Albion Swords Pugio

[Matt Lukes]

Avete omnes<br>
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What does everyone think of the Deepeeka Pugio that Albion Swords has for sale:<br>
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[url=http://albion-swords.com/daggers/pugio.htm" target="top]albion-swords.com/daggers/pugio.htm[/url]<br>
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Thanks in advance.<br>
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Valete<br>
<br>
Matt <p></p><i></i>

[Anonymous]

Ave,<br>
Very much depends who you ask There are those who defend it to the death, and those who, lets say, feel differently.<br>
I have one. It's about the best pugio I'm going to have anytime soon, so I thinks it's great. structurally, it is a significatnt improvemnt over the previous version. Authentically, it's really got some problems- not so much the blade and handle, but the sheath. The entire "integral design/ riveted plate issue aside, the lower ring brackets are just totally in the wrong spot. Although it looks good, it is only losely based on any real artifact. Still, it's the best price for it out there, and you could do worse cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI...eName=WD1V and yes, I am repeatedly depicted wearing one of these monstrosities. It's photoshopped in, I swear <br>
I bet you have the skill to make a new sheath.<br>
Vale, Florentius <p></p><i></i>

[Matt Lukes]

Magna gratias Florentius- as long as something has some merit and can be 'corrected', that's good enough; as you say, the price is great and I really like personalizing things- I always have<br>
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Vale<br>
<br>
Matt <p></p><i></i>

[John M McDermott]

The pugio and belt seemed to be one thing Roman soldiers splurged on. They seemed to attach some mystical significance to them. <img src="http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v488/JohnMcDermott/DSC00158.jpg" style="border:0;"/> <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p200.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=johnmmcdermott>JOHN M MCDERMOTT</A> <IMG HEIGHT=10 WIDTH=10 SRC="http://photobucket.com/albums/v488/JohnMcDermott/th_DSC00144.jpg" BORDER=0> at: 3/12/05 9:27 pm<br></i>

[Crispvs]

Ahh - Dipeeka and their attempts at pugiones. The handle on this one is okay, although you will need to get rid of the pieces they fold around the ends of the guard. The best way to do this would be to remove the two rivets passing though the guard and then simply cut away the pieces which have been folded around to make 'ends' for the guard. This should leave the ends of the guard exposed. Then simply replace the rivets. The blade shape conforms fairly well to type 'B' and although the midrib is somewhat annomalous I would be hesitant to dismiss it out of hand. The sheath is a poor atttempt to copy one which was illustrated in Dan Peterson's book. This itself was a misinterpretation of line drawings of an iron sheath inlaid with silver and decorative rivets from Kempton. The sheath sold by Dipeeka looks more like some sort of highly decorated small animal and would be best discarded.<br>
The sheath shown in John's picture gives a much better impression of what many actual sheaths would have looked like, although in reality the silver and enamel decoration would have been inlaid rather than built up as it appears to have been on the reconstructed sheath in the picture, which appears to be a believable combination of the well known Legio XXII Primigenia dagger sheath from Mainz and one of the type B(II) sheaths from Vindonissa. If I'm wrong about the way the decoration has been created feel free to slap me. It certainly looks the way I would like to see a lot more reconstructions look!<br>
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Crispvs <p></p><i></i>

[John M McDermott]

The sheath is wooden and the decorations are plates attached to the outside. The plates are sterling, repoussed and the enamel is applied to it. The enamel is modern stuff, not ancient niello. The Legio X Fret is of my own invention, seeing how that's my unit. Took a little liberty, but I believe pugios were highly individualized and of great significance to the individual soldier. Besides, I bet their were other pugios with unit IDs other than the one found. <p></p><i></i>