Spaulders are armoured plates worn on the upper arms and shoulders in a suit of plate armour

Plate armour

Plate armour is a historical type of personal armour made from iron or steel plates.While there are early predecessors such the Roman-era lorica segmentata, full plate armour developed in Europe during the Late Middle Ages, especially in the context of the Hundred Years' War, from the coat of...

.

Description

Developed during the Middle Ages

Middle Ages

The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...

, the use of spaulders declined during the Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

 along with the use of plate armour

Plate armour

Plate armour is a historical type of personal armour made from iron or steel plates.While there are early predecessors such the Roman-era lorica segmentata, full plate armour developed in Europe during the Late Middle Ages, especially in the context of the Hundred Years' War, from the coat of...

.

Unlike pauldrons, spaulders do not cover the arm holes when worn with a cuirass

Cuirass

A cuirass is a piece of armour, formed of a single or multiple pieces of metal or other rigid material, which covers the front of the torso...

. Instead, the gaps may be covered by besagews

Besagews

Besagues are circular defences designed to protect the armpits, as part of a harness of plate armour. Armour without besagues might employ larger shoulder defenses, such as winged pauldrons or simply leave the mail beneath exposed.-References:...

 or simply left bare, exposing the mail

Chainmail

Mail is a type of armour consisting of small metal rings linked together in a pattern to form a mesh.-History:Mail was a highly successful type of armour and was used by nearly every metalworking culture....

 beneath.

The Japanese (samurai

Samurai

is the term for the military nobility of pre-industrial Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character 侍 was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau...

) form of the spaulder is called sode.

Modern use

Though the use of spaulders has declined, various craftsmen and machine shops still exist which can craft a pair of spaulders for use in a museum or in simulated combat during reenactments.

Additionally, the Iraq War saw the introduction of a modern day version of the spaulder, in the form of the "Deltoid Axillary Protector" add-on to the Interceptor body armor

Interceptor body armor

Interceptor Body Armor is the United States Army's primary bulletproof vest. The Interceptor design replaced the older fragmentation protective Personnel Armor System for Ground Troops body armor system, introduced in the early 1980s...

worn by US soldiers.

External links

• Arador Armour Library guide to creating replica spaulders