Medieval Russia/Novgorod Arms and Armour

[Exarch]

hey doods
am looking for any info about Russian armour and arms an how they fought, especially in relation to the mongols and the teutonic order.
i kinda have something like this in mind, the last part where the masked russian soldier takes out the byzantine soldier in 0:20.


why did they wear face masks like that?
is that historically accurate? who wore them etc etc

[Babur]

hey doods
am looking for any info about Russian armour and arms an how they fought, especially in relation to the mongols and the teutonic order.
i kinda have something like this in mind, the last part where the masked russian soldier takes out the byzantine soldier in 0:20.


why did they wear face masks like that?
is that historically accurate? who wore them etc etc

those face masks were copied from the Kipchaks, whom the Mongols absorbed into the Golden Horde.

[ivan_the_terrible]

And the Kypchaks copied them from Persians.


@OP,

Ospreys has a pretty good collection on medieval Russian armour. Although it does over-emphasise lamellar armour - looking through it you'd get the impression it was the most common type, which is not true. Other than that it's fairly accurate.

[Exarch]

awesome stuff
so them novgorodians copied steel (was it steel? or copper?) masks from the kypchacks who in turn copied from the persians
would anyone have images or pics or links to the kypchacks or persian face masks?

they look so cool, too bad in the game none of the russian infantry wear the masks, only the cavalry

[Carpathian Wolf]

The face mask was originally worn by Alexander's cavalry IIRC which they took all the way to India. The Cumans copied it from the mid east and carried it into Russia. So the Russians got it from the Greeks about a thousand years later via asia which is really interesting. I heard some accounts of the Rus making face masks like that of the Virgin Mary and they would go into battle completely quiet and just unnerve the enemy completely.