Shulot walked through the busy courtyard and headed to the northwest of the Divine Apocalypse, where is the research area for armor and equipment. The person in charge here is Matlar, an armor master from the Holy City. In addition to being proficient in cotton armor, he is especially good at leather armor.
The Mexicans' cotton armor and leather armor technology is quite mature. Every young warrior was equipped with an iqikawipili, a light cotton armor in the form of a vest. Level 2 warriors and above are equipped with different levels of travezteri, which are bright full-body cotton armor. The more elite senior warriors will transition from cotton armor to leather-inlaid cotton armor, or sleeveless lace-up leather armor.
The main reason why cotton armor is widely popular is its low production cost. Central America is one of the main origins of cotton and has extremely rich cotton seed resources. The ancestors of the Americas have an astonishingly long history of domesticating cotton. During this era, the upland velvet cotton grown in the Mexican tribes was the most productive variety in the world, far exceeding the Indian cotton of the same period.
When the Spaniards arrived in Mexico and Yucatan, they discovered the production advantages of fine velvet cotton and brought it back to Eurasia, where it quickly spread and replaced the original cotton types.
Hulot knew that in later generations, 90% of the world's cotton production would be upland cotton originating from Mexico. In fact, American civilization had no cattle or sheep, and lacked leather and wool, so it went very far in the domestication of plants. Corn pumpkins, potatoes and sweet potatoes, tomatoes and avocados, peppers and passion fruit, cocoa tobacco, and high-yield short-staple cotton are all outstanding contributions of ancient American civilization to the world and have completely changed human life. This is another great form of civilization.
When Shulot entered the nail-making workshop, the aroma of cotton lint hit his nostrils, making him feel light and relaxed.
The young man looked around. The craftsmen put several kilograms of cotton wool into the mold, soaked it in water and pressed it repeatedly, layer by layer, into a thick sheet, that is, a cotton sheet. At this time, the space in the middle of the workshop is filled with cotton pieces that are being dried. If these cotton pieces do not swell after being exposed to the sun for a day, they are considered qualified and can be used to make cotton armor.
In the corner of the workshop, armor master Matt Larr was sitting next to a large pool, tanning a nearly four-meter-long crocodile skin. This is the fresh raw material that the samurai just sent from Tianhuo Island? Ask the armor master to help make leather armor.
Compared to cotton, leather materials are relatively rare. The only sources of leather for the Mexicans are the rare wild deer, coyotes, jaguars and huge crocodiles. Senior warriors with many years of experience would go into the mountains and forests to try to ambush wild deer, chase tigers and wolves, and hunt predators, so as to make precious and tough leather armor for themselves. Leather armor has therefore become a symbol of high-level warriors.
Shulot strode closer and looked carefully. The crocodile skin has been soaked and washed, becoming soft and clean. The protein fibers have been fully stretched and expanded. Now it is put into the pool of leather tanning. The pool was filled with bark cut into small pieces, and a layer of oil floated on the water.
The boy smelled the slightly pungent smell and smelled the unique aroma of pine trees. He looked at the texture of the bark again. It was indeed pine bark rich in tannins? There might also be some fir bark. The sap tannins in the bark will flow into the water, and then penetrate into the leather and combine with collagen, completely denaturing the protein structure, and turning the leather into leather, making the leather tough and no longer irritated.
Matlar vigorously turned over the crocodile skin in the pool, as if training a huge beast. This stirring process lasts for two quarters of an hour every day. After about a few weeks, the skin will be soaked and soft, and you can take it out and pat and rub it again. After tanning is completed, it is washed and stretched on a wooden frame to dry. Finally, it is optionally smoothed, oiled, polished and kneaded until it is completely formed.
In the hall where Shulot works, there is a piece of soft and tough jaguar skin as a cushion for him to work on the floor. Jaguar noble warriors also like to wear tiger skins or make tiger skins into leather armor to show their bravery and strength.
Seeing His Highness coming, Matlar knelt down respectfully and saluted. He was about forty years old, with an ordinary appearance. There was a long diagonal claw mark on his face, which looked quite fierce. It was the mark left by hunting tigers and leopards when he was young. Looking at his thick fingers and thick calluses, and his quick and powerful movements, he was obviously an excellent hunter.
Shulot immediately took two steps forward and held up the armor master with a smile.
Matral is an old man from the Holy City, whom he has known since childhood. He is a senior civilian warrior who is good at hunting and armor-making. He eventually retired from the warrior ranks and became an armor-making master. He has a high status in the Holy City Army. The boy's leather armor and moccasin boots were made by Matlar.
