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+--- Thread: Plumbata (/showthread.php?tid=1271)
Re: plumbata - brennivs - tony drake - 04-20-2008
Excellent work Vortigern
I will do a close up of what I described so you end up with the lead rounded on the shaft like the one on the right it will save cutting excces lead away.![[Image: pb3.jpg]](http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t272/brennivs/pb3.jpg)
Regards Brennivs
Re: plumbata - Iagoba - 04-21-2008
Yes, the molten lead it´s barely over 300° (high Pb grade), so it won´t burn a lot...
Which would be a quite interesting way of cooking
Sadly, as it´s toxic, liquid lead cannot be used to roast meat... :?
Sorry for the OT :roll:
BTW, the wood will be hardened by the heat.
Re: plumbata - martijn.wijnhoven - 04-21-2008
Although not exactly about the plumbata or Roman, this might be interesting. Yesterday I saw part of a documentary on Bhutan where they showed a national game called Khuru. Basically it involves big darts that are thrown over a distance of 20 meters at a small target. The shape of the darts reminded me much of the Roman plumbata, especially a round-like ball placed behind the head of the dart (though, this seemed to be made out of wood and I do not know whether this served the same function as the lead addition found in plumbatae).
Here is a link that shows some photos:
http://www.thingsasian.com/stories-photos/all/2867
Regards,
Martijn
Re: plumbata - Robert Vermaat - 04-21-2008
Thanks Martijn!
The wooden ball seems to serve as a grip for the hand more than as a weight, I think.
The sport does not seem to have reached Wikipedia yet. :wink:
Re: plumbata - martijn.wijnhoven - 04-21-2008
Robert,
I think you are right as there is no need for any extra weight within a game context. The last of the 10 photos found on the link posted above seems to show a dart with a metal addition instead of wood (below right).
Cheers,
Martijn
Re: plumbata - Robert Vermaat - 04-22-2008
Quote:The last of the 10 photos found on the link posted above seems to show a dart with a metal addition instead of wood (below right).I don't know.. They look like modern darts with an added ball of wood or maybe rubber or something. Look at the modern plastic flights.
![[Image: kuru10_lcon.jpg]](http://cdn.thingsasian.com/content/2700/5/images/kuru10_lcon.jpg)
Re: plumbata - martijn.wijnhoven - 04-22-2008
Quote:I don't know.. They look like modern darts with an added ball of wood or maybe rubber or something. Look at the modern plastic flights.
Yep, this could well be plastic. The manner in which the central person in the photo holds the dart also seems to indicate that the wooden addition would serve to give an extra impulse or push behind the dart when thrown.
Cheers,
Martijn
Re: plumbata - Robert Vermaat - 04-22-2008
Still, it's a nice crossover between the plumbatae of old and modern 'pub' darts! :lol:
Re: plumbata - martijn.wijnhoven - 04-29-2008
IIRC I haven’t seen these plumbatae posted here on RAT; both come from the former collection of Axel Guttmann.
Photo 1 Remarks:
Große, römische Plumbata,
2./3.Jhdt. n.Chr. Kräftige, leicht gegratete Spitze, die unteren Enden als Widerhaken ausgebildet. Schlanker Schaft mit angegossener Tülle aus Blei. Gereinigter Bodenfund, auf hölzernem Ständer montiert. Länge 17,5 cm.
Außergewöhnlich großes und gut erhaltenes Exemplar.
Photo 2 Remarks:
Zwei römische Plumbatas,
2./3.Jhdt. n.Chr. Schmiedeeiserne Spitzen mit Widerhaken, kräftige Tüllen aus Blei. Gereinigte Bodenfunde. Länge 12,5 und 13,5 cm.
Regards,
Martijn
Re: plumbata - Gaius Julius Caesar - 04-29-2008
Robert, your PPE is a bit dubious.....I'll have to give you a STOP card for those safety boots!! :wink: :lol:
Re: plumbata - aitor iriarte - 04-29-2008
A leadworker at Mercaforum drove us to the same conclussion, Robert. Just a box full of casting sand and later finishing by hammering. Nothing more 8)
![[Image: 008.jpg]](http://www.cohorsprimagallica.com/images/galerias/galeria_012/008.jpg)
Aitor
Re: plumbata - Robert Vermaat - 05-04-2008
Thanks Martijn, I had been notified about them earlier.
Quote:2./3.Jhdt. n.Chr.As always, the dating here is pure guesswork. :x
Re: plumbata - Robert Vermaat - 05-04-2008
Quote:Robert, your PPE is a bit dubious.....I'll have to give you a STOP card for those safety boots!! :wink: :lol:Byron, wot's a PPE? 8)
Quote:A leadworker at Mercaforum drove us to the same conclussion, Robert. Just a box full of casting sand and later finishing by hammering. Nothing more 8)Aitor, thanks for that picture. So he just hammered the lower half of the weight into shape with a hammer? Interesting, I must try that as well. Did he measure the amount of lead for each plumbata?
Plumbata origins? - Paullus Scipio - 05-06-2008
I don't know if this has been referred to before ( there is way too much on RAT regarding plumbata to check it all !! ), but while checking some points about velites/grosphosmachoi (lit: grosphos-users, the grosphos was a type of javelin, used by Polybius to describe the Velites 'mini-pila' weapon), I came across this passage at Strabo IV.4 written c. 20AD:
"The Gallic armour is commensurate with the large size of their bodies: a long sabre, which hangs along the right side, and a long oblong shield, and spears in proportion, and a "madaris," a special kind of javelin. But some of them also use bows and slings. There is also a certain wooden instrument resembling the "grosphus" (it is hurled by hand, not by thong, and ranges even farther than an arrow), which they use particularly for the purposes of bird-hunting.
.....Hhhhh..mmmm, a hand-thrown missile resembling the velites'mini-pila' i.e. wooden half-shaft and iron shaft/tip, and reputed to outrange arrows, which must be fairly small to be used in bird-hunting?
Sounds rather like a 'plumbata' ,though no mention of the 'plumb', doesn't it ? (the lead, as well as increasing range would also turn a 'bird-killing' weapon into a lethal weapon of war).............
The earliest reference to the origins/ancestry of the plumbata?
Re: plumbata - Iagoba - 05-06-2008
Sorry, but there is somewhere a list of plumbatas, place of the find and current location?
I was shocked to find one in Basel, in a display of Etruscan armour!
hock: At least it was labelled as from the IIIrd. century... :?