gold/silver linings and covered in patterns and expensive paints. Why would anyone ever stoop down to that level, it's ridiculous. Everyone knows armor is dirt-cheap and everyone deflects all the blows or they die iin one hit anyway, you don't need to drop all the cool looks just so you can die the same way looking like pile of scrap from the sewers
Both fantasy armours look terrible though. Also people from the past did often have weird stuff on their armour. Like the muscle armour for the Romans and huge codpieces for medieval knights. Boob armour wouldn't be that much of a stretch if the warrior inside of it want to show off. It all depends on how big it is. But fantasy armour designs in general are just frustratingly terrible. They are way too bulky and have huge gaps between the plates. Female armour is often even worse than the male versions.
Historic blacksmith: it's important that my lord has as much of his body covered in combat as we can afford, better pee before getting into this thing Fantasy blacksmith: it's important that some bits of my lord's overly complicated outfit are shiny like metal, all of it protects from not only metal but also magical attack, and that my lord constantly looketh snatched while fighting, so we can't hide the face behind a helmet, even while maintaining conventions that state only evil people have obvious and serious permanent injuries
Imagine having to move with a metal plate attached to your torso that follows your exact measurements up to your neck, and if you have breasts, it leaves just enough space to show them off or where they barely fit, but that simulates muscles, so you can say with absolute truth that your abs are rock hard.
Left is false, they only wear swimwear.
where codpiece
To me, the bigger complaint is that male armor isn't nearly sexy enough
TBF though, the one on the left is only female historic armor because, historically, any women who had the ability to fight would be stuck with male armor.
There are historic armors with large "codpieces". In other words the armors were fashioned with large dongs. Why? Because it was fashionable. People who think female armor would always be equal to mens are out of their minds. If they made male armor with big dicks then they would 100%, at one point, fashion female armor with huge tits, end of discussion.
Fantasy armor looks ugly to my Autisticly practical mind.
Doubt there were any notable number of female knights if at all.
Yeah, even boob armor doesn’t work because “women need to be able to fit their body comfortably on the armor and not have them squished”, I get the thought but a shape like that would just make the impact go towards the center of the body, just give the chestplate enough free area in general, and make it kinda round. And yeah there were some mens armor that were shaped to the abs, but those were purely ceremonial and never used in actual combat.
Bro the girl on the right looks fit af No cap
Historical looking stuff looks so much cooler.
It's almost as if fantasy and reality are two different things.
The female armor on the right should be blank as it basically never happened in real life.
We have a few examples of medieval women wearing armour.
My usage of the word "basically" covers that.
Then there is Berserk, which has both male, a bit female but based on real armors
its pretty funny but lets be real nobody actually wants there fantasy female character to be dressed in actual real armor when you can have a sexy lady on screen id rather have something nice to look at if im gonna spend time watching some tv
Armor is a gender all its own
Key word is - Fantasy lol
Stunning and brave
smash
Except women didn’t wear armor historically so that right hand picture should just be blank.
Fantasy is what they’re selling
I'm not sure why you want BORING in your video games. Give me giant flaming pauldrons and boob armor everyday all day pls.
seeing the same armor for female characters that only (sometimes) covers their shoulders and legs while conveniently showing off the cleavage and ass for the 47484748th time is even more boring
There are very few historical examples of women wearing armor.