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Gambesons in roman times?
#16
(04-30-2019, 01:13 PM)Dan Howard Wrote:
Quote:I'm just observing that in no way is what he's wearing described to be quilted. Once again, it is tied tightly, taking the role of the quilting. I am confident you'd be able to wear 27 thin tunics if you tied them

The verb doesn't simply mean "tied". It can also mean "laced" or "stitched" or "quilted". You can't rely on translations for this kind of research.

If that is the case, that changes things.
"No, vikings didn't wear any goddamn gambesons" - Me, explaining the same thing for the hundredth time

- Ali Zufer
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#17
Quote:Scale armour did not form vertical columns like that.

[Image: ET-Todi.jpg]

Scale armour aligned vertically, with distinctive lines separating the rows, and pteruges.


Quote:If they were painting scales onto it anyway, why first go to the trouble of carving those vertical bands into the stone?

There is no way to know because we don't have any of these things with the painted detail.


Quote:The relief with the two armoured legionaries shows the lefthand man wearing what is surely mail (incised 'dots'). The righthand soldier is wearing something different - what else would create diagonal bands like that?

No idea. These things aren't photos. The artist may simply have wanted to show two different styles of mail. The only sensible thing to say is that the artist is likely depicting some kind of armour. To say anything more without corroborating evidence is irresponsible.

There is no extant example of textile armour anywhere in the world with diamond-pattern stitching and no textile armour with anything that resembles those dots. Why on Earth would you think it was textile armour?
Author: Bronze Age Military Equipment, Pen & Sword Books
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#18
(04-30-2019, 01:13 PM)Dan Howard Wrote:
Quote:The diamond-patterned cuirass on the Spilt sarcophagus shows a 'dot' at the centre of each diamond. The sculptor is obviously able to represent all sorts of patterns and textures - if he wanted to show scales or mail he would have done so.
The dots in the middle make it even LESS likely that it is quilted textiles. Mail is most likely interpretation because it is the only one for which we have a precedent.

Whatever it is, it isn't mail. It may be a true representation of quilted armour, for which we have no surviving examples with which to compare it, or it may be what the sculptor thought quilted armour looked like, without having seen it, in the same way in which the cataphracts on Trajan's Column are an over-literal interpretation of cavalry described as having horse and rider 'covered' with scale armour.

   
Michael King Macdona

And do as adversaries do in law, -
Strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends.
(The Taming of the Shrew: Act 1, Scene 2)
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#19
(04-30-2019, 11:16 PM)Dan Howard Wrote: Scale armour aligned vertically... The artist may simply have wanted to show two different styles of mail.

I must say I am not seeing that - those look like horizontal bands to me... One of those eye-of-the-beholder things I suppose!

And I can't imagine what 'different style of mail' could possibly look like that either...


(04-30-2019, 11:16 PM)Dan Howard Wrote: To say anything more without corroborating evidence is irresponsible.

That seems unnecessarily legalistic [Image: wink.png]

Some kind of armour is certainly what we're looking at, and I don't think it's at all wrong to speculate within certain boundaries. But we are clearly looking at these things quite differently, and holding them to quite different standards of evidence, so it does not seem fruitful to continue debating the issue.


(05-01-2019, 09:51 AM)Renatus Wrote: it may be what the sculptor thought quilted armour looked like

Possibly so. I notice he was quite capable of depicting scale armour (on the two figures to the left of this one) in an exaggerated way, and various civilian garments too, so I don't think we can assume a sudden bout of incompetence here. He knew what he was depicting (or thought he did), and we do not - whether his idea of what it looked like is at all close to what it actually looked like lies in the realm of the unknown...!
Nathan Ross
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