Yes and no.

Based on the gambeson you wear and the mail quality, it can be very different.

Getting some high quality chainmail, like a standard medieval suit, isn't easy and is a lot expensive.

My experience is this:

1) A good (I mean a lot padded) gambeson is a way more cumbesome and hotter than chain mail.
2) A slash from a sword, based on the strike location, may be nothing more than a soft blunt to a painful bruise.
3) Thrust are felt, expecially on thorax.
4) Generally we avoid hitting in the head when there is only chainmail
5) Mail is a lot easyer to fight in, so you are more capable of dodging blows (footing).

I'm not a Master. My experience is all based on selfteching, practising and reading of historical texts.

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Si vis pacem, para bellum
I Signori della Guerra: http://www.isignoridellaguerra.com

thanks for the info, very interesting.

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Where I Store Harnmaster Stuff

I study both German and Japanese swordsmanship (Hyoho Niten Ichi Ryu). The techniques are really quite similar, and any reading of Go Rin No Sho certainly strikes a chord with those who have read the German masters. The main difference is the focus on the bind in the German school, which is not often present in many Japanese ryuha.

One is reminded of the manuscript HS 3227a, written in 1389 and formerly attributed to Hanko Dobringer. It states "there is only one art of the sword", and he's right. The principles are universal, but some of the particulars change due to the tools involved, even within a given art.

I once had the honour of doing a demo of German longsword for an HNIR seminar, and the instructor said "that looks a lot like our advanced stuff". There is much more the same between east and west than is different with regards to practical combat techniques. But depending on one's mindset, one will find either the similarities or the differences more interesting. When learning HNIR, I was able off the start to graft it onto the structure that German longsword had given me to understand the basic idea of a given technique, and learn the finer points later. A kenjutsu practicioner could do the same thing in reverse in learning European longsword, of course.

In my view, a late medieval European knight would not have felt much out of place training in a feudal Japanese dojo (cultural issues notwithstanding), and a hypothetical Samurai who found himself training in a German fechtschule would be familiar with much of the syllabus already from his own training. The bigger problem for both of them would be the alien culture, not the combat techniques.

Best regards,

-Mark

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Putting the "Ho" in Hodiri since 1998.
The Forge: Western Martial Arts

Unfortunately there is not the depth of manual information for things like sword and shield or spear and shield combat, would be nice if this was more formalized and written down.

I'm sure there was a formalized to an extent type of training for this - the manuals of the later renaissance did not just spring into existence - it was likley based on a possibly verbal tradition.

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Hmm Gurthang. What a nice name for a sword....

Yeah, that would have been cool. Our only decent sources remain I.33 (sword and buckler), Italian renaissance rotella, and Scottish sword and targe.

Interestingly enough, the German group Hammaborg has done some wonderful stuff on adapting both I.33 and Talhoffer's duelling shields for viking sword and shield. Search for them on youtube. It would at least give you an idea on how one-on-one combat with those weapons might have worked.

Best regards,

-Mark

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Putting the "Ho" in Hodiri since 1998.
The Forge: Western Martial Arts