Why banded armor (lorica segmentata)? Why not breastplates?

[FlaviusCrispus]

Breastplates can be surprisingly small. Hold your arms out straight in front of you, and have someone measure the distance between them--that's the width between the armholes. Next bend over 90 degrees and measure from the vertical part of your belly to your throat--that's the height from neck opening to bottom edge. Granted that folks were a little smaller back then, and I do think they tended towards a more wiry build. But even the Corbridge armor parts were described as being too small to fit anyone, and the repros we made to the same dimensions fit me and several of our members just fine!

Well, it certainly doesn't come close to fitting me at 6' tall, 190 lbs. (Of course I tried to put it on-- you think I'd pass up a chance like that?) The closest it came to fitting someone in our office was when we put it on Silvia, our front desk/receptionist, who is about 5' 6" and very slender.

As far as thickness goes, it's hard to guesstimate because the area around the arm holes is thinned and punched with holes (for attachment of a leather lining?), and the neck opening and bottom edge are lined with what looks like a layer of oxidized iron. The thinned edges are look like about .5 mm, so maybe you're right that the body is less than 1 mm. I'll see if I can borrow Caius Man's calipers and do a proper measurement.

The dimensions are provided via this link:

http://www.freemanandsear.com/displaypr ... rodid=2545

[Tarbicus]

The earlier Etruscan bronze body curiass is well known, but there is no extant example of a Roman bronze body curiass dating to the 1st and 2nd centuries AD. Yet there are numerous statues showing senior Roman commanders wearing the muscle cuirass. Did they ever exist, or are they merely artistic inventions? Until one actually turns up, we will never know.

Looks like one may well have turned up:
[url:37ziaktx]http://romanofficer.com/marblelogo.htm[/url]

[Nectanebo]

The earlier Etruscan bronze body curiass is well known, but there is no extant example of a Roman bronze body curiass dating to the 1st and 2nd centuries AD. Yet there are numerous statues showing senior Roman commanders wearing the muscle cuirass. Did they ever exist, or are they merely artistic inventions? Until one actually turns up, we will never know.

Looks like one may well have turned up:
[url:aml5fiy2]http://romanofficer.com/marblelogo.htm[/url]

Sorry to go off topic here (although this thread went off topic ages ago , only in a very informative and entertaining way), but is this definitely confirmed as Roman, i.e. have any papers etc been published about it? How much do we know about the context in which it was found? Could it not be a recycled 2nd century BC Italian cuirass?

The reason I ask, is if this is genuinely a 2nd century AD Roman cuirass, then it is a HUGELY important find and well worth not one but several threads devoted to discussing it.

[Tarbicus]

Sorry to go off topic here (although this thread went off topic ages ago Very Happy, only in a very informative and entertaining way), but is this definitely confirmed as Roman, i.e. have any papers etc been published about it? How much do we know about the context in which it was found? Could it not be a recycled 2nd century BC Italian cuirass?

The reason I ask, is if this is genuinely a 2nd century AD Roman cuirass, then it is a HUGELY important find and well worth not one but several threads devoted to discussing it. Smile

Don't know, mate. His email address is on his website, so you could always contact him about it. In the meantime, Greeks keep your grubby hands off OUR cuirass! :wink:

[Anonymous]

Ave!

My Greek hoplon is about 18 pounds, which seems to be about the same as Connolly's reconstruction. Matthew

You surprise me, Matt! The heaviest one I have weighs that much (and very few people want to use it!)*, but the two I made myself are around 13/14 and the one I'm currently working on feels as if it will work out lighter still. Okay, I haven't been able to face them in bronze, but what would that add, given that such facings seem to have been extremely thin?

*correction - NO-ONE wants to use it! Not that we're weedy over here - Ashley now has a shield of about that weight having removed 10 kilos from it! It's just that no-one wants an 18-pounder when most are so much lighter.

[Matthew Amt]

Oh, if I were ever mad enough to make another one, I'm sure it would be lighter than the first one! Almost killed myself trying to hang it back on the wall last time I used it... But considering that all I had for information was a teeny cross-section in Connolly, it ain't bad for my first attempt! Most likely I made it too think around the edges and rim.

The leather I used for the face is about 5-ounce, as I recall. Probably too thick. I don't think thin bronze would weigh any more than that.

Being as I *am* pretty weedy, this hefty old hoplon of mine should give me at least a little help in a shoving match.

Looks like one may well have turned up:
http://romanofficer.com/marblelogo.htm

Ah, I remember seeing that page a while back. Seems to be a better source of information than a Museum Replicas catalog, but I'm a little leery. Looks like his date for that breastplate fragment is based entirely on his personal (rather involved) analysis of the "nemesis tondo". Aside from the fact that it looks like a perfectly common Medusa head to me, I'm not sure it's safe to ascribe that particular piece to a particular buddy of Hadrian's. BUT I'm not an art historian!

Valete,

Matthew

[Marius_Ursus]

Segmentatae are superior for mobility.