Why the belt or strap in some plate armor and some other armor exposed in the middle front side?

Upvote:1

While the exposed belt holding the placard in position might be destroyed by the opponent, you have to ask yourself: is it worth it?

Destroying the belt will have some effect on the knight, since the placard will not sit in its proper place anymore. However, I doubt that the knight will be severly hampered. Reenactors with a suit of armour of this style could easily test this.

On the other hand, if you attack the belt, you are not attacking the knight. This opens you to counter-attack.

So, my guess it that the belt is a low-gain, high-risk option for the attacker. Thus, there is little need for the armourer to protect the belt in any way.

Here's a demonstration from a YouTuber, who focusses on many topics medieval on his italian armour:

He undoes the front strap holding the plackard to the breastplate. However, first there is another strap at the back, and second, there's the wearers body in the way. So, simply cutting the front strap will not lead to the plackard simply falling away if there is more than one attachment.

Upvote:2

Assuming you're talking about the diagonal belt across the hips, that is to support the sword; it is not critical to the integrity of the armor.

As to the other straps, as @Daniel says,

I think he's referring to the straps on the lower edge that hold the tassets in place and the ones front and back that hold the plackart and lower back piece. Given that the tasset straps were still being used in the 17th century on half armour there doesn't seem to have been much of an issue with these straps being cut. As for wear, these armours were maintained so straps starting to wear would be replaced before they could fail.

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