We get asked a million questions about our work and maille in general. Here are the most common ones.

Will chainmaile protect me from knives/fire/guns, etc.?
This is the million-dollar question, and the answer is always the same:

No, no, and yet more no. Chainmaile alone is pretty bad armor, and I’ll tell you why in a minute. But first, I’m going to explain a bit about armor in general.

Let’s Pretend…
You’re a medieval guy and you’ve been called to fight! Where do you start?

If you were dirt poor, you grabbed the nearest pointy farm implement and off you went. Good luck. But if you had some money and general warfare was immenent, you would have started off with a gambeson. A gambeson was a thick, quilted shirt with heavy padding throughout. Sleeves could be laced on or attached, but they all came to about the middle of the thigh in length and had a high collar to protect your neck. Most had arming points sewn on (like belt loops or laces) so you could attach and secure pieces of heavier armor. A good gambeson would soften blows taken from blunt weapons in battle and might have protected you from blades and spikes. Not amazing, but better than nothing.

So you’ve got a parti-colored gambeson made from that brocade that’s everyone’s wearing now (because even armor was not immune from the fashion police) but now what? You’ve got a bit more money and would like some more protection. That’s where the maille comes in. Most soldiers of little fortune had a hauberk made, which was a simple maille shirt that came to the knees and had long sleeves. The sleeves could be flared, fitted with laces or worked straight; it depended on style, time period, and region. Some of the nicer pieces had maille mittens or gloves worked right onto the sleeves with leather grips sewn to the edges. Slits were usually made in the lower half to allow for horseback riding. If you didn’t have as much money, you could have a haubergeon (literally “little hauberk”) made that was essentially a maille T-shirt. If you had even less cash on hand you could have a byrnie (vest) made; this was an economical choice because you could always have the mailler add sleeves later.

We’ll say you’re rather well-off, so to upgrade you could have more length added and have a full coat. As a bonus, the edges could be trimmed in brass or bronze and worked in various styles. Zigzags along the bottom and at the ends of flared sleeves were popular. If you were going all-out you would also get chausses; a kind of leg armor usually made from maille. They ranged in length from knee to ankle; some even had booties with leather soles built right into them. They were usually worn over thick pants that, for extra protection, could be made in the same fashion as a gambeson. For a better fit you could have your chausses split up the back and laced at the seam.

You look great now, but what about your head? Leaving that exposed isn’t exactly tactical, to say the least. To start you would put on an arming cap, which sort of looks like a bonnet, complete with strings to tie under your chin. It could be gamboissed or simply made from thick wool. This offered some cushioning from attacks and also protected your scalp from the maille coif that you would put on top of it. A coif has an open face and goes down to cover the shoulders. Some have extra flaps backed with leather around the face area (ventails) that you bring across your features like a mask and tie off, leaving only your eyes exposed.

Now you’re ready to go! You’ve got your gamboissed layer on under your maille, which we’ll say has all the nice features like built-in gloves and the ventail because you’re a lord or something. What happens when you step onto the field of battle? If someone goes at you with a sword, chances are good that you’ll live. Slashing and chopping blows were the general fighting style, and good maille can handle that. Axes could likewise be thwarted. But stabs could make it through. So pikes, halberd, spears, and the serious business end of a warhammer would more than likely punch a hole in you. Arrows and crossbows would go right in, but you might get lucky. And while a gambeson can soften blows, it can’t stop them entirely. Spiked maces and flails might not pierce your hide, but you could still end up with a lung punctured by your own splintered ribs if it was a really heavy mace.

But that still sounds pretty good. Why do you say chainmaile is bad armor?

It has to do with construction and modern habits.

Medieval maille was usually made from alternating rows of riveted and welded (or punched) rings from a type of steel much closer in composition to iron than the steel we use today. During fabrication the rings were first annealed, then tempered to further increase their strength. Today the vast majority of maille you find is butted, which means that the ends are not fused or joined shut in any way. A slash with a knife can get through the breaks on butted rings; I know because I’ve personally sliced my way through a patch of stainless as a test. Stabs easily force open rings, too. In addition butted maille is worked cold, which doesn’t do anything to increase the strength of the metal being used, and the rings are usually larger than the ones used way back then. And don’t forget that there’s a lot of aluminum maile out there, which is not a metal known for it’s strength.

