The light armed cohorts discussion and evidence

[Tim Edwards]

These spherical expansions have actually been found on surviving pila from Ljubljanica in Slovenia!

See M Feugere 'Weapons of the Romans' pp129.

I have only seen rough line drawings so far, but they look like iron expansions of the socketed shaft type. One find looks like the spherical expansion is intact, though what material this is, is difficult to ascertain. Until I get better images, I favour Crispus' interpretation that these expansions would have been wooden, in this case sandwiching an iron tang expansion.

At least one had a pierced centre, which I think would make practical sense as an extra point of anchorage to the shaft.

These spherical expansions are smaller than what appears to be shown on the Cancellaria reliefs, but neatly match the smaller size as shown on some of the Adamklisi metopes.

Hope this helps...