Hamata ring size

[Anonymous]

I want to publicly thank Matt Amt for showing me the small bits of maille that he had made by Erik Schmid. I really would like to know what kind of tooling he developed to work on maille with rings that I would guess are no more than 5mm OD made from I guess 20 gauge wire, about half the size of mine. The question that I have though is such tiny maille really typical of roman hamata? I would think that such tiny rings wouldn't offer much protection. I know that for the 1st century at least the ring size that I'm using, about 10mm OD with about 1.5mm cross section, isn't out of the ball park. See the following for an example:<br>
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www.vicus.org.uk/<br>
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I understand that some almost complete roman maille shirts of ferrous rings have been found. What are the ring sizes? <p></p><i></i>

[Matthew Amt]

You're welcome! I bought that smaller piece from Erik for the very purpose of showing it off. Its rings are just under 7 mm OD, by the way. You can contact Erik through his website,<br>
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www.erikdschmid.com<br>
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According to Robinson, pieces found at Saalburg have rings ranging from 4 to 7 mm, and those from Newstead average about 7mm. On a piece from Kastell Kunzing, the rings range from 7 to 9 mm. He cites several pieces of bronze mail with rings about 3 mm in outer diameter, including those with little scales attached (what we call plumata).<br>
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Erik got to examine several of these pieces in England, and the dimensions he noted pretty much agreed with Robinson. He was startled to notice that iron mail samples from at least 2 different places were VERY consistent in size and workmanship. And it showed signs of being made in a hurry!<br>
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I think one of the issues of JRMES has some ring sizes and wire thicknesses in it, but don't have those at hand at the moment.<br>
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Like Erik, I believe mail this fine was VERY protective. People talk about weapons cutting rings or forcing them open, but attacking a single ring with wire cutters or a chisel while clamped to an anvil or workbench is much different from approaching a properly-padded mailshirt worn by a living target. Weapons are basically designed to cut flesh, and each ring in a shirt is supported by many others, making it into sort of a big spring. A weapon will spend much of its force in breaking or cutting one ring, as the mesh and the padding give way before it and absorb its energy. Having gotten through one ring, it then needs to break another, and another, to make any penetration at all--and of course if it has broken a riveted link first, the next ones to conquer are all solid!<br>
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But don't take my word for it! Ask the ancients why they used mail for almost 2000 years.<br>
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Vale,<br>
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Matthew/Quintus <p></p><i></i>

[Anonymous]

Ok, I stand corrected, his OD is my ID.<br>
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I have the article from JRMES that you refer to, vol. 4 (1993). In it it says that "the diameter of rings varies from 3 or 4mm to 13mm". I also have a copy of the article, "Roman Chain-Mail: Experiments to Reproduce the Technique of Manufacture". This paper indicates a wide range of iron ring cross section thicknesses, from 0.85mm to 1.51mm.<br>
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Oh well, I'm going to continue to use the materials that I have. My maille may not be at the mean but at least I'm still on the curve.<br>
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