Mainz Gladius Waist

[Binoy Fernandez]

Gaius:

I agree, there never will be two swords from that period that are identical in every measurement. Even today, when hand forging a sword, I think it would be unfair to complain if the smith was off by a little as long as that mismeasurement does not adversely affect the final product. As an intellectual exercise, though, I believe it is completely fair to challenge these kind of details. Things like: was there an angle when the blade turned to the point or was it a smooth curve like how gladii are designed today; or whether there is too much waisting going on. Either way, I think the general shape is right, i.e. the form of the gladius, which is what, like you said, Albion is going for.

[Matt Lukes]

Okay, that makes sense. The Strassburg looked like it was way too long coming through at 4 pages. The state that sword is in remarkably good shape, it looks like, given its age. Actually, I'm not sure of its age, but I'm guess around 1800 years or so? I'm using too general a search in google, I think, in trying to get information on it. So I'll have to do some more research into the measurements before going to fedex kinkos with my flash drive and having them print it out on one page for me.

I believe the Strassburg is dated to the first half of the first century CE, so aged around 1950 or 1960 years? Yeah, it's remarkably well-preserved for sure, but then it's all about the conditions of the deposit- if it's anaerobic mud, for example, the iron won't degrade- just look at the Bank of England segmentata breastplate, for example- it's perfect.

And you don't need to go to Kinko's- when you click on the print button in the initial Print window, you should- at least I do (using XP)- get the Print Setup window, and the lower panel on the left is 'Size'- just select 'Specific Size' from the dropdown menu and enter the length plus a large width to be sure the entire length is what prints. The blade is 535mm or 21.06" long. Make sure you crop the image right to the ends of the blade for this to work properly. And since it's larger than the paper, you have to print it in three sections- the Print Setup window has a section for that at the upper right ('Position'), and you just have to print three times using the upper, middle and lower center positions then tape the pages together...

I feel like I'm getting too critical in looking at modern interpretations of this gladius. I'm trying to figure out what it is about the blade design that makes, say, a Mark Morrow blade so good and the MRL or KC gladius as ones to avoid as accurate representations. To do that I'm trying to go to the sources where you can't say "this isn't an accurate gladius" because, well, it is an authentic gladius. So I figure if I can get the size right with those pictures I can get, not just a high quality picture, but good estimates of dimensions as well - after smoothing the edges.

That's not really what I was saying- you can't look at modern pieces for information because virtually all are pretty flawed in one way or another- but if you want a reconstruction, you can't really be overcritical or you lose out on the entire point of having one- to see what the real thing was like; 'versions' aren't so good for that because they miss important details like thickness- nobody I know of makes Mainz blades thick enough and this makes a HUGE difference because it so drastically affects weight and weight for such a short sword is a major factor. Plus if you're paying for a reconstruction, you should get a real shape- not just somebody's idea of what it would look like because who knows what they consider important or not- generic isn't really very good. If you have an Albion sword, you don't have a Roman sword- it's just an Albion. And that's not even getting into the machine-perfect faces and perfectly symmetrical edges, etc. that are just plan modern...

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

No..but you have the "Perfect" Roman sword! :wink: :lol: