Templar Knights’ charge in the Holy Land (MED0019)

Medieval armour and the Templar charge in the Holy Land

The knight in this painting carries the equipment that defined western warfare for roughly two centuries: a mail hauberk over padded garments, a great helm, a kite or heater shield, and a lance couched under the arm. It is worth stating plainly what that harness could and could not do, because few subjects have gathered as much invention as medieval armour.

What mail actually protected against

A riveted mail hauberk of perhaps thirty thousand rings weighed around ten to twelve kilograms, distributed across the shoulders and hips by a belt. It stopped cuts almost entirely and resisted most thrusts, but it transmitted impact: a man could survive a sword blow with unbroken skin and a broken collarbone. Against the crossbow bolt and the heavy arrow at close range it offered no guarantee, which is why the padded garment beneath — the aketon — mattered as much as the iron above it.

The couched lance

The charge shown here depended on a technique that took generations to develop: the lance held rigid under the arm rather than thrown or thrust, so that the impact carried the combined mass of horse and rider. It required a deep saddle with a high cantle, stirrups taking the rider’s weight, and above all a formation that held together. A single knight charging was a target; fifty charging knee to knee were a battering ram.

Heat, water and the eastern campaign

In Syria and Palestine this equipment met conditions it was never designed for. Chroniclers on both sides return constantly to thirst and heat exhaustion, and commanders who ignored water lines lost armies without a decisive engagement — Hattin in 1187 being the clearest case. Latin forces adapted slowly: lighter surcoats over the mail to reduce solar heating, and increasing reliance on locally recruited light cavalry for scouting and screening.

Toward plate

From the late thirteenth century onward, iron plates began to supplement mail at the points most likely to be struck — knees, elbows, chest — and by the fifteenth century full articulated plate had replaced it almost entirely. The knight of the crusading era stands at the midpoint of that development: better protected than his Carolingian ancestor, considerably less so than the man who would fight at Agincourt.