BORIS

In case you happen to want to know, chain mail was/is always worn over serious padding, not bare skin; the metal links can stop a blade's edge but not its impact, so unless the mail is backed up by serious padding, you get bruises and broken skin at the very least (early SCA members called it "waffle chest," and I know at least one man still had the scars ten years later) and--with heavier blows--permanent or fatal injury to bones and/or major organs.

(A lot of fantasy artists don't worry about realism, though, or we wouldn't see all these pictures of Elf-maidens wearing only steel bikinis.)

--Nonie