Regarding modern habits, well… How many people do you see with gambesons? That was their alternative purpose – They protected you from your own damaged armor. Rings that get forced open in a shirt of maille instantly form sharp, pointy ends that can dig into your skin. I’ve seen the results of someone wearing a maille vest over a T-shirt who then crashed his motorcycle. The medics were picking rings out of his back for hours. He didn’t have any road rash on his torso, but he did have lots of metal bits stuck in him.

So please, please, please do not try any stunts while wearing chainmaile, no matter who you buy it from. Chances are good that it will not save your life. If someone tells you chainmaile is knife or bullet-proof, they’re lying. I don’t care what anyone says they saw on YouTube; I have also personally driven a cheap $10 pocketknife straight through heavy-gauge welded stainless steel and actually cut a tear in the mesh. Besides, if maille really was a viable armor solution today, we’d still be using it. Technicians and scientists are still trying to make stab-proof armor; it’s like the holy grail of tactical personal protection.

And this is why we have an…

IMPORTANT LEGAL DISCLAIMER!
We of Rabbit Dance Designs make no guarantees about the protective abilities of our products. They are reproduction pieces, and as such no guarantee of their level of protection against such items as (but not limited to) knives, swords, clubs, batons, spears, spikes, acid, flamethrowers, guns, axes, motorcycle accidents, chainsaws, shrapnel, etc. will be made. The buyer agrees that should they engage in activities that directly expose them to such materials, conditions, or states, we of Rabbit Dance Designs will not be held liable in any way for the resulting action, as our products are not intended for personal protection.

END OF BIG SCARY LEGALESE SECTION

It’s right here and at the bottom of every page on this site. I need it because I have had heated arguments with people convinced that an aluminum and rubber wrist cuff could protect them from a knife attack. It’s the same reason we see warnings on window cleaner to not use it on our eyes, or on hairdryers telling us we shouldn’t be using them while asleep.

Okay, enough ranting… On to the fun questions!

Chainmaile looks like fun! Is it hard to do?
Not at all! ^_^ Tools aside, all you need are good hands and lots of patience. Prior experience at doing the same little task over and over and over helps. If you’d like to learn more, check out the Links in the sidebar to your right.

Why do you tell people where to learn how to make chainmaile? That’s bad for business!
Not really, in our eyes. What we might lose in sales we more than make up for in new friends. ^_^ It takes a special kind of insanity to really enjoy sitting and putting one ring next to another for hours on end, so the more, the merrier! We even have maille parties. It’s sort of like a sewing circle, but usually with geekier movies playing in the background and more caffeine being consumed.

How long does the average piece take?
It honestly depends on what you’re talking about. I can make a nice little pile of stretchy bracelets or earrings or cell charms or other small items in a day. A necklace can take one day or maybe more, depending on the complexity of the design and the materials I’m using. Generally jewelry doesn’t take too long unless it’s micromaile, in which case it might take weeks. A long wait time usually happens if we need to order specific materials, such as precious metals (we don’t keep much on hand) or other more expensive/exotic materials.

Costume items are another story altogether. Full maile shirts take a month to six weeks on average, but things such as shirt size, ring size, weave, and material can add or detract from that.

Why don’t you make your own rings? Isn’t it cheaper?
Although it is cheaper from the supply side of things for us to make our own rings, it isn’t cheaper time-wise. Having done the math, it’s honestly cheaper from a pure money standpoint for us to buy the rings! It’s less expensive for you guys as well, because you’re not paying for all the extra time we would have put into making the rings ourselves, and chainmaile is priced by time before materials. Also, because our rings are machine-made, the size is consistant and the cuts are much nicer than anything our wire-cutters or saws can do, anyway.

Everyone wins because you “the customer” get a quality handmade maille item at a reasonable price, and we the maillers get to spend our time actually making maile, which is a lot more fun than coiling and cutting rings for hours (trust me on this).

How do you spell “chainmaile”, anyway?
There isn’t really a right way to spell chainmaile, I think. The most common spellings are “chainmaile”, “chainmail” and “chainmaille”. “Chainmail” is falling out of use, probably because a lot of people connect it with horrible “chain mail”, as in, annoying letters saying you’re going to die or something horrible if you don’t pass it on to twenty five people and three cats or whatever. “Chainmaile” is what I normally use, but I also use “maille”, and Etsy has a tag for “chainmaille”. Feel free to use whichever you want; people will usually understand what you’re talking about. If you want to get technical, “maille” is generally the term used for armor. “Chainmail” is actually a modern invention. Some people might nitpick, but we don’t. ^_^

“You must have tons of patience!”
We hear this every time we’re at a show.

And yes, yes we do. ^_^ But it’s worth it.