Gaulish felt armor

[Caturix]

a few points;

(1) That statue is, I believe, a few hundred years prior to Telamon.

Yes (and I said so before), but you have various evidence of organic armor in various gaulish context:

[url:104btqpq]http://koso.ucsd.edu/~martin/CelticSitter.gif[/url]

[url:104btqpq]http://usuarios.advance.com.ar/cernunnosgb/images/guerrier.jpg[/url]

[url:104btqpq]http://jfbradu.free.fr/celtes/les-celtes/roquepertuse1.jpg[/url]

[url:104btqpq]http://www.celticworld.it/immagini/ad_img/fgallery/fg_887_1118.jpg[/url]

Here, in the Frontone of Civitalba, while a lot of Celts are "Gaesatae-Like", in the first image on the left the second figure is dressed with something look like a padded armor: [url:104btqpq]http://www.ilmontesantangelo.it/assets/images/sassoferrato.gif[/url]

(2) The majority of numistic evidence shows La Tene era Gauls sans armour, the exceptions being mail.

As in literature, the naked barbarian is more a "topos" than a matter of fact.

Without doubt there were some Gaulish groups, as the Gaesatae, that fought naked, or Gauls so poor (The light infantry wich Polybius, Caesar and Tacitus, in different times wrote about) that couldn't afford any kind of protection, but is quite difficult that it was the rule.... padded clothing (or animal skins, or leather) is a kind of protection quite ancient, used along time and space by lot of culture, and quite cheap, if not heavily effective.

(3) If felt as being generally used as an armour in 225BC it would have had a mention somewhere and if it was particular to Gauls then it would have been specifically mention as they were a big topic in those days.

Is quite less impressive than the habit that some Gauls had to fight naked... and an organic protection isn't something of big interest...

I know one bunch of guys who would have been using it, if it was cheap and effective ... Romans.

As I already wrote, in fact Romans used it: it was the "Coactilia" (cfr. Caes., Bell. Civ.).

I am not convinced that the Geastate were anihilated for any reason other than they were in the front line and threw themselves at the Roman line.

And they were nakend...AND most important of all, their shield were small (smaller than the Roman ones and probably the other Celts').

Besides, at Telamon the Celtic army was attacked by two Roman armies and deployed in double directions: The gaesatae were not the only "front line" of the celtic army (that, in fact, facing two different armies had TWO "front lines")... But the Boii and the Taurisci weren't anihilated by javelins.