Sources for gladius hilt materials

[marcos]

LUCIUS, of course I agree , a lot of hilts have survive, but - be attention - some in your pictures aren' t original. They seem so , but aren't ,also if they are in a museum.
Then , take a look at the guard of the mogontiagum (the first sword in your post), and precisely take a look at the hole of the guard to insert the tang and then to the width of the bottom of the tang . Sounds strange.

here some other original handles
The following , well knew and already published , is an amazing spatha , sold around 1 years ago by a auction house



and then some others unpublished , not available on internet (only the grip is original )


[img]
http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/pomp ... 1/w500.png [/img]




Jesper , I have some more pics , if you are interested .

About materials for grips, I have re-hilted some original gladius and thus I check a lot of kinds of bone , and I have to say that it isn' t easy to find the straight one . Pigs bone are absolutely not good , the same for the big part of the cow , just a little better for horse legs bone, but until now I have not find the perfect bone . I can say that it doesn't exist.
I'm sure there is a "backstage" but I have not again found it .

[LUCIUS ALFENUS AVITIANUS]

The Mainz picture is probably an Museum assemblage of parts of many swords, only with a museistic/ didactic purpose. The pieces are published in Miks.

The only pieces that aren't original in the pictures posted by me are the pommel and guard of one of the Nijmegen's sword, i think the right one.

The spatha you have posted is III century. The other two are strange (fakes?). The most difused in I century is the octogonal in section one with the four ridges for fingers.

[Jesper D]

Hello,
Nice pictures! I see you have chosen to rehilt one of those swords with iron pommel and guard!
Glad to see the thread lives on! I would love to hear something about metal hilt findings if anyone knows anything about that. I am would be very interested in seeing further photos of gladius hilts. Would be great if you guys could write a little string about where the swords/hilts are from - I for one would be interested in visiting the museums in question if I happen to be in that area sometime in the future!

Cheers,
Jesper

[Crispvs]

I don't know about metal handle parts, but the Mainz type sword found at Rheingoenheim had a wooden handle completely covered in thin silver.

Crispvs

[LUCIUS ALFENUS AVITIANUS]

A picture of Rheinghonheim:

[marcos]

fine , here some other pics.

this one -already published in RAT in some other topic - is from an Hispaniensis , found near the spot of the Pharsalus battle. Unfortunately survived just an half of it , the rear is missing.




this from a Fulham type, but only the grip is original . The pommel and the guard are modern replacement.




and last the following from a pompei . This too has only the grip original and the pommel + guard not original.




As you can see in all the pics of this topic , none grip has octagonal or esagonal shape, but that's is straight (or althought I think so for my experience) because is highly difficult , almost impossible, find a bone good to make a similar shape. I don't think that an armorer had so much time to check hundred of bones before make one sword.

At last i think the big part of the gladii had handle from wood and only sporadically from bone, because to work wood you need very very time less than the bone, and all at once a lot of available material.
But of course wood can't survive.

[Crispvs]

"Then , take a look at the guard of the mogontiagum (the first sword in your post), and precisely take a look at the hole of the guard to insert the tang and then to the width of the bottom of the tang . Sounds strange."

It is indeed a museum assemblage of seperately found parts. They are all from Vindonissa.

"As you can see in all the pics of this topic , none grip has octagonal or esagonal shape, but that's is straight (or althought I think so for my experience) because is highly difficult , almost impossible, find a bone good to make a similar shape. I don't think that an armorer had so much time to check hundred of bones before make one sword."

Actually, the vast majority of Roman sword grips which have been found have been either octagonal or hexagonal in section. Also, it is very easy to find the right bone once you know what you are looking for. The best bone for a sword grip is the rear cannon bone of a calf - hardly an uncommon animal to be found in an ancient abbatoir. Once you can recognise it finding the right bone is child's play, even today. The time to make a grip is not great either, once you know what you are doing. Once the bone had been cut to the right size, it took me nearly an hour to cut and file the ridges and recesses on the first side of mine. After that however, the other sides each took about 5 minutes to do.

Here's a picture of mine, also showing that if you know what to look for you can find the right bones for any part of a sword hilt



"At last i think the big part of the gladii had handle from wood and only sporadically from bone, because to work wood you need very very time less than the bone, and all at once a lot of available material.
But of course wood can't survive."

Actually, wood does survive in many places and Vindonissa, for example, has produced a number of wooden guards and pommels, along with bone guards and possibly pommels and a large number of bone grips. I think that there was one wooden grip amongst the grips from Vindonissa.

Crispvs

[marcos]

The best bone for a sword grip is the rear cannon bone of a calf - hardly an uncommon animal to be found in an ancient abbatoir.


