Mainz Gladius Waist

[Binoy Fernandez]

Hey all,

So there was something I've been wondering about the gladii and the waisting of the blades. So as I understand it the waisting of the blade was most pronounced in the Mainz Gladius, and while it was there in the Fulham it was much more subtle and then it was gone in the Pompeii.

So most of the sites and sources I've seen mention that the Mainz style is waisted, but I've had some difficulty finding anything about to what degree. From the British Museum website it says the width of the Sword of Tiberius is 7 cm, which is approximately 2.75", but it doesn't say at which part of the blade. I'm working on the assumption that it is at the base of the blade at the guard. Is there any record about to what degree the curve of the waisting is and how narrow the blades usually get? From the pictures I've seen the waisting feature of the blades, even on the mainz style, was subtle and not extreme, but I'm having some trouble getting a good idea of how much there is from the historical images I've been able to find.

I'm not sure if I'm just not looking for the right key words in books like B&C or in the search parameters on the forum.

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Man, if you are really interested, you need to get the Miks books,
They have images of practically every Roman blade going, I think. Some totally surprise me.
It has good depiction of the waisting on the mainz type gladius. Mind you, the text is all in German, but still, worth themoney and the patience wit hthe references!

[Binoy Fernandez]

I was afraid you'd say that. Is the vml.de website the only one to purchase it from? I've tried finding it on the usual sites but have had no joy.

[Marcus Mummius]

Oxbow books has it too:

http://www.oxbowbooks.com/bookinfo.cfm/ ... ation/DBBC

Vale

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

I bought mine from Oxbow too.

[Matt Lukes]

No, he doesn't LOL Enough people here have it to do a little looking up and posting for anyone who doesn't.

The answer to the question is that the waist on a G. mainzensis is actually not terribly significant- I've printed photographs of a number of them at actual size and the original Mainz gets down to about 57mm, the Tiberius gets down to 58mm, the Straßburg to 59mm, the Fulham to 55mm, but the 'waist' is very long and gentle; the width of the guard end is deceptive and the blade narrows quite quickly- on the original Mainz, for example, after only 50mm it narrows from about 70mm at the guard plate to just 64mm, but after a further 50mm it's 61mm and after yet another 50mm it's only 59mm. The Fulham's waist is somewhat subtler, but not to a huge extent- it's also very wide at the guard and more narrow at the middle than the others, it just doesn't become as wide again at the forward end- it only gets to around 57 or 58mm (hard to be sure due to damage); the Straßburg, by contrast, gets up to about 63mm.

So even drawing a straight line from the max widths of the guard and forward end (just before the point taper begins), the Straßburg's waist is max 5mm on each side, the others are hard to say for sure because their forward ends are much more damaged making the original shape only 'likely', but they're likely no more significant; the Fulham's edges are asymmetrical, one being more flat than the other, but it's maybe 2.5mm from each side.

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Hmmmm, that would mean relying totally on someone else... :roll: :lol:
But if you really get the bug, than it is a worthy investment. But as Matt says there are always others here good with the info....

[Binoy Fernandez]

The answer to the question is that the waist on a G. mainzensis is actually not terribly significant- I've printed photographs of a number of them at actual size and the original Mainz gets down to about 57mm, the Tiberius gets down to 58mm, the Straßburg to 59mm, the Fulham to 55mm, but the 'waist' is very long and gentle; the width of the guard end is deceptive and the blade narrows quite quickly- on the original Mainz, for example, after only 50mm it narrows from about 70mm at the guard plate to just 64mm, but after a further 50mm it's 61mm and after yet another 50mm it's only 59mm. The Fulham's waist is somewhat subtler, but not to a huge extent- it's also very wide at the guard and more narrow at the middle than the others, it just doesn't become as wide again at the forward end- it only gets to around 57 or 58mm (hard to be sure due to damage); the Straßburg, by contrast, gets up to about 63mm.

So even drawing a straight line from the max widths of the guard and forward end (just before the point taper begins), the Straßburg's waist is max 5mm on each side, the others are hard to say for sure because their forward ends are much more damaged making the original shape only 'likely', but they're likely no more significant; the Fulham's edges are asymmetrical, one being more flat than the other, but it's maybe 2.5mm from each side.

Cool, that's what I thought, that it was a subtle thing. Having those measurements is useful. I'm trying to visualize them, right now - some of them seem like widths and others lengths. Using the original Mainz description: at the guard it is 70 mm wide, and then 50 mm from the guard it is 64 mm, then moving another 50 mm (so we're at 100 mm from the guard) it gets to 61, and then 150 mm from the guard it is at 59mm, and then that's the narrowest part of the blade?

So switching to the english system, that means that the waisting occurs closer to the guard than it does to the point? 150mm is 15cm, which is about what, 5.9" or so? If the standard blade length is between 20.25" and 22" in length, does that mean that the widening of the blade as you move past that 150mm mark is shallower than the narrowing of the blade? If we split the difference in total blade length and say 21", roughly, at what part of the blade does it begin to taper to the point? If I understand the evolution correctly, the Mainz had a longer point than the Pompeii, correct, and not only that, but it was a longer blade to begin with?

Now, having asked all of that I'm sure the Roman smiths didn't have a mold they poured molten iron in or calipers to measure these things precisely hock: . Still, this is interesting stuff. Hmm... I'm feeling the geek in me really starting to come out. I'm wondering if I can take these measurements and use some sort of interpolation scheme to sketch a blade. :? Okay, I just read what I wrote...

Is there a good website to see some close up pictures of any Mainz gladii that are in good condition given 2,000 years of wear and tear?

