Weight of arms and armor

[Jona Lendering]

This proves I am not a reenactor: what is the weight of a Roman panoply? (legionary, c.70 AD)

[Hibernicus]

Our kit weights in at 110 lbs, about 50kg

Includes everything: seg, galea, gladius, pugio, 2 pila, scutum/cover, caliga, clothes (wearing), canteen, balteus militare, sarcina (furca, valli, tool(s), basket, net bag or sack with lunch or extra food (bread, apples, sausages), drying udones, extra pair of shoes, loculus containing: 3 days rations, plus some extra dried fruit, extra clothes (bracae, tunica, subligarium, udones, wool cap), mess kit (patera, wood bowl, spoon, horn cup), some personal items, stash of coins and dice, baubles for the ladies, extra hobnails, sew kit, herbal medicine (fights gas), a small wood flute , fire starter, votive figurine, small bag of salt, special food stash: a small jar of honey and one of olive oil, belt knife, small bundle of twine, some extra leather lacings, blanket in an oiled leather ground cloth and paenula.

I'm sure I forgot something..

[A_Volpe]

Hib

You forgot to add in the weight of the Mule

I mean the soldier...

[Jona Lendering]

I'm sure I forgot something..

On the contrary, it is a bit more than I needed... :wink: shield, helmet, armor, spear, pugio, sword, sandals...

[Et tu brute]

I think, though I may be wrong that it's about 30 kg.

[Hibernicus]

A range maybe: 25 to 30 kg

[M. CVRIVS ALEXANDER]

about 45lb or 20kg in my case

[Matthew Amt]

Battle weight about 35 to 40 POUNDS, not kilograms! Twelve to 15 pounds for the lorica, 4 for the helmet, 12 to 15 for the shield, and a few more for pila, sword, belt, pugio, etc.

For the march, a total of 60 to 70 pounds, same as infantry have lugged for thousands of years. Palisade stakes were not a regular part of the marching gear. Is there any evidence for a groundcloth of any sort? Do you need that much extra clothing? (And you have food listed 3 times, Sean--what's with that?) Does every man really need a fire starting kit, dice, and "baubles for the ladies"? How much free time are you going to have after marching and building the camp but before you go to sleep or on guard? Just curious!

Valete,

Matthew

[Et tu brute]

By the way, I meant on the march

[arklore70]

Matt,
now a days the modern load is like 100 pounds. Everything takes batteries and the HMMWV can not go everywhere to lug it around.

v/r
MIke

[Hibernicus]

Just weighed my "battle kit" and it comes in at 55 lbs and that includes water and "lunch".

No evidence for a ground cloth but a waterproof leather wrapper for the blanket keeps the blanket dry on the march and you dry on the ground.

Fire starter? Absolutely. Weighs next to nothing and I usually have tinder as well. What if the guy withe firestarter is dead, transfered away for a day or a week or lost it!

Dice? I don't trust yours or do I? Micarius has dice and knuckle bones. Don't game with him! Ask Flavius!!

Baubles? Of course!! Hair pins go over very well! .. 'cause you never know when you'll get some free time.. I mean its not like we march very day or don't stay in one place for a few days... or that our unit will be stuck with scut duty.. some centuria or contubernia get rewarded with immunes and even if its for an afternoon and if there's a village or town of any size.. well... let's hope they have cerveza too!

We have our "3 days rations" in the loculus, plus I like to carry a small bag on the balteus militare with some lunch and a net bag hanging off the sarcina with what ever fresh food I can buy or acquire. Those locals go crazy for coin or "baubles" in exchange for loaf bread or fruit... and every now and then a small skin of cerveza...

[Jona Lendering]

Wow, the estimates are a lot higher than I had expected! I start wondering what we know about legionaries' skeletons - one would expect deformed shoulders, like the collarbones of Mycenaean warriors.

[Hibernicus]

The weight is nothing. When we fought SCA our kit weighed a bit more. Segs were the same but the galea was closer to 12 lbs. Leg and arm protection weighed 10-12 lbs. But we didn't carry pilum, pugio and rarely a canteen.

The soldier that was found at Herculanium is said to have femurs twice as thick as expected.

A Danish bog body was noted to have been a warrior, longer right arm stockier left... read on:

Some years ago I had the opportunity to go through physical therapy which required x-rays and cat scans that show deformations from years of SCA sport combat.

The Physical therapists also noted the external evidence
- longer right arm
- leaner shoulder muscles on the right
- larger latissimus, detoids, trapezius on the left
- shorter left arm
- larger left bicep
- larger right wrist

My wrists grew in circumference by 1.75 inches

Didn't surprise me.

Imagine what the bones and muscles of professional soldier would have been like!

[Matthew Amt]

Sean, I still think your stuff is too heavy! The weights of surviving original items just don't add up to that much.

Mike, yeah, today's troops carry a lot! Back when armor was giving way to firearms, they made up for less tinware by adding more ammo. But now body armor is back in fashion, and the darn things weigh twice as much as a lorica! That is SO not fair... (Though they DO still get to ride in something at least some of the time!)

Matthew

[Paullus Scipio]

British/Australian experience is similar - used to be 70-80 lbs, but now closer to 100lbs for the P.B.I (poor bloody infantry)

In the Falklands war some impressive loads ( 100-120 lbs or more ! ) were "yomped/tabbed" across the bogs !!........

sorry, a little off-topic, but the "grunt's" load has remained remarkably similar down the centuries......