the.com/gambeson
the padded ancestor of armor that quietly outclassed steel for not getting you stabbed
means A padded, quilted defensive jacket worn either as standalone protection or as a cushioning layer beneath mail or plate armor.
from Comes through Old French 'gambeson' (also 'wambais'), borrowed from a Germanic source related to Old High German 'wamba,' meaning belly or stomach — fittingly, a garment that wrapped and guarded the torso. The same belly-root is a distant cousin of English 'womb.'
- material
- Layered linen, sometimes thirty sheets thick
- solo act
- Often worn alone by poorer foot soldiers
- under steel
- Knights wore one beneath plate too
- arrow proof
- Quilted layers could stop or slow arrows
- name root
- From Old French for protecting the belly