Armor question

[jbd_29349]

First off it has been a while since I have been on here so if this has already been discussed I am sorry any inconvience!

The question I have is that some of the pictures I have seen of hamata is that the doubler is not chain but what looks like leather. Also, on the ancient warfare magazine of Caesar, his armor looks like a Greek linothrax(spelling?). Is the armor a regular hamata with a leather covering or is it just leather?

Thanks!!

[Matt Lukes]

Indeed there are a number of instances of shoulder flaps not looking like they're made of the same thing as what the main armor is- the Adamklissi Meotopes and the grave stela of Sertorius Festus come to mind immediately, but sculptural depictions are dodgy- who's to say the sculptor just decided not to detail those bits? Certainly there are many depictions where the flaps are clearly the same armor- mail or scale. It may be that some non-armor versions of flaps or doublers did exist, but it's surely problematic to demonstrate it.

[Matthew Amt]

Yeah, the Ahenobarbus relief springs to mind--is the doubling mail with a covering, or leather, or fabric? Or is it metal plate?? We don't know! The shape of the Roman hamata and muscled cuirass are certainly derived from the Greek "linothorax" (which probably wasn't actually called that, we're now deciding...), and of course the whole Roman aristocratic panoply was very Hellenistic. We still argue the details and amount of artistic stylization, obviously!

Valete,

Matthew