Aqtai
Sergeant Knight at Arms
mihoshi said:It looks more like mongol/middle Asia for me...
Mongol armour changed over time, but at the time of the Great Mongol conquests of the early 13th century, most Mongol warriors were unarmoured. Those who did wear armour usually wore lamellar armour, made with iron or laquered leather lamellae. After the conquest of China the Mongols also adopted Chinese styles. The states established by Mongols further west and in the Near East, such as the Ilkhanids of Iran and Iraq and the Golden Horde (in Russia and the Ukraine) eventually adopted Persian and Turkish styles of arms and armour.
Most Medieval Rus warriors wore little or no armour, only boyars (noblemen) druzhina (professional warriors) and some urban militias had armour. As I mentioned before up until the late 13th the Rus wore mainly mail, lamellar or various types of padded armours. The main external influences were the Byzantines, the Norse and Central Asian peoples like the Khazars, as well as their own indigenous styles. After the Mongol conquests the arms and armour of Western Rus principalities such as Novgorod were influenced by Western Europe, where as Eastern Rus principalities such as Muscovy, as result of Golden Horde influence, adopted Turco-Persian styles of arms and armour. Many types of Rus armour, helmets and weapons used in the 16th and 17th centuries especially, such as the shishak, yushman, zertsalo and bekhterets were very similar to Turco-Persian types.
On reflection though, although I have seen Vaegers wearing mail, lamellar or padded armour, I have yet to see one wearing a shishak, yushman or bekhterets. So really they seem to be more like the earlier Rus. Or maybe the whole Rus thing is just in my imagination.
We have gone completely off the topic of plate armour BTW.