7TH-8TH CENTURY LOMBARD INFANTRYMAN

An extract from Armies of the Dark Ages 600-1066
by Ian Heath

44. 7TH-8TH CENTURY LOMBARD INFANTRYMAN

Though the Lombards were principally cavalry their lower classes served as bow-armed infantry.

Typical Lombard costume can be seen here. Their early dress apparently resembled that of the Saxons, except that their linen tunics were dyed in broad bands, either stripes or wide hem-bands. They customarily wore wrappings of white cloth round the lower leg, as a result of which their Gepid enemies ridiculed them as 'white-legged hacks'; proper trousers apparently only being adopted in the early-7th century, horsemen wearing shaggy woollen leggings over these. Boots were also in common use by the 7th century.

The Lombards wore their beards extremely long (the derivation of the name Langobard or Lombard) while their hair was cropped short at the back but hung long at front and sides, parted at the centre.

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