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+--- Thread: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum (/showthread.php?tid=4240)
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Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Marcus Mummius - 11-28-2005
Salvete,
I have a question about the rawhide rim of a shield. Should it be painted or left natural? If painting it is best than what colour? Matt Amt says on his site that it should be painted red, yellow or black. Does someone know of any evidence concerning this?
Kind regards,
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Primvs Pavlvs - 11-28-2005
Marcus,
I do not think there is any proof either way. So I am leaving mine the natural shade of rawhide, and ,letting nature provide patina. I am also using rawhide made from a deerskin my friend made. I found that the deerskin will stretch and fit the curves better than rawhide from dog toys. Plus its no bleached to the snow white color most dog chews have.
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Theodosius the Great - 11-28-2005
Quote:Matt Amt says on his site that it should be painted red, yellow or black. Does someone know of any evidence concerning this?
Yep. The Dura scutum (of which I own a replica of :wink: ) had its rawhide edge painted red. Although mine is black.
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Primvs Pavlvs - 11-28-2005
Theodosius,
Wasnt the edging missing on the Dura scutum?
the Dura scutum was found with a rim - Neuraleanus - 11-28-2005
and it was painted, see the description given in Simon James's book on the Dura finds. There's also a nice color drawing in "Greece and Rome at War".
Don't use Dog chews for a rim. These have been chemically treated and no longer have the correct properties. Instead, buy an entire side of rawhide. Here's where I have purchased cow rawhide sides:
www.springfieldleather.com/catalog/uncut_leather/rawhide/rawhide.asp
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Marcus Mummius - 11-28-2005
Thanks for the feedback! Alas I already started using dog-chew toys :roll: the scutum is halfway 'rimmed' now. If I have time I'll make another scutum (then I'll have three...). This third scutum will have a leather front and I'll use real rawhide for the rim.
@Neuraleanus: what kind of rawhide did you use? Goat?
Kind regards,
Cow, but goat may be ok - Neuraleanus - 11-28-2005
click on the link that I provided and scroll down to the cow rawhide listing. One hide will make rims for several scuta. The problem with the dog chews is that they've been bleached. They do not look or feel like natural rawhide. The romans used goat leather for many things, so why not goat rawhide for shield rims? Either cow or goat is probably fine.
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Marcus Mummius - 11-28-2005
Quote:One hide will make rims for several scuta.
Sweet! Then this isn't that much more expensive than using dog chews:-)
But I'll paint this rim in a red colour so the chemical bleaching won't be visible.
Best regrads,
Re: the Dura scutum was found with a rim - Robert Vermaat - 11-28-2005
Quote:Don't use Dog clews for a rim. These have been chemically treated and no longer have the correct properties. Instead, buy an entire side of rawhide. Here's where I have purchased cow rawhide sides:
www.springfieldleather.com/catalog/uncut_leather/rawhide/rawhide.asp
What color is that rawhide. the dog chew stuff we used was light brown to dark beige (chamois), never 'white'.
How large would such a side generally be? Can I use one for the front of an oval shield?
The dog clews that I\'ve seen were white - Neuraleanus - 11-28-2005
and they felt "leathery". This is from the bleaching process. The rawhide that I purchased was light brown and translucent. So, if you have obtained translucent dog clews, that may be ok. I still do not like it, as you're forced to use short sections. The one example that we have, the Dura scutum, appears to use long pieces of rawhide for its rim.
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Robert Vermaat - 11-29-2005
Nah, not leathery, only when they were properly soacked. After hardening, hard as stone.
Yes, dog chews over here are still translucent:
![[Image: scutum22.jpg]](http://www.fectio.org.uk/articles/scutum22.jpg)
How long a piece can I get from a goat hide? The pieces I used were (stretched) about 80 cm. I needed 4-5 pieces for the whole rim.
Here's my scutum page.
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Gaius Decius Aquilius - 11-29-2005
Hey, umm...
I spent last night trying to cut 9 inch sections of copper tubing into an edging shape and got nothing I wanted. I then thought to cut rawhide into the same shape, like the bronze riveted pieces. I have seen "brass" and "bronze" colored oil paint at the art supply store. Has anyone tried that to fake the edging, or is that too Hollywood?
Gaius Decius Aquilius
(Ralph Izard)
For a proper brass rim, - Neuraleanus - 11-29-2005
see:
[url:1nxfonz5]http://www.florentius.com/scutumedging.htm[/url]
I haven't tried this method, but it appears to work. You have to get some tooling made so that you may make good bends in the brass.
Salve, Valerius
Your rawhide looks like the stuff that I used. I think that there are dog chews and then there are dog chews. The stuff that I have seen people use dried to a white leathery state, not at all right. So I stand corrected, dog chews may be alright, if you buy those that are unbleached.
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Marcus Mummius - 11-29-2005
Those are the same dogchews as I used.
Re: Painting rawhide rim of a scutum - Matt Lukes - 12-05-2005
Me too and they worked just fine. I have also tried the bleached ones previously mentioned (accidently) and they're definitely no good. WAY too thick and have a very weird grainy texture. Only go for ones that are that golden brown and are clearly thin. Certianly the only authenticity drawback to using chew-toys for rawhide is that you can only get relatively short lengths, meaning your rim will be composed of a bunch of pieces rather than one or two long ones. I suppose that's just something that one would have to live with if it's either difficult or too costly to get a full hide. Then again, I can imagine that the ancients wouldn't waste material and may well have used shorter pieces when they reached the end of a hide or when there were enough scraps to do the job.
Matt