I'm currently reading the Iliad, and I've noticed that Homer often describes how spears, arrows, and swords puncture people's armor. Armor is sometimes effective -- I think that, at one point, Hector's helmet deflects an arrow -- but armor fails more often than it works. The only consistent protection characters have in the Iliad is a belt buckle, I think.
As far as I understand, this sort of penetration wasn't really possible with arms and armor either of the Late Bronze Age or the Archaic Age. A common paraphrase I've seen is "people wore armor because it worked." My questions:
I am sorry to start my comment with a rebuttal that might make the answer a bit short. The assessment about armour reliability (and weapon capabilities) on which the second question is based on - is not correct. With slight exception of present age of kevlar and super-materials, armour was, allowed for some variations, never (expected to be) impenetrable.
It still ''worked'', because it did what it was supposed to do - deflected most of the otherwise painful or potentially incapacitating or even deadly hits, grazes etc. In this sense, Iliad is describing the exact realty of contemporary warfare. As supported by archaeology which explicitly showed us that armour didn't always stop attacks.
Not even the thickest pieces of bronze armour such as helmets could completely stop spear hit or (especially) throw, or even discourage warriors from targeting it, as confirmed by many archaeological findings (items that aren't pierced still show numerous dents from attempted attacks on the very thickest part of it). Examples of the above can be seen in this helmet (make sure to select side view), or these helmets 1, 2, 3, 4...or this devastated greave for example.
