The Human Side of Animals: Chapter 4 - Amour-Bearing & Mail-Clad Animals

The Human Side of Animals by Royal Dixon is part of HackerNoon’s Book Blog Post series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here: [LINK TO TABLE OF LINK]. Chapter IV: Amour-Bearing and Mail-Clad animals

CHAPTER IV. ARMOUR-BEARING AND MAIL-CLAD ANIMALS

"The spectacle of Nature is always new, for she is always
renewing the spectators. Life is her most exquisite invention;
and death is her expert contrivance to get plenty of life."

—Goethe's Aphorisms (trans. by Huxley).

Civilised nations throughout the world at different times in their country's history have protected their soldiers and warriors with coats of armour or mail. This practice prevailed extensively during the Middle Ages; but it has almost entirely disappeared. The German breastplates of to-day are an attempted revival. The coats of mail of the ancient warriors underwent an evolutionary process, until they were indeed brought to a high pitch of perfection and beauty. It was at this period that they were abandoned as too burdensome to be of practical value.

This protective form of armour has been used by animals since time immemorial, and was copied by man from them; and among the various forms of it are found examples of every kind of armour

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