Making a Corinthian Helm?

[Jason Hoffman]

I have watched a skilled craftsman in turkey produce an immaculate fluted metal bowl from copper sheet in about two hours, with a hammer chisel and stake. Personally i can in no way see how helmets could be hammered over a stone form. metal just does not work that way. modern forming and forging yes, because you are dealing with a positive and negative mold. but not working sheet metal.

for example let me explain, to get a dome on a sheet of metal place sheet on on an anvil and strike repeatedly with a hammer in the same place. what you have done is thin the metal at this point increasing its surface area. because it is constrained by the none hammered metal around it this increase in surface area has to go somewhere and out it goes. If you now want to put a cross in the dome place it on a chisel edge where you want the cross to be and hit repeatedly, you have further thinned the metal at this point and it will have to go up or down to accommodate the greater surface area. If you want to reverse the process it is a case of flipping the metal over and very slowly hammering the metal back reversing the stretching process.

The making of a helmet would require the hammering on the inner and outer surface which a skilled craftsman can do amazingly quickly and get a finish that is hard to believe.

I believe a craftsman making a Corinthian helmet would have started with either a cast bowl or deep cup or just used a lump of bronze. hammering it into a sheet in order to shrink it back into a helmet shape does sound like a waste of effort.

If you ever get the chance wander into the back streets of places like turkey, India, China etc the skills of the people who have been doing this kind of work their entire lives is amazing, they just make it look so easy and are amazingly fast and seldom use anything apart from hammers and stake anvils.

[Praefectusclassis]

One example of a stone helmet form is in my blog on Ancient Warfare. All forms that I've seen have intricate decorations on them, perhaps they were used to make decorative sheet metal that was added on an iron or bronze core? Just thinking out loud...

[Sean Manning]

Jason: Isn't there one metalworking technique for spreading sheet metal into a void (doming?), and another for bending it around a stake (raising?)? You seem to describe the former, but I think a specially shaped stake like these forms would be used with the latter. Mind, most of my knowledge comes from two readings of Techniques of Reconstructing Medieval and Renaissance Armour: The Fourteenth Century so I'm no expert!

[Matthew Amt]

Sean, yes, there is dishing or sinking, hammering into a hollow (for a helmet that would be hammering from the inside); and raising, which is hammering on the outside while the metal rests on a stake. Both techniques can be seen in that Anvilfire tutorial on the Norman helmet that was already posted:

http://www.anvilfire.com/21centbs/armor ... _index.htm

Raising can be used to shrink the circumference of a piece of metal, helping it go from flat to bowl-shaped. This thickens the rim, by the way.

I've never seen raising done on a particularly helmet-shaped stake, just whatever shape fits nicely inside the work. In fact, a completely helmet-shaped former would be very difficult to work with, since you couldn't turn the piece freely to hammer as needed. That stone item that Jasper shows is FASCINATING, no mistake, but I'm really not sure that it's for making or decorating metal helmets. Craftsmen doing embossing or chasing simply don't use such things. So I'm VERY puzzled!!

Okay, we have the same sort of mystery about the Roman patera or messpan. It has thin sides but a thick heavy handle and bottom, the latter having circular grooves cut into it on a lathe. The only thing I can think is that a thick blank is cast and then spun to shape, leaving the edge and bottom full-thickness. SO if someone can demonstrate that the face area of a Corinthian helmet was cast and the rest hammered to shape, okay, I'm good. BUT with the face at the front, you'd have a problem with a gap at the back, or at least a seam that would need to be closed. And bronze isn't forge-welded like iron...

Much easier for me to handle the idea that a basic bowl was cast--the very top of the helmet--and then worked to shape. That even makes more sense with very early Corinthians that are very plain in form. But I still want to see more hard data about thicknesses and such.

Late, gotta sleep! Khairete,

Matthew

[richsc]

can in no way see how helmets could be hammered over a stone form.

I'm not sure why a stone form would be different than an iron stake; as Matt said, the form would have to be smaller so you could rotate the piece as it was hammered out. I would think stone would be too brittle except if you're plannishing the piece. Iron or maybe wood would be much better.

I don't think it is that hard to create domed shapes from flat bronze. Dish the flat piece first, pushing metal into the center, then turn it over and raise it, pushing back to the edges.

Somewhere I saw some sketches of blanks for helmet forming that were cast to create a lens like disk, that is, thicker in the middle than the edges, that was intended for raising. You would be able to skip the dishing and go straight to raising. This could be where the casting ideas came from, as I could see that saving a few steps.

[Dan Diffendale]

I've never seen raising done on a particularly helmet-shaped stake, just whatever shape fits nicely inside the work. In fact, a completely helmet-shaped former would be very difficult to work with, since you couldn't turn the piece freely to hammer as needed. That stone item that Jasper shows is FASCINATING, no mistake, but I'm really not sure that it's for making or decorating metal helmets. Craftsmen doing embossing or chasing simply don't use such things. So I'm VERY puzzled!!

Much of the raised or embossed detail found in ancient metalwork seems to have been done on forms, see, e.g. M.Yu. Treister, The Role of Metals in Greek History...

[richsc]

In the case of that hammer you can see the extreme length of it where the armorer went way into the bowl to shape it. Today, you would use another type of stake, that in effect hammers from the inside.

[PMBardunias]

Eric, good to see another Floridian on here. If you should start a reinactment group anywhere near the SE of the state, let me know.

I undertsand that the Pilos was possibly "spun", though I have no direct evidence of this. Spinning metal is a bit like spinning clay to make pots and is very quick compared to hammering. Is there any evidence that more complicated helmets were spun?

