Читать книгу Arms and Armor of the Pilgrims, 1620-1692 онлайн

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Men armed with muskets might sometimes wear pikeman’s armor, but more often they wore simpler corselets consisting only of breast and back-plates. With these corselets they wore either a cabasset, a morion or a burgonet.

The weight of the corselets worn by the Pilgrims depended largely on the quality of the breastplate. The helmets and other pieces were sufficient to stop a sword blow or turn an Indian’s arrow but still quite light. Breastplates, however, were made according to three standards depending on what weapons they were supposed to offer protection against. The lightest forms were labeled pike proof or high pike proof; the next heavier were called pistol proof, and the heaviest were musket proof. The musket proof breastplates are quite scarce. Often they are ⅜ of an inch thick and bear a dent caused by a bullet fired at them as a test when they were made. Pistol proof plates are much lighter and are much more plentiful. They also often bear a testing dent and sometimes the letter “P” as a proof mark.