spike tanged pilum

[Marcus Mummius]

Salvete,

I'm looking for a way to construct affordable and strong pila to do throwing practice. I am a bit reluctant to use my nice Mark Morrow pilum for that.
I want the design to be simple, strong(as it has to be thrown repeatedly without breaking or the wood splitting) and relatively historical accurate (this is secondary as we already have accurate pila).

I read in Peter Connolly's article on Pila in Exercitus that the spike tanged pilum was a lot stronger than the 'trapezium tanged' pilum . As the spike tanged pilum is also easier to construct this may be the best option for our 'practice' pila.

Connolly says they were riveted with only one rivet through the tang. Why would this have been? I would think two rivets trough the shaft would strenghten the construction and reduce forces on the tang against the wood. An iron collar is also needed to avoid the spilitting of the wood.

I can see that the surviving spike tanged pila have a tang a bit like a sword. It tapers down to the end. Would this be necesarry for the pilum to function properly? It would be a lot easier to just use a steel rod, shape one end into a piramidal point and leave the other end as it is (you would'nt be able to see this anyway.

How does the wooden shaft of a spike tanged pilum look? Does it have a piramidal block with a hole in which the tang of the steel pilum shaft is inserted?

Valete,

[Matthew Amt]

Sounds like a description of our "cheapy chuckers". Piece of rod with one end banged and ground into something pointy, other end stuck into a stick (something a little tougher than the average broom handle!). Drill through both parts a few inches down from the top of the wood and put a nail in, then stick a slice of steel pipe or conduit around the top of the wood. Since I get all the materials from trash piles and dumpsters, they don't cost anything. If you actually put a little effort into their appearance, they will look fine from any distance. Sometimes they break, usually the wood splitting in spite of the collar, but they're easy enough to rebuild or replace.

http://www.larp.com/legioxx/RD02b.jpg

The frontmost one in this photo was some sort of tool with a wrapped socket. I just cut off the tool blade, drill a hole, and stuck in the rod for the head. The ones to the left are more typical of what I crank out.

Happy chucking!

Matthew

[Marcus Mummius]

That's what I'm talking about Matt. I bet that indeed from a small distance they look very real. We plan to use ash for them so I think the wood will be strong enough.

Don't you think they would be stronger and more durable if they had two holes and two rivets trough the tang?

I'm still wondering what the wooden shaft of a 'spike tanged pilum looked like. Did it have a piramidal block with a hole or were they just simple wooden rods with a hole drilled in?

Kind regards,

[Neuraleanus]

Connolly says they were riveted with only one rivet through the tang.

I haven't seen the particular article, but could Connolly be refering to the use of wood dowels instead of metal rivets? The intent here is the pila breaks upon impact and cannot hence be throw back.

You can make a flattened tang with a bit of work using a Map gas torch, an anvil, and a heavy hammer. It takes a bit of work, but I did this once. Heat the steel to red hot, hammer, heat again, and hammer some more till you achieve the desired flatness.

[Marcus Mummius]

Connolly says they were riveted with only one rivet through the tang.

I haven't seen the particular article, but could Connolly be refering to the use of wood dowels instead of metal rivets? The intent here is the pila breaks upon impact and cannot hence be throw back.

You can make a flattened tang with a bit of work using a Map gas torch, an anvil, and a heavy hammer. It takes a bit of work, but I did this once. Heat the steel to red hot, hammer, heat again, and hammer some more till you achieve the desired flatness.

No he wasn't refering to the pila with wooden dowels, he mentions those too but in another part of the article. He says a spike tanged pilum with one rivet and an iron collar would be stronger than a flat tanged pilum as there is less sideway force to the wood (there is no slit). The fact that you do not have to flatten the shank makes this type of pilum easier to produce. He states that the spike tanged pilum was the most used pilum during the Principate.

[Matthew Amt]

From what I've seen (and I haven't seen Connolly's newest article), the spike tangs just have one hole. Two is really unnecessary, since the failures we've had are simply the (generally crappy!) wood splitting or breaking. More holes through it would just make that worse, actually.

The impression I got from the late Republican finds is that the spike tang pila would just have straight dowel shafts. But I'd have to see his article and dig through other sources before saying whether some Imperial ones had the junction block like on the flat-tanged style.

Valete,

Matthew

[Crispvs]

Jef,

I think you may be confusing two types of pila which Connolly talks about in the article. The ones with the single rivet going through the spiked tang are a type which he says was common in northern Italy in Marius's time and which Marius may have equipped his troops with. He suggests this on the basis of excavated examples and the idea that Plutarch, when he says that Marius removed one of the rivets from the pilum, may have been mistakenly referring to Marius's possible arming of his troops with pila with only a single rivet rather than the normal two. The wooden dowel in the place of a rivet would simply be a case of Plutarch trying to solve the problem of the single rivet in what he presumed to be a two holed tang. The idea of the pilum head swinging sideways is part of this rationalisation as Plutarch has obviously tried to think af a reason for (as he believed) removing one rivet. Presumably pila of this northern Italian style were not in use in Plutarch's time and the only rivetted pila he was familiar with had two rivets.

The other typee of pilum you are referring to is the longer spike tanged pilum used in the early Imperial period 150 years later. This type had no rivet and was presumably hammered into a hole in the top of the pilum shaft and secured in place by a collet.

Neuraleanus,

There is actually no evidence to suggest that the pilum was intended to break or even to bend. The idea is based on (a) the Plutarch quote referred to above and (b) a reference by Caesar to pila bending after penetrating the shields of two or more shields held by running Nervii Celts. This bending is likely to have been caused by being twisted by the similtaneous movements of several shields. Connolly has demonstrated convincingly that bending could not have beeen a primary design feature of the pilum but rather one which might occasionally happen as a by-product of actual penetration. He has shown that if a pilum will bend it will not penetrate a shield. Therefore it could not have been designed to bend on impact (or break for that matter). After all, would you rather have a weapon which bends or one one which will penetrate your enemy's defences?

Crispvs

[Tarbicus]

After all, would you rather have a weapon which bends or one one which will penetrate your enemy's defences?

And the pila are incredibly difficult to retract from the shield which partially covers the problem of them being thrown back at the legion, assuming the legionaries were good at throwing javelins, which I think we can assume given their training.

[Hibernicus]

We toss nothing but the pila we make...only on rare occasions does the wood split.. if it does we lash it back together.. some sinew tightly wrapped below the wood head is an excellent stengthening techinque. On even rarer occasions does the pyramial point break off. The metal hafts can bend but we always bring a hammer and anvil to the pactice field.

www.rlqm.com