"Armour Worn By Foot in The Thirty Years War(2)" Topic

Which armies' Foot wore armour during the Thirty Years War and how did it change during the course of the conflict? (first post hit by The Bug)

Early on in the war the ideal for every army was that pikemen should be armoured with corselete and helmet except if the army still divided pikemen into armoured and unarmoured categories. (Which was basicly limited to the Spanish with their "Picas secas" if we look at the armies active at that point.)

You get some "regional" variation in the armour with the "German" or "South German" style preserved today in large numbers in the Graz armoury still having a collar with attached spaulders that protected the shoulder and upper arm. "Dutch" style armours lacked the shoulder defences and so on. ("German", "South German" and "Dutch" are all modern day designations and very rough ones at that that use the typical origin of surviving armour to identify a particular type)

On paper at least some regiments in the Catholic League issued the halberdiers in each regiment with gauntlets as additional protection but like the halberds themselves it is likely that in the field they were discarded or simply left in storage as halberdiers were converted to pikemen to make up the shortage of pikemen.

The Swedish army was unusual in that it issued helmets to everyone due to it's experiences when fighting in Russia and Poland. Once inside Germany demand soon got way larger than supply so the "new" regiments raised post-1630 would most likely have gone without.

Okay, that is great, thanks very much. Did armour gradually disappear for pikemen during the war or were there some key dates? And for clarity, the only army where helmeted musketeers are justified in the TYW is the Swedish army?

No really hard dates that I know of maybe Daniel S (when is your book coming out :)) has some for the Swedish. After the 1630s there appears to be a movement toward less armor but that's not to say units before that all had full armor.

There are accounts of some Imperial troops and Spanish musketeers wearing helmets. In theory they would look different than the Swedish style. But again the norm was a hat.

Thing about the 30yw is there is little that is very "hard" for clothing and equipment since lots of times it was whatever they could get. One of the reasons I like this era not to much that people can tell you what your troops have is wrong.

As DGT observed, there's no uniforms. Men without armor probably envied those who had it until it was time to run!
Lots of what was worn was looted or stripped from the dead as the campaigns progressed. One common quality is that the soldiers were muddy, dirty, and soiled with the blood of the enemy or from their own wounds.
None of my figures look very nice.