Spearhead Finds at the Harzhorn

[Spurius Rutabaga]

Does anyone know whether classic pilum heads have been found at the Harzhorn site? I have seen the photos of the leaf-shaped heads but haven't come across any indication of pilum finds. There seems to be an oblique reference (but my German is limited) to a pilum find in one of the Limes forts that was overrun in 260.

[Simplex]

Hi Eric
...rest asured: Goggle is your friend, too. :wink:
Just in case : .... not .... :whistle:
...ta daaah .... da pics:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:H...d_Pila.jpg
That should be both of which they talk about. IIRC ,Dr. Geschwinde's lecture at Frankfurt last October still referred to only two. If we should attribute all the spearheads to germanic tribesman,
or some may be referred to as hasta , well .... who knows.
Right now I haven't found /or can't remember any dating reference to other "contemporary" places ( like late Rainau/Buch, Künzing or even Niederbieber)

Greez

Simplex

[Spurius Rutabaga]

Hi Siggi,

This is great! Google is not always your friend unless you know what search terms to use in other languages - and Google Translate can be misleading. Once I had your note I searched Harzhorn Fund in Wikipedia and came up with several other bits I hadn't known existed like the cavalry helmet peak (!). There is stuff there that doesn't seem to be on the actual http://www.roemerschlachtamharzhorn.de site.

The Google Translate version of one of the site pages mentions two pilum heads, but the translation makes it sound like they were found at Eining.

I can't guess about the leaf-shaped heads. I suppose it would depend on which way they were pointing ! But the sources keep talking about Mauretanian javelineers so they may have somethjing to do with them, or perhaps they were lanceae, or cavalry spears...but ok, Maximinus' legions still used pila, which is what we wanted to know.

Thank you!!

Eric

[M. Demetrius]

Many moons ago, I read about the leaf-shaped pila, which were reported in that article to be anti-elephant pila, while the more familiar pyramid shaped ones were anti-personnel. The reasoning they used was the that leaf shape would cause more bleeding, but still penetrate the animal's flesh. It sounds plausible, but of course, that doesn't make it true.

I would take just a few minutes to turn a pyramid shaped pilum into a leaf or "arrowhead" shaped point.

It would take considerably longer to revert. Easier just to cut the tip off and make a new pyramid a little further up the shaft.

[Spurius Rutabaga]

Mostly I doubt the Germans had elephants at the time, but I still am skeptical about the theory, elephants are why we have scorpions. I guess the leaf-heads could have belonged to either side, but the thing in Herodian about Mauretanian javelineers is why I brought up the whole thing, it implies specialist troops, and why have specialist javelineers if your heavy infantry still use pila? I think it must have been a bigger than usual contingent of skirmishers.

[Spurius Rutabaga]

Your private msg went missing on me, could you repeat that exhibit link please? Also the thread on this forum? Apologies for being scatterbrained.

Also, what's your estimate on force strength? I saw '10,000' somewhere in the on-line stuff. I would guess not much more as they have to have been living off the land plus march rations, Herodian is a dead giveaway on that. I bet not more than 15,000, but a detachment from IV means they pulled it together from all over.

Best,

Eric