[PMBardunias]

I'll have to hunt them down, but I know there are a number of vase images of a workman holding a corinthian, perhaps Hephaestus making Achilles' armor. I can't recall if he is hammering though.

Edit: found one showing the tool he used.

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

A bit irrelevant to helmets,but still.

I also have another photo of a helmet manufacturer,though he's in the stage of decoration on that one. And he's holding a tool like a curved knife
Khairete
Giannis

[caiusbeerquitius]

I am happy to let you all know that my initial statement about the helmets being cast in the 1st step of their production has been proven right by an intensive study of the helmets found at Olympia.

H. Born, Die Helme des Hephaistos - Handwerk und Technik griechischer Bronzen in Olympia, München, 2009.

*edit*
I highly recommend this beautifully made and well-written study to anyone interested in the subject

[Virilis]

I am happy to let you all know that my initial statement about the helmets being cast in the 1st step of their production has been proven right by an intensive study of the helmets found at Olympia.

H. Born, Die Helme des Hephaistos - Handwerk und Technik griechischer Bronzen in Olympia, München, 2009.

*edit*
I highly recommend this beautifully made and well-written study to anyone interested in the subject

Interesting! I have always thought too that there must have been some "hybrid" method involved ...

[Kineas]

If you look carefully at the lonely mountain forge Corinthian you might find some discrepancies to the originals. The nose isn´t thicker, it´s just the edges are folded at 90°. Also the lower part of the cheek pieces are braised on. These are quite a way from the Originals.

You're welcome to go to my website and see Joe forging a one-piece Corinthian from a single sheet, complete with double thickness nose guard. Stating that Joe brazes on his cheek pieces because he has done so on other helmets is not really accurate. Any of these craftsmen who tell you they can raise a helmet from a single piece can do so.

They are "quite a way for Originals" are they?

LOL.

As to casting--is this the same gentlemen who, in his book on greaves, didn't know the difference between raising and sinking? I suspect that jury will remain out. I think this subject needs some commentary from a trained metal worker. I do know that casting bronze and then working it is possible because it should remain workable, but would have been very, very difficult in the ancient world for a variety fo reasons, one of them being that the ancients didn't know that tin and bismuth were different metals, so that they might easily end up with cast brass--which is unworkable. But why not ask Craig or Joe to write an article? They've both made them--and they are not "quite a way from Originals".

[caiusbeerquitius]

You're welcome to go to my website and see Joe forging a one-piece Corinthian from a single sheet, complete with double thickness nose guard.

The question is not whether it is possible to do so nowadays, the book is concerned with how it was made in Antiquity.

double thickness nose guard.

Well, that´s great. However this is just not enough information... double thickness from where on the helmet? In many cases the back skull of the helmets is just 0.6mm or thinner, so this would mean a 1.2mm noseguard. However, in average the noseguards are around 6-7mm, and in some cases up to one cm, that would be IMHO impossible to achieve out of a sheet metal. o0

[Kineas]

But--now, seriously, and not trying to be a pain--you can't imagine that these things were made out of a sheet of metal--right?

There was no "naturally occurring" sheet metal in 490 BC. If someone needed a sheet, he--or his slaves--had to beat an ingot into sheet. No cold rolling, no rolling presses.

It has been hypothesized--repeatedly--that smiths poured their sheet on slate. That is to say, they heated slate to a relatively high temperature--they could so this simply by building a fire on the slate and then sweeping it clean--and then poured newly mixed bronze straight onto the slate, in effect pouring "sheet." The sheet, as poured, would be subject to all sorts of possible flaws, but as bronze can be re-cast several times before it gets wonky (not a technical term ) a craftsman could make a pouring error and simply re-melt and recast.

That said, the "discovery" that parts of the bowl of a Corinthian are "cast" --the top of the bowl of the helmet is the least worked part--is essentially meaningless, as the whole "sheet" (really a thick ingot) would have been poured at some point. in effect, all bronze began as "cast." Then it was "worked. If it was not "worked," the wearer would end up with a heavy helmet that offered no protection. I can put a spear through cast bronze--even with a glancing surface. Not a risk the wearer wants to take. So the smith will take his ingot--even if he pours it with some shape to it (I would!) and work it to harden it. Bronze work-hardens--believe me!

So--perhaps Joe and Craig might achieve a higher level of authenticity by casting ingots of varying shape--I think the last theory I read in Hesperia posited a hollow tear-drop--but as they have gremlins to make them exact 16 gauge and 14 gauge bronze, and as the bronze they use is not, according to them, anything like the bronze used by the ancients, anyway... (I gather that ancient bronze has quite a number of properties not found in modern 220 or Silicon or phosphor bronze, and no, I don't really know what I'm talking about!) I think it is fair to say that they are doing the closest imitation they can to an ancient helmet.

I would, however, be very interested to see a craftsman make a helmet from a pre-cast ingot with, say, the shape of the dome (the easiest part to form, let me add! So not really a big deal to raise) and see how it went--even better if it was done with the best imitation of period bronze.

For me, the proof that raising a helmet was a difficult and time-consuming process that affected production rates--even then--can be seen in the Attic helmet, which is a simple and rather shallow bowl with a neck guard (easy to form) and the cheek pieces are added after by hinges and rivets--in effect, making a three piece Corinthian. The Pilos and Boeotian are both much easier to work than the Corinthian, and seem to have cost less. On another thread, i was surprised to find that the Hellenistic Attic is 5 or 7 pieces--I wonder when brazing and/or riveting became sufficiently facile for Classical craftsmen that they could make multi-piece helmets?