Lamellar armour is a type of body armour made from small rectangular plates (scales or lamellae) of iron, steel, leather (rawhide), bone, or bronze laced into horizontal rows. Lamellar armour was used over a wide range of time periods in Central Asia, Eastern Asia (especially in China, Japan, Korea, Mongolia, and Tibet), Western Asia, and Eastern Europe. The earliest evidence for lamellar armour comes from sculpted artwork of the Neo-Assyrian Empire (911–609 BC) in the Near East.[citation needed]
Lamellar armour should not be confused with laminar armour, a related form of plate armour which is made from horizontal overlapping rows or bands of solid armour plates (called lames) rather than scales. By comparison, lamellar armour is made from individual armour scales which are laced together to form a strip of armour which appears to be solid but is not.