Lorica Squamata closing method

[alekaras5811]

Doc,
Thanks for your comments. You have given me a lot to think about. Some that I can fix some that I cannot but valuable all the same. I think the comment about the color makes a lot of sense and fortunately Suhel told in an email that it's brown. Hopefully I will be able to fix that. I have not received the shirt yet but in the pictures the buckles do look a bit big. Fortunately, there are a lot of vendors that sell more accurate ones. Hopefully I can replace those as well. As for the rest I will wait and see it up close, I was told it was shipped yesterday, so I can't wait to see it up close.

[Doc]

You are welcome.....

That is what we are here for or should be doing which is to give suggestions based on what we know and help out if possible.

[Aryan Steels]

Hi,

Just to confirm that the leather we used is dark brown and not black.

Thanks for valuable advice on buckles. In future only small period buckles will be used if we make this type of squamata in future.

Suhel

[richsc]

Being too lazy to get up and walk over to my book shelf and try to find a real answer, I was going to flippantly answer "duct tape". And then recalled all those statues with belts tied around their musculata, and pondered whether those were actually functioning as the same thing. Consider that over time in real usage, the actual fasterners keeps breaking. What does the wearer do? Or rather the wearer's slave do? Run back and find an appropriately colored cloth to tie the damn thing together with. Voila, a military fashion is born, and now everyone has to have a colored sash. "By the gods, if Pompey can have one, I need one too. And a murex dyed belt is a lot cheaper than an entire cloak".

[Alexand96]

Doc,
You said we have no complete sets of Roman Squamata - is the provenance of this find disputed? According to the information I have, it was found near Lake Trasimene in the 30s. However, in response to the OP, don't know how helpful a reference this would be for closing method.

[Flavivs Aetivs]

I think a complete set was found at Trier (although I don't know), and I know a Shoulder section was found at Carlisle (or was it Caervarnon?) which shows the Romans used that circular construction on the shoulders. Some were found at Kunzig as well, and scale was also recently found at Caparcotna where my Legion was stationed.

[alekaras5811]

Aetious,
Thank you for the information provided and I appriciate your coments . It will give me some reference material to keep looking for more reference material, in an effort to make some changes on my squamata shirt. While I understand that the roman empire was huge and manufacturing methods would have variations, I would prefer to have my gear as authentic as I can get them.

[richard robinson]

Alexander the photo of the scale shirt you have shown is said to be a fake which < I know, is heartbreaking.

regards
Richard

[Flavivs Aetivs]

There is also of course the recent post in the Leon Segmentata Thread which has a PDF discussing bits of 3rd and 4th century Scale Armor that was found there.

[Alexand96]

Alexander the photo of the scale shirt you have shown is said to be a fake which < I know, is heartbreaking.

regards
Richard

Really it is. Anytime I see something either really interesting or really well preserved from antiquity, my first inclination these days is to write it off as a fake (unless recovered by archaeological means, of course) with the hope that I'll be pleasantly surprised later. It really is so difficult to verify for so many pieces with the once and always booming market for antiquities. Also the torpid pace of the publication of archaeological finds, now that I think of it

At least I'm glad to hear from MMFA that there are other squamata that have been properly discovered out there. I've always had a soft spot for this type of armor.

[Doc]

Well Alexander, now you know why I said we do not have a complete squamata.

Evan, from the 1st C AD......which it appears the armor in question is going to be used for, there are only fragments. I personally do not know of any complete shirt.

There are two complete scale shirts or nearly complete but those are the famous hybrid scale/mail.

With respect to that rounded collar, AFAIK, I do not think you can conclusively state that it belonged to a squamata in the manner in which the typical reconstruction shows. Everyone has gone overboard with this piece and from dozens of pictures that I have seen of re-enactors.....EVERYONE has the same scale shirt with that collar. It could have been a bishop type mantle and not integral. It just makes no sense to me that the scales would run vertical and all of a sudden stop and this circular thing just attached. I think that circular collar was a separate piece that went over the shoulders like your typical doubler.

Besides, there are many depictions showing scale armor and although care must be taken when looking at sculpture, the same is true with actual pieces.

[Flavivs Aetivs]

Didn't Dura Europos yield a nearly complete set of scale and coif as well as longs sleeves and I think chausses too?

[Doc]

Does this armor at Dura tell us, other than the backing material and the scale shapes and sizes, the EXACT overall appearance of a squamata and arrangement of the scales? Again, it should be noted that the time period should be taken into consideration.

[markusaurelius]

Dura has the complete horse scale example. However it is not clear if you can make any direct parallels to scale worn by people. The Carpow example of scale is so small it is unclear i think where it came from (neck or otherwise). Interestingly enough both examples from Dura and Carpow have the same identical bordering stitches, even though the two examples are separated by a century and thousands of kilometres.

[Flavivs Aetivs]

The 3rd century was the beginning of the centralization of arms factories, so they could have come from the same supplier.