History of Chain Mail and Ring Mail 239 



Volga and Kama peoples, or rather from the southern Turko-Tatar 

 tribes who seem to be very familiar with this kind of defensive armor. 

 The representation of chain mail on figures in the cave-temples of 

 Turkistan 1 might be directly traceable to Iranian influence, which is 

 overwhelmingly manifest in those monuments. But let us first exam- 

 ine the state of affairs in regard to ancient Persia. 



Specimens of Persian armor of very ancient date, unfortunately, 

 seem not to have survived; and our knowledge of the subject is largely 

 founded upon literary records, and on reconstructions based on the 

 appearance of warriors as often represented in the stone sculpture of 

 the Sassanian period. In regard to the armor of the ancient eastern 

 Iranian tribes, W. Geiger 2 remarks that it possibly consisted of metal 

 scales or of a texture of brazen rings. The fundamental passage for 

 our knowledge of ancient Persian armor remains Herodotus (VII, 61) ; 

 and A. V. W. Jackson, 3 taking it as the starting-point of his study, has 

 made a very valuable contribution to the subject. According to the 

 statement of Herodotus, the ancient Persians wore tunics with sleeves 

 of diverse colors, having upon them iron scales of the shape of fish-scales; 

 and this comparison leaves no doubt that scale armor, and not chain 

 mail, is meant. 4 The nobles and commanders seem to have worn 

 breastplates of golden scales, bedecked with a purple tunic (Herodotus, 

 IX, 22). This passage shows that Persian armor was solid enough to 



1 A. Grunwedel, Altbuddhistische Kultstatten in Chinesisch-Turkistan, pp. 8, 

 25 (Berlin, 1912). 



2 Ostiranische Kultur im Altertum, p. 444 (Erlangen, 1882). 



3 Herodotus vn, 61, or the Arms of the Ancient Persians illustrated from Iranian 

 Sources (Classical Studies in Honor of Henry Drisler, pp. 95-125, 6 figs, and 1 plate, 

 New York, 1894). 



4 According to O. Schrader (Reallexikon, p. 611), chain mail then became 

 known in Europe for the first time.— The Persian shield mentioned by Herodotus 

 under the name gerron, and contrasted with the Greek aspis, in my opinion, has not 

 received full justice from the hands of Professor Jackson (/. c, p. 99). The additional 

 note of Prof. Merriam (p. 124) is very ingenious, but it should not be forgotten that 

 Ammianus Marcellinus (xxiv, 6, 8) describes the Persian shields as oblong and 

 curved (convex), of plaited willow, and covered with rawhide, and as used by the 

 infantry composed of the rural population (quorum in subsidiis manipuli locati sunt 

 peditum, contecti scutis oblongis et curvis, quae texta vimine etcoriis crudis gestantes, 

 densius se commovebant). Similar types of shields, in which wood and skin were 

 combined, occurred among the Arabs (G. Jacob, Altarabisches Beduinenleben, 

 p. 136; G. Migeon, Manuel d'art musulman, Vol. II, p. 246, Paris, 1907). Typologi- 

 cally, they correspond to the circular Chinese shields plaited from cane or rattan, 

 and painted with the head of a tiger (p. 203). The gerra alluded to by Herodotus were, 

 I am inclined to think, likewise devices of plaited willow. G. Rawlinson translates, 

 "They bore wicker shields for bucklers." Also Xenophon {Anabasis, 1, 8) speaks of 

 Persian troops with wicker shields, and next to them heavy-armed soldiers with long 

 wooden shields reaching down to their feet (the latter were said to be Egyptians). 

 The ancients, according to the testimony of Vegetius (Institute ret militaris, 1, 11), 

 who lived at the end of the fourth century A.D., availed themselves of round shields, 

 likewise plaited from willow twigs (scuta de vimine in modum cratium corrotundata). 



