Toledo helmet

[Ebusitanus]

Personally talking, if I would have been Trajan then I would certainly make sure the first time I would inspect the ongoing work on the TC pieces and started seeing the liberties taken and "ignorance" of my sculptors that they got the right equipment brought to them or bring in a few inspired veterans to tell them how it really was.
Rome was not a small sleepy village. Thousands of travelers would come and go daily and not few of them from the border provinces.

Sorry, but I just can not see this TC being done out of ignorance as valid. Maybe we will end up finding one of these helmets eventually.

[sulla felix]

Why would the sculptors travel to a campaign or fort? What circumstances would put them in daily or even monthly contact with fully equipped soldiers, especially in Rome itself? Long distance travel was something of a dangerous affair, and generally it was the rich or merchants who travelled any distance and often with the aid of bodyguards, mostly for economic reasons or to vacation once or twice a year. Even then, it would actually be a rather large assumption that soldiers wore their panoply for civic duties like policing roads (if they did) or construction, etc, within the confines of the Empire. What's the worst those soldiers could come up against apart from ex-soldiers involved in banditry? I also think you overestimate the accuracy of memory.

Is the suggestion here that the average Roman citizen had no contact with the military? I think this is a little too black and white for my liking, particularly for a society in which many members had experienced active military service.

As to soldiers abandoning their kit somewhere outside Rome and then just wandering into the city in "civvies" I wonder what the evidence for this is. Surely legions were constantly on the move around the empire complete with their kit? I believe the surviving epigraphic evidence clearly demonstrates that a legion or detachment could expect to be moved at very short notice.

As to the claim that all soldiers involved in a triumph did not wear their fullkit, I do not believe anyone has actually proven that this was the case. As I stated earlier Pliny certainly records soldiers carrying their spears in a triumph in Rome. If they were carrying their spears then it is highly likely other items of kit were indeed worn. Much more impressive for a general to triumph with his troops in full glory, than for a mob shuffling through in tunics and belts? But that is just a hypothesis until I can do a bit more research on the surviving source material.

[tlclark]

Could you tell us more about Paul Zanker

Very famous (academically) for his book Augustus und die Macht der Bilder, translated as The power of images in the age of Augustus. Very much the standard of measure for any discussion on iconography and imperial propaganda.

I guess now's not the time to mention Richard Brilliant who takes exception with nearly everything Zanker says. :wink:

These internicine battles are really tiresome.

[Dagann]

I've said a number of times before on RAT, I think these helmets under discussion on TC and similar are stylised representations of the Italic A, as with other similar monuments. Above all other options, I truly believe the helmets are based on what were seen within the walls of Rome, which would not be worn by legionaries and auxilia, nor even Praetorians, simply because they weren't allowed to wear their armour. In other words, the sculptors modeled the helmets on those worn by vigiles or the urban cohorts, and "refined" them with artistic license. And I'm not just talking about the TC sculptors.

Another aspect to the Column that to me is near proof that it completely disregards any pretence of accuracy in military dress; where's the Dacian armour? Dacia was a highly evolved, rich and powerful culture, and yet they themselves are portrayed wearing simple trousers and hats. But we do know they had armour. Not only do I think basing a Roman impression on the Column is foolhardy, but even a Dacian impression.

Very interestings thoughts!
Were could i see depictions of the dacian armours?

On the one hand, it's pretty hard to envisage not even an armour was given to the scupltors as a model.
On the other hand, the scupltors may not pay attention to the likelihood of the legionary depiction. The most important was to make the the people recognize the "good" guys from the "bad" guys.
Convention and propaganda would explain this, as it has already been said.
It's more or less the same thing in many warlike medieval paintings.

May be the roman people had already a picturing of the legionary coming from theatre, street shows, graffitis, votive items, etc...
And the trajan column scupltors just fitted to this picturing cause they wanted the people to understand the column or themselves were imagining the legionary the way the scuplted them on the TC.

[Paullus Scipio]

Well, here's another conundrum from Trajan's column for you.
I think Tarbicus might have been referring to the 'Dacian' armour depicted on the Column's base, as a form of Tropaeum. It is sculpted pretty much life-size, in lots of detail and looks completely realistic. Much of it (maybe all ?) belongs to Allies, such as the Bastarnae two-handed Falxes, and the apparently leather full body' segmentata' which matches Tacitus' description of leather Sarmatian armour. The shield patterns too are noticeably elaborate too.
Yet on the column itself ( presumably carved by the same team of sculptors, but maybe not), the Sarmatians and their horses are shown in 'lycra' :lol: - skintight scale suits ! No Bastarnae at all (but they appear at Adamklissi). The elaborate shield patterns are much simplified. As Tarbicus says, the Dacians are shown as wearing tunic and trousers,their leaders distinguished by 'caps' - not a single piece of armour between them, not even the King Decebalus !! hock: . Yet he is wealthy enough to bury a vast treasure in a river-bed.
Obviously, the column makes no attempt, with its 'stock' figures, to depict reality, and I would suggest most of its Roman audience understood this .

[Celtic505]

In real life all the legionaries and Auxila would not be wearing identical equipment, I think what we see on TC is just a generalization of the equipment used at the time. Just like modern depictions of soldiers today basically show them in BDUs, metal helmet and rifle, they don't necessarily show the MICH helmet or the M-4, I can pick out countless modern monuments or depictions that show generic helmets on troops instead of what they actually wore. I think it's just easier for the artists sake of generalizing the equipment and for the people being able to recognize quickly the identities of all being shown. What I see on the sculptures is just a quick representation of the ever changing equipment used by soldiers. And if it was important enough to show exactly the right stuff they surely would have done it.