Appearence and tactics of early 5th century Saxons.

[ambrosius]

Hi Robert,

]
Now to be honest, I thought, at the time, that you were
contradicting yourself, rather. But I didn't like to point it out to you,
in case you called me racist, or something :lol: So my question, above,
about customs control of importation of Germanic weapons in the century
before 400 still stands. Unless you wish to revise what you said. :wink:

Mike, it's not even nice to use that word in jest now is it?

Ah, but I'm neither being racist, nor accusing anyone else
of that, only trying to avoid it being levelled against me. But yes, let's
agree not to mention the word again. Probably. Maybe not. 8)

But maybe I was misaten - to answer your previous question about customs - of course traders could sell to Romans who were allowed to carry arms. So soldiers could of course buy weapons from foreign traders - why not? I said the Roman state had a monopoly of arms manufacture, and you of course know that arms exports were forbidden, but that did not means that arms imports were off limits too.

Ah, I see. You meant the military importing weapons, not
civilian merchants. Though I still think it unwise to do that. We had the
Iron for making weapons (more than the Anglo-Saxons) and all the
other resources for Iron-working. Plus it's unwise to depend for weapons
on anyone you may have to go to war against. And don't tell me that
the Anglo-Saxons made any othe those - oh, whatchamacallthem -
plumbatae (I thought they didn't use them) :? Besides, due to being
from an 'Iron-poor' region, wouldn't it make more sense for them to be
buying weapons from us? hock:

Btw, must sign-off, now, before my home-computer cuts-out. The
internet connection tends to get lost unless I put another shilling in
the meter. Speak to you soon. 8)

Cheers,
Ambrosius/Mike