On the other hand, the Ionic corslet of the seventh and earlier sixth century is made of plain plates of bronze, fastened at the sides--back-plate and breastplate--with a short projecting metallic rim to protect the hip-joints. There is no mailed kirtle, no decorated belt. The whole equipment, with the addition of mailed flaps to the plain corslet, is well rendered on a scaraboid gem.[8] In fact, this kind of plain corslet, with back-plate and breast-plate, fastened at the sides, is the regular Ionian or seventh to sixth century body armour, while the hauberk, of metal scales, or small plates, probably fixed on leather, begins to come in towards the end of the sixth century. Early in the fifth century, Polygnotus decorated the Lesche or lounge at Delphi with pictures of the Trojan affairs, mainly illustrating the _Little Iliad_, an Ionian cyclic poem attributed to Lesches. Among the pictures, says Pausanias, was represented an altar, and on it was a "bronze corslet, such as was worn of old, for now we seldom see them. It consisted of two pieces called _guala_, one to cover breast and belly, the other for the back, fastened by clasps." Unconsciously anticipating Reichel, Pausanias says that this piece of armour would be protection enough, "without a shield," as if a shield could simultaneously protect both back and front. "And so Homer represents Phorcys the Phrygian without a shield,"[9] "because he wore this kind of corslet."[10] Homer says that the spear of Aias burst the _gualon_ of Phorcys, and the bronze let out the entrails.[11] The shield of Phorcys, if he wore one, must have been slung over his back or side at the moment. But in these two passages Homer seems to have in his mind a corslet of but two _guala_, back-plate and breast-plate fastened at the sides, like the eighth to sixth century corslet. If so, he knew both the corslet of two plates, fastened at the sides, and also the hauberk of scales or small plates of metal fastened in the centre of front and back. This is not impossible, for, as we shall prove, the corslet of metal plate was worn even in pre-Homeric Crete; while the hauberk is represented, if I am right, in art of the Dipylon, or pre-Dipylon period. Art in the late sixth century proves that both the corslet of back-plate and breast-plate, and the hauberk of small plates, fastening at back and in front, were worn. [Illustration: Fig. 3.--Tirynthian Vase: Man in Hauberk _By permission of John Murray, Esq_. Schliemann's _Tiryns_, plate xvii. b] We have some red figure vases with the plain plate corslet, and some black figure vases with the decorated corslet or rather hauberk of scales, and mailed flaps; but the set of fashion is away from the plain plate corslet fastened at the sides, to the decorative hauberk of scale-mail, fastening in front,--Homer's type of corslet (at least in some cases), and the corslet of two very early Tirynthian vases.