Santa Maria Maggiore mosaics

[Dan Howard]

So is there any evidence of segmented armour in any culture ever reaching down to cover the thighs? Is it even possible to make a practical segmented coat that resembles that illustration?

[Tarbicus]

So is there any evidence of segmented armour in any culture ever reaching down to cover the thighs? Is it even possible to make a practical segmented coat that resembles that illustration?

What if the plates were untied at the middle on the lower part? Or it could be a bad representation perhaps?

Here's how I think lamellar would have been represented:

[Tarbicus]

This is the figure I think may be wearing lamellar leg armour, but looking more closely it goes down to above the knee. Or, it may be black femenalia:

[Robert Vermaat]

I think maybe you're reading too much into this. I see all kinds of anachronistic details in the other images (like chariots!) too view each soldier as a candidate for 100% correctly represented by the artist.

[Tarbicus]

But hamata is hamata, squamata is squamata, musculata... etc. Regardless of accuracy of the shape, the types are identifiable.

[Tarbicus]

So is there any evidence of segmented armour in any culture ever reaching down to cover the thighs? Is it even possible to make a practical segmented coat that resembles that illustration?

Hmm, come to think of it:

[Antonius Lucretius]

At last the Santa Maria Maggiore mosaïcs..
That banded armour --it is indoubtedly banded armour or "seg"-- reminds me of a similar one on Trajan Column's base. There are two on TC, actually. One with the lower part hidden by something else --a shield or a tunic-- and the other one shown complete and going down the hips. It is obvious that the lower part going down the thigh was not tied it the middle like the torso/upper part. I suggest it was made in two sets --one for each thigh and that they were attached to the torso/upper part like the shoulder plates in a segmentata: with leather straps.
I also could not fail to notice --again-- two very mysterious types of helmets that do not appear in the archaeological record.
But that really is the only place where they don't..
The first type is the "carolingian" type. Looks a bit like a morion. It definitely has a large rim. Very videly represented in iconography, including the very stylized reliefs on the arch of Constantine which manages to show also the archeologically attested Intercisa type.
The second type is the famous "smurf helmet" a sort of thrakian/phrygian helmet, pointed upwards and forward. Good examples can be seen on the arch of Septimus in Rome, on several other sculptures and on many a mosaïc, including Sta. Maria Maggiore's.
As far as leather muscled cuirass go. The sculptural evidence points obviously this way. Or rather, it points to the fact that some were made of leather and some were made of metal. I have no doubt the Romans, and many before them, mastered perfectly the cuir bouilli and leather embossing techniques.
The muscled cuirasses shown on this mosaïcs are defintely metal. Either polished iron or maybe silver plated.

[Tarbicus]

That banded armour --it is indoubtedly banded armour or "seg"-- reminds me of a similar one on Trajan Column's base. There are two on TC, actually. One with the lower part hidden by something else --a shield or a tunic-- and the other one shown complete and going down the hips.

Like the one seen here?
[url:3qn8450f]http://www.classics.ox.ac.uk/resources/www/pictures/trajan/colbase3.jpg[/url]

[Antonius Lucretius]

Yep Tarbicus. Like that one.
It seems the mosaïcs also show armour (Mail?) fitted with the large bronze breastplates characteristic of IIIrd century cuirasses...

[Paulus Claudius Damianus]

Maybe we want to see more than reality...

[Tarbicus]

I personally don't see lamellar any more than others see seg :? I still think it's the latter, and I think examples of 'long' segmented plate armour from both earlier sculptural representation and actual artefacts have been shown.

One thing is seemingly clear, and that is the armours as shown in the mosaics are all metal. It may be that the mosaics give an excellent indication of the colours that would have been used on the Columns and other sculptural representations, especially as the way the armours portrayed are so similar in their depiction to them. I also don't have a problem with the 'classical' look of many details, and rejecting much because of a few details is like throwing the baby out with the bath water. It would seem even more odd to not have details of times before when depicting stories from times before.

[Tarbicus]

I think the mosaic is being taken too literally. I certainly never said it was an accurate depiction of the construction of a seg, but the same potential 'mistake' can be seen on Trajan's Column which is another piece of art and not a construction diagram for amourers.

I don't think the onus is on the seg-believers now, because evidence for both actual long plate segmented armour, and also representational evidence have been produced.

Can someone produce an artistic representation of lamellar that only has horizontal lines and no vertical?

It's clearly 1-0 to segs.

[Dan Howard]

So how do you explain the existence of knee length lamellar corselets from Asia?

But we're talking Roman, and all the depictions I 've seen are only to the waist.

Of course we are but you said, "Lamellar scales are wired both vertically and horizontally, and a cuirass that long wouldn't move! Lamellar stops at the waist to allow the wearer to bend at the waist."

The very existence of knee length lamellar refutes the statement that lamellar cannot be made that long. The armour's origin is irrelevant.

[Dan Howard]

It's a seg.

Or, enlighten us with an example of a Roman foot soldier wearing lamellar, and one that went below the waist, before the time this mosaic was made, please.

OR it is scale armour.

[Tarbicus]

It's a seg.

Or, enlighten us with an example of a Roman foot soldier wearing lamellar, and one that went below the waist, before the time this mosaic was made, please.

OR it is scale armour.

There's scale armour in the same mosaic piece and it is quite different to the banded armour we're talking about. A scale lorica is directly behind him to the left, and also one to the right of him, and another furthest to the right of the whole pic.