History of Chain Mail and Ring Mail 



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from China; that they made use of it, while riding on horseback, in 

 fighting Chinese infantry; and that the Chinese soldiers learned to 

 handle it, and are more clever at it than the Jung. Its shape is com- 

 pared to a threshing-flail; and it may even have been derived from this 



Fig. 41. 



Ring Mail of Steel Wire (from Wu pei chi of 1621). 



implement, with which it agrees in mechanical principle. It is still 

 known in Peking under the name of "threshing-flail," and is used in 

 fencing. I saw this sport practised in 1902, and at that time secured a 

 specimen for the American Museum, New York. In the time of the 

 Emperor K'ien-lung it was still employed in the Chinese army. l 



1 Huang ch'ao li k'i Cu shi, Ch. 15, p. 25 b. According to this work, the weapon 

 is first mentioned in the T'ung tien of Tu Yu, who died in 812, where it is said that it 

 was manipulated by women on the walls to resist invaders. Ti Ts'ing, the famed 

 general in the wars against the western Liao (biography in Sung shi, Ch. 290), who 

 died in 1057, employed it on horseback. 



