Maryport Roman Festival, Senhouse Museum. 24/25 July

[John Conyard]

Thank you for the kind comments, and especially to Brian for making the excellent chamfrons. Mark ties his on around his horse’s lower jaw using the rings provided, but it moves too much for my taste. I made a halter, which the bridle fits over, and the chamfron is tied to the halter. So far this is a very secure system. We have others and I may get a chance to fit them during August.

Our horses and riders vary from weekend to weekend. Each rider has their own challenges and battles to fight during the 30 minute display. The show starts slowly, has a couple of clever bits and then moves to a fairly rapid routine desensitising the horses to targets and infantry before a big finish of some sort. The stunt legionaries have to work with the horses, clear the arena, manage the sound system and not get damaged. It is a big team effort.

In the photo above, left to right we have:

Nobby is riding Star, around 14.1, a mare who is brave, but still learning. She can do it all in the sand school, but needs public shows now. Mobile horse archery is still away off.

Stuart is riding Rocco a lovely 14.1 four year old gelding. This horse is one for the future. Currently he is getting used the shield and using some missile weapons. Stuart is only beginning to carry stuff on him, doing some sort of Moorish cavalry impression.

Amy is riding my old warhorse Murphy, a gelded Irish cob. Lazy and grumpy, I was worried about the horse but Amy has really got him moving and he is feeling proud once again. I suspect she will be riding him for a while and the combination can do all the show very well.

Catherine is on a mentally challenged ex race horse called Sweet Ears. A gelding, he occasionally bucks for now reason. She has to keep him calm and focused. At over 15 hands for us he represents a tall narrow Hunnic horse disliked by Roman writers. Good at doing everything in the show.

Mark carrying the draco is riding his own Argentinean polo pony called Picador. After three years Picador is now the perfect display horse, but still needs to be balanced before each run and Mark spends much of his life polishing horse armour. This season Mark has occasionally had a go at archery on the move. Scary!

Since last October I have been training Hal, a 14 hand stallion. He looks great, can jump and is really fast, but is very very nervous. I suspected he would take three years to come good, now I think he will do it sooner. He can do mobile horse archery, but also has to cope with me commentating. It is hard to multi task but good that the public are brought into the show, understand what we are doing, and that the show can be made to fit each audience.

We also have reserve horses, and a nice little four year old who should be good for next season. But you can never tell with horses.

At Maryport I was pleased that each rider and horse could take something positive from the weekend. Everybody improved and the shows were the best so far this season. The riders need to concentrate on their riding, the overall show and what is coming next, and their weapon skills. It is a very intense 30 minutes.

[John Conyard]

Graham - I will expect you wearing a leather bikini and face paint at the next show.

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Thats what I thought....

[Robert Vermaat]

Thanks for tthe introductions John!

Graham - I will expect you wearing a leather bikini and face paint at the next show.

And call him Gwen when you see her. :twisted:

[PhilusEstilius]

John.

I will have to do a drawing of the browband strap that was used by the Roman riders, it's an interesting little piece of leather and it took me a while to rumble just how it functioned with those chamfrons.

In fact it took me a long time to work it out and the top end of those chamfrons show just how it worked, I studied the hole arrangement on those for a long while then one evening the penny dropped when I remembered having made both the Vindolanda and the Trimontium leather ones.

It was a revelation to find that this kind of fixing was also on those ones as well, which shows that this tried and tested method lasted from the 1st century right on through to the 4th century to fix chamfrons to a bridle.

Indeed what might be even better is if you PM me an address I shall make a couple of these staps and send them to you to show the method of just how they are used.

[Graham Sumner]

Graham - I will expect you wearing a leather bikini and face paint at the next show.

Spoken in a low gruff Saxon voice..."Conyard, wherever I go on this wretched island, I hear your name. Always half whispered, as if you were..... a god. All I see is flesh and blood. No more god than the creature you're sitting on".

Graham.

[Robert Vermaat]

Graham wanted me to add two more:

[John Conyard]

I am taking a few days out to chill out in Elgar country on lots of beer, but had to respond to this! The chamfrons are really beautiful work. Brian I would love to see your arrangement. My major concerns is that the chamfron does not go any where near the horse's eyes, that it does not bounce up and down too much, and that it does not pull off the bridle. The horse tries to rub off the chamfron and if he succeeds I'm in trouble without the bridle.

The photos Hal in the halter, with the bridle over it and the chamfron tied to the halter.

Graham, my horse is god-like. I am fat and lazy living off beer and too little sleep!

[PhilusEstilius]

The arrangement of the straps I refer to is such that they have to be made to a length where the chamfron fits the browband and puts the eyeguards exactly in position for a particular horse.

In fact I would think that riders who took part in the Hippica Gymnasia had another extra bridal with the chamfron fitted permanent to it where the positioning had been sorted out previous, it is these straps that determine the eye position for the horse being used.
When I first made these chamfrons I fitted a long strap that acts similar to a pole strap, however I was very wrong this is not the way the Romans did it.

[John Conyard]

Cheers Brian. I look forward to seing your arrangement.

Currently I use your initial strap to go across the poll just to hold the chamfron on roughly in the right position, before fixing it to the halter that I made for it. There are fixing points on the halter that correspond to the attachment points on the chamfron. You can hopefully see this arrangement on Graham's photos.

The initial strap you made to go across the poll is of soft leather which is very kind to the horse. But after the chamfron is fixed to the halter the strap across the poll does nothing really.

I leave the halter on at shows. The bridle goes over the halter, helping hold it in place, and the chamfron is attached to the halter. So far so good. Hal is a very nervous horse but can cope with this. But it covers up his good looks.

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[Gaius Julius Caesar]

He's not a vain horse though....I'm sure he thinks he looks pretty cool in the chamfron.

[John Conyard]

The best of the photos can be found here:

http://www.comitatus.net/gallerymaryport10.html