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'Octateuch', Codex Vaticanus Pal. Graec. 746, Part I. Byzantine, 12th century
Biblioteca Apostolica, Vatican.



60v, Races of Noah's Descendants.

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Referenced as figure 85 in Arms and armour of the crusading era, 1050-1350 by Nicolle, David. 1988 edition
85 Smyrna Octateuque, Byzantine manuscript, 10-11 Cents.
(Vatican Library, Cod. Gr. 746, Rome, Italy)
85A—f.469v “Judah attacks Jerusalem”; 85B—f.120v “Arab trader takes Joseph to Egypt”; 85C—f.447v; 85D-85E—f.453r; 85F—f.455r; 85G—f.354r “sword of an angel”; 85H—f.446r "Joshua with the angel”; 85I—f.153r “Pharoah’s guard”; 85J—f.134v “Arab"; 85K—f.189r “Pharoah’s army”; 85L-85M—f.455r; 85N—f.480v “Philistine”; 85O-85Q—f.60v “Races of Noah’s descendants, Arabs(?), Asiatics(?), Africans(?)”; 85R-85S—f.471v; 85T—f.134r “Pharoah’s guard”. The famous Smyrna Octateuque contains many interesting illustrations of armed and armoured warriors. Figure 85A makes a clear distinction between the Israelites, most of whom are dressed in pseudo-Roman armour and only one of whom wears a lamellar cuirass, and their Jebusite foes. The latter have mail and lamellar armours, tall conical or rounded helmets, a curved sabre and a short bow. As such they probably represent various Islamic peoples who, like the Jebusites of their day, were still successfully defending Jerusalem against Byzantine attack. Here, as elsewhere in the Smyrna Octateuque, a variety of shields are shown. The kite-shaped examples are still relatively small except for Fig. 85T and are similar to the kite-shaped but hand-held shields shown in various eastern European sources in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.