Makedonian Armour

[MeinPanzer]

Regarding colour on the sarcophagus, I follow the opinion of those who have looked at all the colour sources for it, such as Sekunda and McBride. But it is a pity that we have no weapons on the sarcophagus to compare colours with!

I've seen the same sources as well as the newer Bunte Götter colour reconstructions, and I disagree with Sekunda's reconstruction of the blue on the helmets as being blue paint. Careful consideration of contemporary painting shows that blue, even deep blue, was commonly used to represent iron. In the late-4th/early-3rd century Kazanluk paintings, the sicae/rhomphaiai were painted blue, and in the late-4th century Aghios Athanasios paintings, the spearheads carried by Macedonian soldiers were painted a deep blue.

IIRC the famous painting of a Alexander-era cavalryman (a prodromoi?) wears some purple too. However, the Alexander sarcophagus largely depicts nobles, and we know Alexander captured and issued great quantities of Tyrian purple cloth. So even if there was some other decent purple dye, I suspect the purple on the sarcophagus was Tyrian.

But even outside of Alexandrian times purple is not uncommon. Painted Ptolemaic stelae show seemingly common soldiers wearing purple clothing or cloaks edged in purple, as do some funerary stelae reliefs with remnants of paint on them from elsewhere in the world.

Thinking about one-piece iron cuirasses, the main reason I doubt they existed was that I don't think large enough iron plates could be reliably produced anywhere in the world before 1400 or so in Europe. One-piece iron helms are hard enough to make with earlier technology!

They weren't one piece. Muscled cuirasses were always made of a front and back, and we have some examples to prove that it was possible.

I haven't heard of that painting you refer to- perhaps I will Google it.

Aghios Athanasios? I think some decent-quality images of it have been posted here a few times, so search for the name and it should return some results.

[Kallimachos]

Ruben, if blue painting stands for iron, how do you explain that some spearheads and butts aren't painted in blue?
http://www.imageload.biz/image.html?fil ... 136512.jpg
http://www.imageload.biz/image.html?fil ... 22c303.jpg

[hoplite14gr]

Colored helmet reconstructed with ultraviolet study:
http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t178 ... edhelm.jpg

It is a detail of this:
http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t178 ... rseman.jpg

Kind regards

[MeinPanzer]

Ruben, if blue painting stands for iron, how do you explain that some spearheads and butts aren't painted in blue?
http://www.imageload.biz/image.html?fil ... 136512.jpg
http://www.imageload.biz/image.html?fil ... 22c303.jpg

Iron wasn't always represented in blue, but it was quite often. In the Lyson and Kallikles tomb, for instance, a lighter, blue-grey was used for iron. All I'm saying is that I wouldn't be so sure that a helmet painted blue should automatically be assumed to be painted.

Colored helmet reconstructed with ultraviolet study:
http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t178 ... edhelm.jpg

It is a detail of this:
http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t178 ... rseman.jpg

For painted helmets, there is of course the Kinch tomb example as well as the red and purple helmets from (once again) Aghios Athanasios.

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o118 ... C01278.jpg
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o118 ... C01277.jpg
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o118 ... C01276.jpg
From the Amphipolis museum.They don't look iron to me...I think it's supposed to be painted blue...Amazing vase anyway,it had gold on there!It shows battle with Amazons...
Khairete
Giannis

[MeinPanzer]

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o118/...C01278.jpg
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o118 ... C01277.jpg
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o118 ... C01276.jpg
From the Amphipolis museum.They don't look iron to me...I think it's supposed to be painted blue...Amazing vase anyway,it had gold on there!It shows battle with Amazons...
Khairete
Giannis

When does this date to and where is it from?

The spearheads from the Aghios Athanasios paintings look painted blue as well, but I highly doubt that they painted spearheads. My point is that it wouldn't look iron to the modern viewer, it would look painted blue, but it would represent iron. Iron was sometimes painted blue from Assyrian times.

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

The point is,we are sure they painted their helmets red and other colours,we do know blue was one of their favorite colours(clothes,temples,grave stones etc),why should this helmet-and others be interpreted as more likely an iron one?
It was found in a grave near Ampipolis,I don't know date but if I remember well all fndings in that part of the museum were late classical.With the rest of the gold that was found near and with it,it's a safe guess it comes from arround 350-300bc(oh well,call that Hellenistic if you want)
Khaire
Giannis

[MeinPanzer]

The point is,we are sure they painted their helmets red and other colours,we do know blue was one of their favorite colours(clothes,temples,grave stones etc),why should this helmet-and others be interpreted as more likely an iron one?
It was found in a grave near Ampipolis,I don't know date but if I remember well all fndings in that part of the museum were late classical.With the rest of the gold that was found near and with it,it's a safe guess it comes from arround 350-300bc(oh well,call that Hellenistic if you want)
Khaire
Giannis

Because, as I said before, we know from contemporary art that blue was used to represent iron. I'm not trying to say that everything we see that could have been iron that was painted blue was iron, I'm just saying that there's a good chance that some of it was, and so the blue helmets on the Alexander sarcophagus are not so clearly painted.

[MeinPanzer]

[

And... to further muddle this issue, those helmets painted blue to represent iron could in fact be silvered or tinned bronze .

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

Nice thought,but silver and tin are more or less white and not grey(if polished) so blue would be a bit strange even for them to represent silver or tin.Hmmm not a post you should argue,just a though it is,with a LOT of speculation
Khaire
Giannis

[Sean Manning]

Thinking about one-piece iron cuirasses, the main reason I doubt they existed was that I don't think large enough iron plates could be reliably produced anywhere in the world before 1400 or so in Europe. One-piece iron helms are hard enough to make with earlier technology!

They weren't one piece. Muscled cuirasses were always made of a front and back, and we have some examples to prove that it was possible.

I mean one piece for a breastplate, and one piece for a backplate. And as far as I know we don't have some Hellenistic examples, just one possible example. Even if that one was iron, it could have been a rare item, like the iron dagger buried with Tutankamun.

I agree that the helmets might not have been painted, but I think the evidence is strong. In any case, that red helmet was certainly painted.

[Dan Howard]

There is no way that metal armour would have been reinforced with metal scales. Either the foundation is textile or hide, or they are not metal scales (i.e. they are painted or embossed decoration).

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

In the center,a black muscled cuirass and in the righ another white.Should we consume it was painted?
Also,these are heroes but yet,most of them are normally armed,one wears only chiton and one is completely nude.For me,a point against "heroic" nudity.
Khairete
Giannis

[MeinPanzer]

In the center,a black muscled cuirass and in the righ another white.Should we consume it was painted?

Seems like it could be an attempt at contrasting iron and bronze muscled cuirasses.

Also,these are heroes but yet,most of them are normally armed,one wears only chiton and one is completely nude.For me,a point against "heroic" nudity.
Khairete
Giannis

There's a very similar situation on the Hellenistic amazonomachy frieze from the Temple of Artemis on the Maeander. Dozens of warriors are represented and they range from fully, realistically depicted (helmets, scabbards, swords, cuirasses, shields, mid-ankle boots) to wearing only a chiton and carrying only a scabbard and sword to fighting fully nude with only a sword and scabbard. I think this simply shows another aspect of heroic nudity, rather than being a strike against it, though.

Examples like these illustrate that there were degrees of heroic nudity, rather than it being a binary convention like nude/realistically depicted.

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

We'll never solve that problem with nudity...
But trying to represent iron in that vase is not realistic either.It's too early for iron cuirasses.We can harldy find examples in Hellenistic times,a vase of the early-middle fifth century is unlikely to depict iron muscled cuirass!
Khaire
Giannis