mailshirt

English

Noun

mailshirt (plural mailshirts)

1. Alternative form of mail shirt
   • 2003, Earl R. Anderson, Folk-taxonomies in Early English, Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press, →ISBN, page 156:

     […] The poet [of Beowulf] states the theme of this passage explicitly: the Geats were glorified by their splendid armor […] ashwood spears whose gray blades match the gray mailshirts, and visored helmets. […] The Normans' mailshirts are presented in stylized form […]

   • 2004 August 2, Michael P. Speidel, Ancient Germanic Warriors: Warrior Styles from Trajan's Column to Icelandic Sagas, Routledge, →ISBN, page 15:

     The Column portrays them wearing mailshirts and fighting with swords, as they did in the early Middle Ages. Since mailshirts slow men down, such men would have shared with wolves no so much speed but fierceness, […]

   • 2012 April 9, Duncan Head, Armies of the Macedonian and Punic Wars, Lulu.com, →ISBN, page 277:

     It is shown with a smooth surface, but Peter Connolly suggested it is actually mail, mailshirts often being sculpted smooth and then painted to indicate the material. However short mailshirts with pteruges do not seem to be known this early, or indeed before the 1st century AD when the Romans start to use them, […]

   • 1997, Dan Shadrake, Susanna Shadrake, Barbarian Warriors: Saxons, Vikings, Normans, Potomac Books:

     References to mailshirts are to be found in both Viking and Anglo Saxon literature; the poem Beowulf refers to men swimming in mail armour, although this may just be poetic licence. There are later mentions of mailshirts in the Viking Age, for […]