Ok, so, here is the challenge:

sub-roman persona living in the forests of Briton, probably around the Kingdom of Gwent (based on a 500CE map).

Not purely anglo-saxon, but mix is ok, possibly cornish or native briton blood. Not christian, so a bit of a rebel.

Question is: what armour am I wearing? What garb do I have access to (long tunics, pants, or kilts?)? Weapons?

If I were growing up there I assume I'd be well versed with a bow, probably long bow. And I think anyone trained in horsemanship would be using some sort of long sword.

Is the silk road influential enough to pull in items from Syria/Sarmatian/Alans?

Basically, I have a bunch of sketchy research and my brain hurts.

Thanks for any help.

Well, if you're living in the forests, you're either poor or an outlaw or something, because otherwise, there'd be no reason to live in the forests. Important people live near other places, and people who live in forests and the like usually don't have access to a lot of resources.

So, you probably don't have armour or good weapons, unless there's another reason that you'd have them, and if there's another reason that you have them, then there's probably a weird reason for you to be hanging out in the woods. Fantasy-style rangers armed and armoured to the teeth with the best stuff don't happen in real life. As far as what armour would have been used then, the answer is real simple: maille. End of story. Swords would be some variation or descendant of the Roman spatha, so medium length blue. Spear and bow are likely, as is a long knife, possibly an axe.

DO NOT WEAR A KILT. The kilt was not invented until the early modern period, and you're way, way too far south for one anyway. Clothing would probably be a long tunic, pants and a cloak. All in linen or wool, probably wool for most of it. Leather shoes. I don't know what pattern of tunic you'd be wearing, maybe Roman styles maybe early forms of Medieval styles. We've been talking about that a few other places as well, you might want to check this thread from the Dag boards where someone was asking about just the same period:

http://www.dagorhir.com/forums/index.php?topic=12714.0

At this point the early medieval regional identities of Britain have not really started to coalesce yet. There's probably a fair amount of Roman infrastructure still in place, the Germanic migrants have not really formed any unified identity yet, and I don't know what the common people would have thought of themselves as, although most would probably be speaking Breton not Latin or Old English.

You have to realize that all of the invasions into Britain really did very little to change the genetic ancestry of most of the common people. The main people of Britain and Ireland aren't primarily descended from Celts or Saxons or Normans or Vikings--most of their genetic ancestry goes back to the original recolonization of the islands in the mesolithic between 10 and 12 thousand years ago.

At some point due to factors that no one really understands but was NOT due to population replacement, the people who lived there all became what we today call Celts, and then they were conquered by the Romans, and then Rome fell apart and they became some weird mix of Celts and Romans and then they became Saxons, but it's cultural change not mass population change and migration. It's really all quite complicated, but suffice to say that there's no real reason that someone from around Gwent should be a Saxon at all. You'd be a Briton, or maybe you'd think of yourself as a Roman, but there's really no reason to be a Saxon

I knew you'd be the first to post;) Just read your post in the Dag board. Lots of info, very cool.


So if we're aiming late late sub-roman, which I think it ends around c.710, is there still a solid roman aspect to the culture?

I was reading the history of Robin Hood and found that there we're (apparently) stories of a character similiar to him going back as far as the 8-900s and that he was outlawed and more or less stole his goods from travelers. Sounded sort of like an evil robin hood, I can scan the book if you want. One was Herewald I think it.

So during sub roman there is britons and the native irish(celts). What about all the invading anglo-saxons, where did they settle if not the rural lower-class peoples' lands?

The general idea so far was that my persona was the son of a land-tender, possibly a forester or a late sub-roman equivilant tending property for a lord. mother is a celtic woman from medieval ireland(what was it called?), father is a briton. when I am about 16 something occurs to disrupt this, anglo-saxon invasion/roman reclaiming/ruling lord overthrown and my mother is killed, father taken, siblings scattered/killed. I manage to escape with a menial amount of gear, bow/father's sword/some food/clothes and start wandering. End up spending most of my time avoiding people and develop a dislike for the group that dislocated my family. Meet others in similiar position and began harrying road traffic for goods/armour/supplies. Eventually start traveling some, possibly even to the mainland aboard a trading vessel. I would be trained to hunt by my father, small combat training and the rest would be learned from others on the road or observation. etc etc etc.

Not sure if that pans out. And there is the silk road question too...

Also, having trouble dating the end of the use of lamellar type armour. You left it fairly open over there at the Dag board.

PS - I finally got into a position to try making a torc. Worked fairly well though I need to widen the circumfrance a tad. If you're still interested I can do another me thinks.

Sorry, but your information is way off, and I really don't have time to tell you much. Try reading wiki for basic info.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sub-Roman_Britain

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_antiquity

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_medieval

In 710, there's nothing left of Rome but slowly crumbling marble (that by 710 is often pretty intact still) and a sense of wonder that men could once build such things. Even the Byzantines had abandoned any attempt at restoring the Western Empire centuries earlier, and had turned their eyes to the east to face much more pressing issues on their own borders.

