Valkenburg/Castleford style caliga step by step

[Martin Moser]

They look stylish!

Well, probably the legionaries wanted to make a fashion statement when walking over the babarians ;-) )

How comfortable are they? Don't smaller straps cut more into the skin?

Of course they (would) do, but the foot gets the most of its hold from those broad center pieces (the ones that have the five incisions), so it is not uncomfortable. The straps to the front of it are not bound that tight.

[Neuraleanus]

Here is the modification that I made after the backs had stretched-out:


I've also updated my Caligae page. Larger pictures may be found there:
[url:1urjrqg4]http://www.geocities.com/legio_tricesima_cohors_tres/campusMartis/MakingCaligae/MakingAuthenticCaligae.html[/url]

My thanks to Martin Moser for all of his help.

[Tarbicus]

I've also updated my Caligae page.

Look great, thanks, and your page is very informative.

To complement that Martin's step-by-step has finally been added to the How-To's.

[MARCvSVIBIvSMAvRINvS]

Very informative page! however i am inclined to say the leather you use is in my opinion too thin... compared to my own caligae which have lasted me for 11 years now....... including resoling etcetera...

M.VIB.M.

[Neuraleanus]

i am inclined to say the leather you use is in my opinion too thin

I made the uppers from 5-6oz leather. So far, there has been no tears of the thin straps. I've had friends comment that they thought the leather too thick. What weight leather do you use?

[Martin Moser]

Very informative page! however i am inclined to say the leather you use is in my opinion too thin... compared to my own caligae which have lasted me for 11 years now.......

If you refer to the caligae whose (re)production I documented here, yes, the leather should be thicker, see my post above from 24 May 2006.

What is the leather thickness of your caligae based on?

[Martin Moser]

My thanks to Martin Moser for all of his help.

My pleasure and thanks as well for all your comments throughout!

[Neuraleanus]

If you refer to the caligae whose (re)production I documented here, yes, the leather should be thicker, see my post above from 24 May 2006.

You say 2-3mm, I need to measure what I've used, but what weight is that? Also, I used two layers of 8oz leather glued together to make the outsole. Did you use something else? The insole was made from a single layer of 8oz leather with another layer of 6oz over that. My leather weights are guesses as I have no information as to what the Romans used.

[Martin Moser]

You say 2-3mm, I need to measure what I've used, but what weight is that? Also, I used two layers of 8oz leather glued together to make the outsole. Did you use something else? The insole was made from a single layer of 8oz leather with another layer of 6oz over that. My leather weights are guesses as I have no information as to what the Romans used.

No, actually in the post I referred to I said
>I also used thicker leather as advised by Carol vanDriel-Murray and by my
>own recent observations of an original, about double the thickness of the
>leather I used for the caligae described above, i.e. around 4mm.

meaning that I used too thin leather for my reconstruction documented here. I'll eventually do those again, but then not with the "invented" pattern from Stepping Through Time, but with the original one from Castleford then (a Caligae order and a pair of Calcei will come first, though :-) ) )

According to the table at http://www.buckskinleather.com/ref.htm
around 4mm would be 9 - 11 ounces.
For the outsole I used "Bends" (or Croupon in German leather terminology), tanned and pressed to provide hard sole leather. This comes in a thickness of 4-7 mm (10+ ounces) from the tanner I buy from, the one I used was about 4.5mm in thickness. I am using only single layer outsoles as the finds I know about do not show multilayer outsoles for caligae.
As I said above, for caligae leather weights all I have is my personal observation of one caliga here in Munich and what Carol van Driel-Murray said in personal (email) conversation and both point to about 4mm/10 ounces. I am now writing to Jutta Goepfrich, who published the Mainz leather finds and still works at the German Leather Museum. I'll post here what she has to say about this ....

[Neuraleanus]

That's very thick. It would be very hard to cut-out. I remain to be convinced. Look at the Mainz caliga:

[url:qb9z6jtj]http://www.ledermuseum.de/DLM/vollbild/seiten/03.htm[/url]

The leather of the upper does not look that thick. 6oz maybe.

[Martin Moser]

Hi Neuraleanus,

That's very thick. It would be very hard to cut-out. I remain to be convinced.

The Mainz caliga I did (based on the one you just referred to) and posted a picture of above was done with 3.5-4mm (9-10 ounce) leather. As for cutting, well, you need a sharp knife/cutter, obviously ;-) ) . I treated the leather with neatsfoot oil before cutting (always a good idea, I think) and of course you will have to cut 2-3x to actually get through.

As for convincing you, if you don't trust what c. van Driel-Murray said about leather thickness, hm, well, I guess I can only suggest to wait and see what Jutta Goepfrich will answer to my mail.

I also hope to get in a trip to the German Leather and Shoe Museum this year to see some of the finds first hand (eye, rather :-) ) )....

[Primvs Pavlvs]

Are we applying modern standards again? Are we sure that the Romans had a standard for leather weights, or would they have used what was available to them?

Since leather at that time would have been produced by hand I would think there would be a less chance of a hide being uniform in thickness.

[Neuraleanus]

As for convincing you, if you don't trust what c. van Driel-Murray said about leather thickness, hm, well, I guess I can only suggest to wait and see what Jutta Goepfrich will answer to my mail.

I also hope to get in a trip to the German Leather and Shoe Museum this year to see some of the finds first hand

I'm waiting anxiously to hear what you find out. The thickness of the leather is one of those important, yet rarely published details that we need to know. As I said, I've been guessing. I have friends who are also making their own caligae and they've been using leather thinner than mine. To go even thicker is going to be a shocking change.

[MARCvSVIBIvSMAvRINvS]

need to find them first... will get back to you on the thickness!

M.VIB.M.

[Martin Moser]

Hi,

Are we applying modern standards again?

I don't think so. What I was aiming for, is that if the majority of the finds presents a certain thickness or thickness range, then that (to me at least) would be an indicator that not just any piece of leather was chosen for caligae, but rather that a certain leather thickness was preferred out of contemporary experience in terms of useability and longevity of this piece of equipment.

Of course we are moving on thin ice here, considering how many pairs of caligae must have existed back then and how much has actually survived and been found. But that OTOH is true about pretty much any piece of equipment we have/make reconstructions of, I think :-) )