Actually, wood does survive in many places and Vindonissa, for example, has produced a number of wooden guards and pommels, along with bone guards and possibly pommels and a large number of bone grips. I think that there was one wooden grip amongst the grips from Vindonissa.

Crispvs

Crispvs, can you explain what kind of animal is the "calf-hardly" ? I can't figure that.
I understand tha you have notice of several wooden handles; would be amazing to have pics. I'm very interested.

[Crispvs]

Sorry Marco,

Perhaps it would have made more sense to you if I had said '...a calf (hardly an uncommon animal to find in an ancient abbatoir).'

For pictures of wooden hilt parts, have another look at the drawings Cesar posted up on the first page of this thread.

Crispvs

[marcos]

Thanks, Crispvs, and sorry for my bad english , the calf is the "young cow", isn't it ? But in this case I have tested a lot of them and I find not good because normally too short in the stright part in the middle.
May be you can suggest me something.

Concerning the wooden handle , I know the picture you mean but there are only 4-5 exemplars and that is why I said that the wooden grips don' t (normally) survive.

[Crispvs]

There are actually more wooden parts surviving than are shown in the page of drawings Cesar posted up. This page is from Bishop and Coulston and merely shows some examples. It is not a full visual catalogue of hilt parts. If you have access to a copy of Miks you will find a number of further wooden parts shown there.

Regarding the bones being too short, remember that you only need a piece about 8 - 8.5 cm long. You may need to do a bit of shaping before the entire length you need is the same diameter. Saw off the nock end at about the point where you see the small vent in the bone where a blood vessel originally ran through. Then measure 9 cm from there and cut it again at that point. This should ensure that you have the option of cutting away some of the end with the thinner bone. Normally this would be at the knuckle end but it really does depend on exactly where you cut. Looking down the centre of the bone you should be able to get a good idea of the internal appeture. This should be quite small and may in fact need widening a bit in the middle to allow the sword tang to pass through. You are likely to have the greatest external distortion of the shape you want at the nock end but the bone should be thickest here so can be cut away until you have the parallel shape you want in order to start on the final shape of the handle.

If the bones you are using still have nocks on when you get them, try to choose ones which have nocks shaped like the one in the bottom left of this picture, which is actually the nock from the bone I made my own grip from. The two nocks on the right are from front legs and have a 'D' shape to the internal appeture which is no good for the grip. The rear cannon bones have a more circular appeture which is better suited to receiving a sword tang and keeping it reasonably secure.



I hope this helps

Crispvs

[marcos]

If you have access to a copy of Miks you will find a number of further wooden parts shown there

can you give me more information about that book? thanks

I understand that you too had experiences in making an handle from bone, so would be interesting to expand on . I try to explain with some images the problems I found.
1) the stright part of the bones, the middle one , is normally too short, not long more than 6-7 cm and thus insufficient. The two butts are of course tapering.



2) the section of the bone is highly irregular , never close to a circle. It is possible to rasp it of course , but normally not enough to make it perfectly circular , but just elliptic.

before


after


I have tested around 20-30 bones from the legs of cows,pigs horses, young and adult, but the difficulties are always the some. I have recently tested the deer too, it has bones stright and long but unfortunatly absolutely too much slender .
I guess romans knew a way to deform bones , like to put into the vinegar or something like that.

[LUCIUS ALFENUS AVITIANUS]

The bone that is in your pictures is a femur, so is not the bone cited by Crispus.

The cow legs (and arms) are formed by four bones: The closest to the body is shortest and strengntest, with a triangular section. Then, there are a conjunt of two bones, both long, but one very strong and the other very thin. Then there are the metapod (metarsia for the rear leg, metacarp for the front leg) This is the bone that we are looking for: Metatarsus, the long bone of the rear leg closest to the nail of the cow.

I think you don't find the bone because you are searching it in a butcher. Today, with the mad cow disease, is very dificult to find that bone, because the first thing they do with the legs is cut the hands of the cow, the horns, and other and burn it. So you have to talk to the butcher and say that you need the long bone that is in the hand of the cow. Is the only bone that really you can use for it, at roman does.

[Crispvs]

This is the bone you want (the top one, not the bottom one).

http://outdoors.webshots.com/photo/1332 ... 7519DEIqvh

Make sure it is from the back leg and has a round, rather than 'D' shaped internal apature. Look again at the picture of the nocks I posted up and always go for one shaped like the one at bottom left.

I hope this helps.

Crispvs

[marcos]

thanks both , you right , I normally search bones in a butcher, and that can be the problem.
Next time I will have in my hands a gladius (I hope soon ) I 'll do as your suggestions .