Судан и Большой Ближний Восток

272 III. Судан и его соседи Western bow but not armour-piercing arrows of the Asiatic composite bow (as well as the English longbow of a later period), let alone the crossbow’s bolts used by the European infantry. The plate armour is a much better protection in this respect, which was the major reason behind the prevalence of lamellar armour in the nomadic warfare. Thus Mongol-fashioned plate armour (e. g., brigandine) was adopted, 1 and mail shirts were reinforced by plates. This, in turn, created a newproblem for offensive weapons, leading in due course, as it was mentioned, to a further development of shaft-weapons and creating new types of swords which were able to deal with this new type of protection. Aquite similar process took place in theMiddleEast. First, the lords of Western Iran, Azerbijan and Iraqwho survivedChingis-Khan’s invasion, and then the Syrian emirs andMamluks of Egypt had to face theMongol menace and create an increasingly heavily armoured cavalry. Again, it was not something new per se, as the heavy cavalry had been deployed there for centuries, but only Egyptian Mamluks were able to produce a large heavily armed army, with light horse-archers as auxiliaries. And only this army was able, eventually, to stop the Mongols in Syria. Besides, the Mongols had their own large units of heavy armoured cavalry — as their predecessors Turkic Qaghans used to have some centuries earlier — which also influenced warfare of their neighbours. It was another serious reason to find some weapon effective against Pope T. Bows and Arrows. Berkeley, 1930, P. 63; P. 82, pl. 13, fig. 7. Pope also gives an interesting example of mail-piercing effect of arrows, from the period of Spanish conquests in Northern America: “Hansard [P. 22.] quotes some Spanish historian, probably DeLery, to the effect that one of the early explorers in Florida, wishing to test the power of the native archery, offered a young Indian captive his liberty if he could shoot an arrow through a coat of mail. The garment was hung on a wicker basket and the Indian, standing 150 paces distant, shot a f lint-headed reed clean through the armor. A second coat of mail was placed over the first, and the Indian shot an arrow with great force through both.” Pope T. Op. cit. P. 40–41. 1 See, e. g., Matveev A. A 13th Century Mongol Armour Suite from Tuva // Ancient Cultures of Central Asia and St Petersburg. St Petersburg, 1998. P. 232–236. (In Russian); Mikhail Gorelik. The Armies of Tatar-Mon- gols in the 10th–14th C. Warfare, Arms and Military Equipment. Moscow, 2002. (In Russian).