10-07-2011, 10:04 PM
I reenact Ancient Greece (that's what I write books about, of course..) and I've now built something like 15 aspides--or build parts of them. There's a team of four of us (amateurs all, except our metal smith Aurora) who build them, as a team.
About six months ago, I finally 'broke the code.' The aspis below is the first one I think is really correct. Up until this point, we'd get the shape right, and the size right, and the interior right. And we were getting the weight right... but the construction details were wrong, and I knew we needed to rethink it all.
I spent some time staring at the Chigi vase. Here's a reconstruction of it so as not to break copyright.
After a while, I decided that I was looking at strips of wood.
A couple of us built a "Boeotian" (it is on another thread) with strips of wood built into the outer face. It was complex, hard to build, and didn't seem quite right. just as one example,a ll the wood strips lay on one axis, and that's not what I see in the Chigi vase..
So I commissioned a professional woodworker to make me an oak rim, and I left it for a year, and stared at it while I did other stuff in my shop.
Three months ago,m when we all decided to reenact Marathon's 2500th, I started on it. I'll let the pics tell the rest.
About six months ago, I finally 'broke the code.' The aspis below is the first one I think is really correct. Up until this point, we'd get the shape right, and the size right, and the interior right. And we were getting the weight right... but the construction details were wrong, and I knew we needed to rethink it all.
I spent some time staring at the Chigi vase. Here's a reconstruction of it so as not to break copyright.
After a while, I decided that I was looking at strips of wood.
A couple of us built a "Boeotian" (it is on another thread) with strips of wood built into the outer face. It was complex, hard to build, and didn't seem quite right. just as one example,a ll the wood strips lay on one axis, and that's not what I see in the Chigi vase..
So I commissioned a professional woodworker to make me an oak rim, and I left it for a year, and stared at it while I did other stuff in my shop.
Three months ago,m when we all decided to reenact Marathon's 2500th, I started on it. I'll let the pics tell the rest.
Qui plus fait, miex vault.