Matral is a direct descendant who can be fully trusted. This time when the Divine Enlightenment Institute was established, Shulot specially invited the armor-making master from the Holy City to be responsible for the research of armor.
"Matral, has the armor I asked you to try made? How is its defense? How much labor does it cost?" Shulot asked seriously.
The armor master smiled gently and handed over the work in his hands to the apprentice. His character was much better than that of Kushinki. At this time, he personally walked to the row of armors arranged on the wooden rack and explained them to His Highness in detail.
"Your Highness, please take a look. Here are the cloth-covered copper armor, cloth-covered paper armor, rattan armor, and finally the rattan plaque I made myself."
Shulot nodded slightly, looking forward to it. Cotton armor can effectively defend against obsidian weapons and arrows, but has weak defense against bronze weapons and cannot resist the piercing of copper spears. The young man searched all kinds of equipment in his memory and tried to restore the armor master.
"The first is this kind of cloth-covered bronze armor. According to His Highness's suggestion, I nailed many copper nails and copper sheets on the inside, and then filled it with cotton sheets and leather. In order to save copper materials, the copper nails and copper sheets were concentrated on the chest and the position of the two shoulders. Each cloth-covered bronze armor uses between twenty and thirty kilograms of copper. Including the cotton armor itself, it weighs thirty to forty kilograms.
It is fully defensive against cuts from war clubs, but slightly weaker against bludgeoning blows. As for bows and arrows, Tlaxcala bows are completely indestructible, and Mexica longbows require close range to penetrate. This cloth-covered bronze armor was also very defensive against the Tarascans' copper axes and spears. "
Having said this, Matlar admired sincerely, the scars on his face shaking in surprise.
"However, as mentioned before, a cloth-covered bronze armor requires at least more than twenty kilograms of copper and ten kilograms of cotton. It requires specialized craftsmen to make copper sheets and copper nails, and then fix them on the cotton armor. The production cost and The labor is very expensive. This kind of armor is also extremely heavy, and only elite warriors can bear it for a long time."
As he said that, Matlar took the Tarasco bronze ax for testing and chopped it several times, but there was no fatal damage to the cloth-covered bronze armor. Then he switched to a copper spear and stabbed it in the front several times, and then the copper nail slipped away. Only side attacks can be effective and fatal, and these positions will be defended by weapons and shields.
Touching the smooth copper nails on the cloth armor, Shulot nodded with satisfaction and fell into deep thought.
In this era, due to its excellent performance and low cost, cloth armor has been popularized in Ming Dynasty. The elite frontier troops of the Ming Army were equipped with a large number of cloth-covered iron armors, which could even weigh forty to fifty kilograms, becoming a new type of heavy armor.
The cloth-covered iron armor's defense against traditional swords is astonishing. Compared with plate armor and pierced armor, it is much cheaper in terms of craftsmanship and cost, but its defensive power is not reduced much. It is also easy to repair and maintain, and can be widely used in the standing army of the Eastern Empire. At the same time, the filled cotton sheets can effectively protect against emerging firearms, similar to the most rudimentary body armor.
Then, Shulot shook his head and smiled bitterly. This kind of equipment, which is cheap and efficient for the Ming Dynasty, is extremely expensive high-end equipment in the Mexican Alliance and Central American tribes, and is truly invincible heavy armor.
A pair of cloth-covered bronze armor consumes twenty or thirty kilograms of bronze, which is enough to make fifty five-tael spearheads, providing fifty village militias with weapons that can threaten the samurai. However, the Alliance did not produce copper and could not afford hundreds of heavy bronze armors. At the same time, making cloth-covered bronze armor also consumes a lot of labor.
More importantly, this technology skips the forging difficulty and overweight problems of overall bronze armor. Once it flows into the hands of the Tarascans and pierces this layer of window paper, it will truly arm the enemies of the West, exponentially increase the opponent's strength, and change the military comparison between the two sides.
Thinking of thousands of cloth-covered bronze armored warriors, Shulot shuddered and shook his head again. He pondered for a moment, then asked Matlar to put away the cloth-covered bronze armor, and the production technology was temporarily sealed. And when the Alliance marches westward and obtains a stable copper mine, cloth-covered bronze armor will begin to be installed, bringing unexpected surprises and deep despair to the next war target.
Next, the young man looked at the cloth-covered paper armor, this new and ancient cheap equipment, and smiled sincerely.
