12-17-2009, 04:26 PM
Oh yeah definitely- never rely on merchants for information LOL Even if sometimes products are worked on by knowledgeable people, they're all still mass-produced usually as quickly as possible so you can never expect quality or accuracy.
We do indeed know very little about shield colours- the majority of recreations are just copies of other ones, hence the near universality of red; yes the Dura scutum, the only coloured one known, is red, but it's not what could be considered a 'typical' legionary piece since it's from 255CE, is painted quite elaborately and not like any military blazon we know of and so on. I expect some consider the red being the colour of Mars makes it fit, but that's just at theory like any other. A number of reenactor groups have chosen to do things differently and use blue or another colour for the main field, but really there's no real proof for anything. It's all just reasonable or 'not impossible'. Even the exact nature of the blazon isn't clear- the carvings show the elements, but colours and painting styles are anyone's guess; the Dura shields, which are our only source of information so far as I know, are all realistically-painted- not like the modern 'logo' style reenactors usually use- so to my mind that makes more realistic painting on legionary scuta reasonable. Beyond that, however, once more it's anyone's guess. And there's only possibly one unit blazon known- the tombstone of GN. MVSIVS shows a particular design and being the Aquilifer, it's thought by some that his represents the Legio's (XIIII) symbology. Of course there is a possibility that even every Cohors I think it was had a different blazon depending on how one interprets various ancient authors' statements- or the differnet segments of a Legio could have been colour-coded (an easy way to distinguish friend from foe would be shield field colour) or many other theories. The other sculptural evidence is also problematic- Trajan's column shows something like 17 or 18 different shield blazons and yet was it only three or five Legiones took part in the campaign? So it's all kind of dodgy in reality- which makes it best by far to really keep to what's known, i.e. copying a definite blazon and not just mix-and-matching elements, for example, because so much else is uncertain. If you limit the uncertainty, you'll be as 'correct' as is possible. Otherwise you're quickly off in fantasy land...
We do indeed know very little about shield colours- the majority of recreations are just copies of other ones, hence the near universality of red; yes the Dura scutum, the only coloured one known, is red, but it's not what could be considered a 'typical' legionary piece since it's from 255CE, is painted quite elaborately and not like any military blazon we know of and so on. I expect some consider the red being the colour of Mars makes it fit, but that's just at theory like any other. A number of reenactor groups have chosen to do things differently and use blue or another colour for the main field, but really there's no real proof for anything. It's all just reasonable or 'not impossible'. Even the exact nature of the blazon isn't clear- the carvings show the elements, but colours and painting styles are anyone's guess; the Dura shields, which are our only source of information so far as I know, are all realistically-painted- not like the modern 'logo' style reenactors usually use- so to my mind that makes more realistic painting on legionary scuta reasonable. Beyond that, however, once more it's anyone's guess. And there's only possibly one unit blazon known- the tombstone of GN. MVSIVS shows a particular design and being the Aquilifer, it's thought by some that his represents the Legio's (XIIII) symbology. Of course there is a possibility that even every Cohors I think it was had a different blazon depending on how one interprets various ancient authors' statements- or the differnet segments of a Legio could have been colour-coded (an easy way to distinguish friend from foe would be shield field colour) or many other theories. The other sculptural evidence is also problematic- Trajan's column shows something like 17 or 18 different shield blazons and yet was it only three or five Legiones took part in the campaign? So it's all kind of dodgy in reality- which makes it best by far to really keep to what's known, i.e. copying a definite blazon and not just mix-and-matching elements, for example, because so much else is uncertain. If you limit the uncertainty, you'll be as 'correct' as is possible. Otherwise you're quickly off in fantasy land...
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