03-01-2008, 04:13 PM
I also find it hard to believe that the helms were cast, for a few reasons. I would imagine that the helms would be someone tailored to an individual's head and I also would imagine that the Greek smiths would have also chosen the easiest way to produce them.
Something I learned along my art history career is that the ancient method of bronze casting was very labor intensive, even more so for something hollow. It required a rough mold to be made out of plaster or perhaps clay to shape the inside of the helm. This would then be covered with a layer of wax. The wax would be the part replaced by the bronze, and would be shaped exactly as one would want the helmet to appear. During this step any kind of myriad of design could be added to or carved into the wax, yet from the recovered helms I've seen very few if any have designs on them. The wax was then covered with more plaster leaving a hole in the top from which to poor the bronze in. After the plaster was set, the bronze could be poured in, the heat instantly melting the wax and filling the space it once occupied, producing an exact replica of the wax model. After the bronze cooled the plaster would have to be "smashed" off and the bronze cleaned and polished, and probably still in need of some shaping. The Wax Loss method proper.
This was the way bronze statues had been made in antiquity, the technique going as far back as the Assyrians, perhaps farther. I only elaborate on the process to show that a Greek armorer would probably find more rationale in grabbing his hammer and a sheet of bronze for this specific project as he would have had more control in shaping and maintaining thickness.
Something I learned along my art history career is that the ancient method of bronze casting was very labor intensive, even more so for something hollow. It required a rough mold to be made out of plaster or perhaps clay to shape the inside of the helm. This would then be covered with a layer of wax. The wax would be the part replaced by the bronze, and would be shaped exactly as one would want the helmet to appear. During this step any kind of myriad of design could be added to or carved into the wax, yet from the recovered helms I've seen very few if any have designs on them. The wax was then covered with more plaster leaving a hole in the top from which to poor the bronze in. After the plaster was set, the bronze could be poured in, the heat instantly melting the wax and filling the space it once occupied, producing an exact replica of the wax model. After the bronze cooled the plaster would have to be "smashed" off and the bronze cleaned and polished, and probably still in need of some shaping. The Wax Loss method proper.
This was the way bronze statues had been made in antiquity, the technique going as far back as the Assyrians, perhaps farther. I only elaborate on the process to show that a Greek armorer would probably find more rationale in grabbing his hammer and a sheet of bronze for this specific project as he would have had more control in shaping and maintaining thickness.
-Eric DeMott