Herewald is a very Anglo-Saxony name.

The Anglo-Saxons who came mostly originally settled in unoccupied land that they were granted along the coast in the 5th century. Relatively small numbers of people actually migrated, and at some point, the rest of the country started speaking Old English and giving their kids Saxon names. It wasn't about the population being replaced en masse, although of course specific families could certainly get messed up, and in 700ish Gwent borders on Mercia and Wessex, and border raiding would certainly be a fact of life. Another fact of life is that familiar living in contested border lands often have a bad time of it.

Lamellar is not your thing for this period. Too early or too late, although there isn't good evidence for lamellar in Britain to either side, but DEFINATELY no evidence for it in the 8th century.

Are we talking about under water Romans here, or what?
Sub-romans, HA.
Just for the record, people have worn kilts for ever, they only started with the PLAID kilts in Scotland in the 1400's. Very early "kilts" were out there though. The first easy example is Egypt. It's basic human nature to want to wrap up your junk so it doesn't get scratched up when you sit on a rock. Wraping a peice of cloth around your waist and belting it on is the easiest way to do this.
FB

Sub-roman is a term, I believe, that originally related to the pottery? I don't remember but it related to archaelogical finds somehow and people started using it (probably improperly) for the time reference in general.



And yeah, I'm sorry, I was getting some numbers mixed, I think that 710 comes from Anglo-Saxon immigration. I've been reading a lot lately and can't remember where that came from. I am going to draw out a timeline.

And the name was Hereward the Wake.

I'll work on what you've given me and post more questions later. Thanks Oisin.

So you don't mean dudes from Atlantis?
Oh, wait, they are sub-greeks.
FB

Hah, no, I'd rather avoid fish-people garb, though finding atlantis and all the bodies might help solve some garb questions.

Also, any thoughts on this sword

I know it's listed as a 2nd century sarmatian sword, but do you have any more to say about it, as well as in relation to our target time frame, 550-700?

A couple of historical notes:

Sub-Roman Britain is a term used to describe Britain after Roman rule in the 5th century until its conquest by the Anglo-Saxons. I believe that the term comes from pottery (it was Roman in design but not as high quality, IIRC).

Hereward the Wake was an Anglo-Saxon noble who led resistance to the Normans in the late 11th century.

Nevertheless, the idea of a Post-Roman (I like this term better than sub-Roman) outlaw hanging out in the forests fighting against the Saxon invaders, or just anyone with money, seems quite plausible.

Didn't I just say the pottery thing;)

That's sort of what I figured. I was originally going to go with a later period forester working for a lord tending their forest lands, but after doing a lot of research on yeoman(much later period) and rangers/foresters and such I stumbled across some accounts of sub-roman commoners living outside of standard society and it piqued my interest.

So I think I am going to go with that, though the details are undecided for now. Mostly trying to nail down garb and weapons and armour so I can get the aesthetics down before we have our next mounted archery demonstration. Not that I am gearing this towards the demos, I'd just like to ahve garb I didn't make when I was 16;)

Pretty much what's been said . . . Sub-Roman is just the term that gets used, especially in archaeology, to refer to the period of Roman decline in Britain, about the 5th and 6th centuries, roughly. Probably does come from pottery, but I'm not entirely sure.

I'm not sure where 710 comes from, I don't think anything particularly interesting happened in Britain in that year, but I'm not sure.

I don't know about that sword. It's certainly not appropriate for Sub-Roman Britain. Maybe a few centuries earlier, but swords don't stay in use for hundreds of years. You'd have sharpened and resharpened the blade to nothing long before, for one thing.

For 5th century, a Roman-type spatha would probably still be fine. 6th, 7th or 8th century, you'd be looking at more Germanic-looking Migration Era swords. You can look at swords from the same period from France and Germany and Scandanavia, there's a lot of parallels in local traditions, as well as international trade of mostly blades, but some finished swords as well.

This is a reconstruction of the sword from Mound 1 at Sutton-Hoo, the burial of which is dated to around 625 AD:



And the actual artifact:



Blade probably Frankish or West German, hilt probably of local manufacture.

Here's a link to a somewhat more modestly decorated sword of much the same style, or at least, a reproduction of one:

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_sA0GMJLjzis/Ra1EE ... Grip+c.JPG

Link because of large picture size.

Broken link.

Side question about artifacts: I've read some papers on the subject that basically suggested that due to the types of iron and steel being used, blades dont preserve well from the 3rd-9th century(I think that was the span mentioned) and that because of this the artifacts found represent a fairly limited array of examples for aesthetics, although not necessarily for the blade shapes; more for the handles, fixtures, etc. In your opinion, is this a viable perspective? Could a spatha style sword have been made with a pommel like the one on that sword I posted(Sarmatian supposedly) in a later period and there just isn't evidence, or is there actually enough cultural proof that they never occured?

