marching yoke

[Marcus Mummius]

The Römercohorte from Opladen are to my knowledge the group that is most experienced in marching with full kit and a fully laden furca. I marched with them in Xanten last year, carrying a fully laden furca and can tell you that none of us (mostly untrained men) had a hard time. We only marched for about 1hour-1,5hour at a time, but could have kept doing this for a much longer time. Especialy if you would have a resting time of let's say 5-10 minutes each hour. I'm sure trained legionarries, who were without doubt a lot thougher than modern soldiers (life in ancient times was physicaly a lot more challenging), were able to do it. Their bones may become deformed and their body musculature a bit assymetrical, and this, some say, can be seen in skeletal remains.

Here are some pictures of the RCO marching with the furca:







Valete

[Tarbicus]

Okay, let's throw out all the evidence because a modern soldier can't do it and it doesn't fit with 21st Century practices. Is that what you're saying? And while we're at it, how about those who have clearly stated it can be done, with much exeperience of the furca, taking back what they've said? :wink:

A: It's in representation.
B: It's in writing.
C: Re-enactors do it a lot with success.
D: There is no evidence for ancient webbing or backpacks. Zilch, none, nada.
E: You don't need to distribute weight around the body, you need the centre of gravity to be high which, to my mind, makes the furca a stroke of genius - adaptable, portable, quickly dispensed with and quickly picked up again.
F: The representation on TC may be wrong in detail just like the helmets and armour, etc, but that doesn't make the use of the item wrong, just like they had helmets, armour, etc. Strap the swingy bits down and you no longer have swingy bits. Besides, all they'd hit is metal, and the spacing between ranks on the march was likely greater than a modern army's. My furca has a dolabra strapped to it - no probs.

As for Jef's comment about bones becoming deformed, the Herculaneum soldier had exactly that - he was bow legged. The common opinion is due to riding a horse, but there are a number of horse riders who dismiss that notion immediately.

[Paullus Scipio]

Some more random shots........ (my, my, by being a 'doubting Thomas, haven't you stirred up a hornet's nest, John/Karus ? :wink: ...all to the good of course! )

The Legions had a long and continuous existence of over 500 years by the time the Furca was being 'yomped' ( or 'tabbed' if you prefer) all round Europe....plenty of time to get their PLCE to an optimum........

We shouldn't be too astounded by 'body deformation' associated with a particular job....whilst few professions produce this in modern times (Tennis players are a notable exception - male players are often 'assymetric' to the point that their right bicep is the same diameter as their thighs, and hugely overdeveloped , but with a 'normal' left bicep, and this has an effect on bones.); hock: in the pre-industrial era when all jobs were manual, I have no doubt that EVERY profession produced its unique 'deformities', from stooped peasant, to archers shoulders, to bow legged from rickets/vitamin deficiency combined with lifting heavy loads, to 'Blacksmith's arms' and so on......

[Karus]

guys guys..ease up a bit :? I ask out of ignorance in the hope that someone can convince me thats all..I never mentioned backpacks or webbing tabicus I just said I think the whole thing looks awkward! I am in a reenactment unit but so far have not had the chance to try these things but believe me I`m raring to give it a go now. Thanks for the input guys
kind regards

[Hibernicus]

John,
Now that we got ya we ain't a lettin' go!

The pic is of Scithius. We've had success with a controversial :wink: simple shoulder strap through the handle of the scutum. When marching it sits upright, is guided by the hand, not held up by the hand, and has proven very comfortable.

At rest, the scutum can be rotated 90°....a nice arm rest.. set the sarcina aside and you can take lunch without setting the scutum down.. even ..ahem... take care of nature.. its also very very easy to reshoulder the sarcina.

Many of our new scutums now have attachment points for tying off the scutum cover and it also serves as a place to affix a shoulder strap system similar to that pictured in a previous post.

The helmet is on it's own strap (leather straps or card woven belts) though some of the guys hang their helmets off of "Marius hooks"..