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

I haven't seen 2 Mainz blades exactly the same, but some are more asthetically pleasing than others.
Here is a link to one of my favourite blade shapes.

http://www.romancoins.info/MilitaryEqui ... ttack.html

[Matt Lukes]

If you go to the British Museum's website, you can find images of pieces in the collection- they have both the 'Tiberius' and Fulham, and you can sign up to request higher-resolution images by email. If you want to PM or email me your address Binoy, I'd be happy to send them to you as I got them a while back...

[Binoy Fernandez]

PM sent.

[Binoy Fernandez]

Matt,

Thanks for those pictures! I finally got a chance to spend some time studying them. If I'm not mistaken, the fulham type looks like one edge is straight while the other is very slightly waisted; or, at least, that the waisting is much more subtle on one side than on the other - the edges are not symmetrical.

The Strassburg picture is amazing. I agree that the waisting is very subtle. I think it is more pronounced right before the point rather than up at the guard end. In fact, the narrowest point on the blade looks to be just above where the point starts, although it may just look like that from the passage of time. The waisting on the sword of tiberius looks even shallower than on the Strassburg, actually.

So I've really got to print these out to get a better look. Thanks for sending them.

Okay, I printed those pictures out at work... are they actual size? The tiberius picture (blade only) was three pages wide printed in landscape and the strassburg was four! hock: I was getting wierd looks while I trimmed the margins and taped the pages together. The strassburg seems like it is longer than the usual mainz gladius.

I think, with these pictures, I can shift my attention from understanding blade design / specs to the hilt and scabbard.

New edit... I spoke too soon. So the more I look at these pictures and compare them to modern replicas, the more I'm wondering about the shape at where the point starts. All the pictures I'm seeing, and I'm using the sword of tiberius as my primary reference, here, look like the have more subtle waisting going on and that the place where the point begins, it looks like there is a definite angle there. Most of the modern mainz blades seem to have a curve transitioning from the end of the waisting to the point.

On the legioxx website there's a page which has sketches of the general shapes of the different gladii, and even on those sketches the transition from blade to point has a definite angle and not a curve. So the albion allectus and the mark morrow blades are said to be pretty accurate, but even then there are no real "angles" going on. Am I off my rocker with this observation?

[Matt Lukes]

You bet Binoy- glad you found them interesting.

I suspect the 'straight' edge of the Fulham is just an illusion- due to damage from its time in the Thames or some such thing. The waist on the 'good' side is very minimal so it wouldn't take much to make it look straight. It didn't take much at all to make the edges symmetrical again when I was trying out lining up the extant bits with a pencil. In fact, I found the shapes of it and the Strassbourg are very close save about 10mm of point. But you have to beware of scrutinizing things too much- not every tiny detail is intentional remember, and things can be just as likely features of being hand-made. It's not easy to get the edges identical, for example. If the waist is a couple of millimeters deep, it's not too hard to unintentionally reduce that.

Oh no, just printing the image without specifying the physical dimensions won't work- you're just getting the pixels and that's a function of the digital image size. You have to crop the blade exactly (nothing beyond each end) and change the print instruction to 'specified size' and enter the real length.

And you can't bother looking at modern versions as virtually none are follow an exact artifact shape, but are more just going by a basic style- they're simply 'Mainzesque' if anything. You're always better off looking at the real thing alone if you're trying to understand it.

I don't think the narrowest part of the waist is jus before the widening prior to the point- it seems to me more in the middle, and it has to be borne in mind that the forward wide bit does not get out to the full width of the guard end again so even if the curve were symmetrical, it may not appear so for this reason. Plus sharpening can alter the shape slightly and that forward wide point does seem a logical place to run a stone to but stop at before going on to the straight edge of the point, so that could introduce a more angular look to the edge at that wide point.

[Binoy Fernandez]

Oh no, just printing the image without specifying the physical dimensions won't work- you're just getting the pixels and that's a function of the digital image size. You have to crop the blade exactly (nothing beyond each end) and change the print instruction to 'specified size' and enter the real length.

Okay, that makes sense. The Strassburg looked like it was way too long coming through at 4 pages. The state that sword is in remarkably good shape, it looks like, given its age. Actually, I'm not sure of its age, but I'm guess around 1800 years or so? I'm using too general a search in google, I think, in trying to get information on it. So I'll have to do some more research into the measurements before going to fedex kinkos with my flash drive and having them print it out on one page for me.

And you can't bother looking at modern versions as virtually none are follow an exact artifact shape, but are more just going by a basic style- they're simply 'Mainzesque' if anything. You're always better off looking at the real thing alone if you're trying to understand it.

I feel like I'm getting too critical in looking at modern interpretations of this gladius. I'm trying to figure out what it is about the blade design that makes, say, a Mark Morrow blade so good and the MRL or KC gladius as ones to avoid as accurate representations. To do that I'm trying to go to the sources where you can't say "this isn't an accurate gladius" because, well, it is an authentic gladius. So I figure if I can get the size right with those pictures I can get, not just a high quality picture, but good estimates of dimensions as well - after smoothing the edges.

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

There are never goingto be 2 mainz blades exactly the same I would imagine, for the very fact that they were hand made,
and made in more than one place by more than one person. So getting to worked up over the last millimeter would probably
just give you the exact shape of one blade in particular, not a total over all 'generic' shape, which is what an Albion is really.
The sword is well balanced, and a lethal example of the mainz type, not of an actual Manze find. That is what makes it a good sword, but not
an accurate copy of a mainz find. If that makes any sense?