Very enlightening topic indeed!,

Just to offer my 2 cents and a bit of eastern european POV , it seems that the anima armour appears in Hungarian heraldry as early as 1532 (well technically the place is in modern day western Romania , but anyway)

1532 coat of arms of Bakács Sandrin:

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retrieved from http://www.arcanum.hu/mol/lpext.dll?f=templat...tm&2.0

Not only was the style popular in faraway south-eastern europe, but also the Ottomans themselves made use of it (or at least their Grenzer/border troops, as the article identifies the men as " mainly souther slavs" , i.e. martolos/martaloc , that might have had greater access to continental european harness , unlike say.. anatolian units)

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Retrieved from http://mek.niif.hu/01900/01911/html/index51.html , (i'm guessing the source of the illustration is the infamous Codex Vindobonensis 8626 , from the late 16th century)

Note the frontman with the turban , the cuirass he wears seems very similar to the anima style.

In terms of actual historical examples , pieces earlier than later 16th century seem to be rare to say the least... http://www.davidrumsey.com/Amico/amico1259599-33124.html#record

Cheers

To add to this old thread. I'm working from memory here as well, and I'm not with my source at the moment. In his work on the Greenwich workshop, Dr. Alan Williams posits that the small plates were used because they could be heat-treated more effectively than large plates. Once the technique for heat-treating large plates was in use, anime cuirasses seem to fall from favor.

Chad, Dr. Williams posits that it was during the period of expirimentation with heat treating that a number of anime armour were made at Greewich in 1550's because the small plates were easier to perfect techinique with. You are correct, in that he also posits that once the techinique had been mastered that larger one piece breast plates are the norm, anime being made based on survivng Greewich attributable examples for only a small ten year window in the 1550's.

That makes a lot more sense to me than the fashion idea.

By the way, while sabers became increasingly popular in Eastern Europe, the Polish Hussars in particular (who used this armor arguably the most) preferred the Pallasch, which is a strait cutting sword similar to a Schiavona, or the Kanzer which is a type of estoc type thrusting-only sword.

The Pallash was something like this:

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http://www.russianswords.com/palash-navy-belt2.JPG.

Philip II of Spain:

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From Dr. William's " The Royal Armoury at Greenwich 1515-1649 "

" Table 2 strongly suggests that experiments were proceeding on the hardening of steel. The need to devise techniques of heat treatment without distortion would naturally have included efforts to secure a uniform cooling by trying out various methods of immersion or drenching that, for example, avoided trapping insulating layers of steam beneath concave surfaces. It may be for this reason that Kirkener ( Erasmus Kirkener master of the armoury at this time. my insertion ) built anime armours made up from narrow lames that were individually easier both to forge and to quench without buckling than whole breast or back plates "

Thanks for the images.

I believe the pallash evolved as a distinct weapon into the 18th Century, which had a specific type of complex hilt, (something like a mortuary hilt) along with the same type of strait, double fullered blade you see in the much earlier type Pallashes posted above. The Pallash became popular due to the success of the Hussars and was widely copied in Prussia, Holland, and Russia that i know of. The features include the double-fullering, the length, and the canted saber-like grip. Complex hilt came later.

it's hard to find good images of this weapon or any sources in English. Many websites confuse the Kanzer and the Pallash, and the Pallash is spelled numerous ways. I have found some excellent surviving examples from the 18th-19th Century on auction sites but I no longer have the images. I haven't seen any good photos of 16th-17th Century examples yet, those you posted above are quite interesting.

I think the significance of the Hussars use of the strait sword was their emphasis on sustaiend close quarters shock combat, emblematic of their role as heavy cavalry in need of strong armor.

J

Polish word palasz probably comes from ottoman pala and means "sword". Usually cavalry sword. And now it's gonna get confusing.
although there's plenty of old polish names of curved sabres, one of them is palasz pochyly which means more or less "curved sword". Therefore polish period sources using the term palasz are rather confusing, sometimes suggesting difference between sabres and palasches, sometimes describing them all with the same word.
From the 19th.cent. polish historians used term szabla-sabre for curved swords and palasz for straight blades but this is only a terminological convention.

Basically polish word palasz can describe any sword, especially a cavalry sword apart from rapiers and smallswords, so it can be a schiavona, baskethilt of any sort, cutlass, sabre etc.

Hungarian and ottoman palasches as the ones from the pictures I've posted were the main hussar palasch type, but there is an assumption and probably evidence as well that western types of straight swords were in use in this formation as well. Probably is small numbers due to conservative mindset of hussar troops, but it's likely there were some.

Some hungarian style palasches had closed knucklebow guard same as later polish-hungarian sabres and seen plenty of use by the lighter hungarian hussars, which became very popular throughout Europe in 18th. century and I believe it's them not the winged hussars who popularized this weapons in the west and inspired western cavalry swords.
Best example is the british 1796 pattern. 96. light cavalry is very similar to polish-hungarian sabres (has a little different knucklebow and no thumbring, but very similar blade shape and curvature) and is based at german design. 96. heavy cavalry sword looks to me like hungarian palasch with addition of the disc at the guard, also based on the german sword.

Concluding: yes polish-hungarian sabres and palasches inspired many, if not most of western cavalry weapons in the 18th. century, but it is mostly down to popularity and success of lighter hungarian hussars, copied by almost all european countries together with tactics, uniform and equipment.

Here's a couple of pics of reproduction palasches with the knucklebow, and late 17th. century hungarian sabre that later evolved into (hungarian)hussar sabre, popular in Germany and France. I don't have pictures of the latter, but google napoleonic hussar sabre and you should be home :D.

As we are going hugely off top, maybe the subject is worth a separate topic. Or was it discussed somewhere before?

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I just found a picture of the interior of one of the Greenwich anime-armors that may solve some questions about the flexibility of this kind of armor. Although this is a armor made for a twelve year old child, it seems to be completely functional. I regret, that there only was a picture of the breastplate.

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