Hobnails from Augsburg

[Martin Moser]

Hi all,

2 pics I took in the Museum in Augsburg when we went there during the RAT conference. That room was about the early 1st cent. AD so I suppose that these are from about the same time as well (the desription wasn't exactly what you'd call exhaustive ;-) ) )
Head diameter is 8-10 mms (estimated)

[Primvs Pavlvs]

Does anyone have any idea how hobnails were made during Roman times? There has to be a better way then forging each nail.

[Martin Moser]

I dno't think anybody knows, but I'm sure that tools to give the head its shape would have been used. I searched the net once for nailsmiths and found more than one place saying that a good nailsmith 19th/20th century was able to produce 1000 hobnails upwards by hand. Wouldn't doubt that Roman smiths were just as efficient.

[M.H. White]

I know little to nothing about metalworking, but I've seen Roman casts for coins in the National Museum in Rome, perhaps hobnails were cast into a mold? Probably not, but I know even less about the making of nails than the making of weapons!

[Primvs Pavlvs]

Marshal, I do not believe the Romans had the ability to cast steel like this, but I could be wrong.

Martin, Do you have a timeframe on that figure? Just how long does it take to make 1000 nails?

[Emeraldweapon7d]

just my thoughts here. the conical shape was probably done with a form driven over the head like i do when making dome headed rivets. if i had to try making one i'd maybe upset the end of a bar and draw it out to where i wanted the shank then dump it into a nail header and rough out the cone and then use the cone form to finnish it off.
Do the little "dots" on the underside have any purpose? perhaps if a conical form was used it was struck and rotated and struck again and the dots were in the below header to keep the nail from moving about when forming the cone? sorry for the rambleings feel free to add to it or smash it.

[Martin Moser]

Martin, Do you have a timeframe on that figure? Just how long does it take to make 1000 nails?

Ah, sorry, meant to say "per day". I looked up the site I was refering to again ( http://www.leuninger-herbert.de/nagel/nagel1.html ) and it says that average production rate was 1200-1500 nails/day (early 20th century). Average number of hammer strokes was 24 for a nail, so that makes about 30000 hammer strokes/day hock:

See http://www.leuninger-herbert.de/nagel/nagelh.html for (not too good, unfortunately) pics of the stages of hobnail making.

[Martin Moser]

Do the little "dots" on the underside have any purpose? perhaps if a conical form was used it was struck and rotated and struck again and the dots were in the below header to keep the nail from moving about when forming the cone?

Could well be, or they were meant to secure the head against turning and working loose when in the sole. But given what they look like I would also tend to think that those were related to the production process.

[Thersites]

Do any of you have data on the EARLIEST recorded evidence of hobnails in Roman Republican context?

Would be most grateful

Cheers