Chausses

Knight wearing chausses and poleyns, from an illustration by Villard de Honnecourt (1230)

Chausses (/ˈʃs/; French: [ʃos]) were a Medieval term for leggings, which was also used for leg armour; routinely made of mail and referred to as mail chausses, or demi-chausses if they only cover the front half of the leg. They generally extended well above the knee, covering most of the leg. Mail chausses were the standard type of metal leg armour in Europe from the 9th to the early 14th centuries CE.[1] Chausses offered flexible protection that was effective against most hand-powered weapons, but was gradually supplemented and then replaced with the development of iron plate armor for the legs in the second half of the 13th to first half of the 14th century.

  1. ^ Walker 2013, p. 74.