I took medieval war and literature back at the UofO with Professor regina Psaki and she did a section on the validity of our impressions of medieval minds. She had a huge amount of different professional backup and even some proof that suggested that the medieval mind was not as simple as we assume. We see a sword in a tomb, Sutton Hu for example, and we say "this is an example of swords of the time" and we find a few more of similiar trends. But who's to say that other styles weren't made? Who's to say that medieval bladesmiths didn't look at previous eras of bladesmithing as referential material? Of course they couldn't have had photos, but they could have descriptions, sketches, and artifacts. Thoughts anyone?

Google
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I'm not familiar with any theory that blades preserve especially badly during that time period, but it could well be out there. Do you have links or citations I could look up? Iron doesn't tend to preserve well in Britain from any period, although of course some artifacts have been found very well preserved, it really depends on the situational vagaries of decoompositional fate.

As far as proof that something never happened, that's an impossible notion. We can almost never prove that people never did something, we can only interpret what evidence there is to talk about what people probably did and didn't do.

Before I go on, define what you mean by later . . . because, obviously, later people ARE making swords like that, due to the fact that you are looking at purchasing one. We're later people. Do you mean in the 5th century? Do you mean in the 8th century? Because a lot of things change very dramatically during the time you're talking about with a very broad brush.

I dunno about you, but I don't assume the medieval mind was simple. We can fairly certainly say that they had access to less information than we do, but their minds were no more simple than ours. A blacksmith would be extremely unlikely to have a large amount of information about the way swords were made centuries before, the way we do. And while there are examples of swords being decorated in anachronistic fashions to attempt to look like previous generations' swords, the fine details of construction are impossible to replicate.

To go a little bit off on a tangent for comparison, take a look at the below statue:



This statue is the absolute epitome of 5th century BC high Classical period Greek sculptural styles . . . but it was clearly made in the Hellenistic period after Alexander, probably in the 1st century BC. It's a perfect example of craftsmen looking back and trying to produce art that looks like the art their ancestors made, but it's also a perfect example of the fact that outside of the cultural and technological climate of the original period, it's almost impossible to perfectly duplicate the way your forefathers did everything.

In this case, the sculptors of the Hellenistic period had technique and capabilities that far exceeded the knowledge of their Classical forebears, and it shows. The bodies are executed with a precision of form that was still being developed in the 400's, but was taught to every student in later centuries.

So, even a skilled Saxon blacksmith who might know what a Roman spatha looked like would still make one differently than a Roman smith, because they were different people. The handle and scabbard might look the same, but the blade form and geometry would be different. There's just no way to avoid it.

Here's more swords then, all migration era styles, some based off specific finds:

http://www.paul-binns-swords.co.uk/Imag ... 8_hilt.jpg

http://www.kultofathena.com/images%5CDT2070_l.jpg

http://www.armart.antiquanova.com/image ... d_hilt.jpg

And here's a link you might find interesting about ring swords:

http://www.armart.antiquanova.com/Roman.htm

I haven't followed up on any of that, but this might indicate that the ringpommel tradition lasted a bit longer? I dunno, it's not something I know much about specifically, but even if the basic idea of a ringed pommel holds out, I still stand by my statement that the way things are made changes over time in real, discernible ways (or, sometimes, things don't change for a long period, but we can see that as well when it happens . . . usually . . . archaeology is not a perfect science). So, your 3rd century sword would not still be being made in 7th century Britain, even if some of its features did carry over.

In any case, you'd need to follow up to see if those ring pommel swords are speculative or based on actual finds.

Excellent points and information, I will do some ring-pommel investigation.

I'll check my class notes if I can find them for that "swords degrade quickly" reference, I might email Prof Psaki if I can't find it though, she would know.

For that sword, I was thinking later as in 500-800, but more specifically, because I figured the blades would be more or less uniform to their current maker's time (ie a 5th century briton makes 5th century briton blades), but the pommels, crossguards, handles, etc, all the fixtures; how do we know that the fairly narrow style of sword fixtures that are labeled as a specific era, sub-roman or sutton hu for example, are the only ways they did pommels? Like this for example:


found this by typing "celtic sword" into google to make a sort of point. The term "celtic sword" (in all its ridiculously vague lack of specificity) brings that guard handle pommel combo up more or less for 95% of the hits. As well as this one:


and this one you posted


When you ask anyone who even thinks they know celtic style swords they would show you those three and maybe some very slight variations on a theme.
At the same time, show anyone a slightly different version of that sword's fixtures that you plan to make and they will tell you it is completely wrong. You're making the blade the same, but the fixtures are stylized a little differently, yet they say you're wrong., and yet there's no proof this is wrong.
My guess is those three, for example, have well cited examples in archeology and we know they made them often, but why does this have to make them the only versions created?

If you are trying to be true to history, I don't think this is a very good argument. Using this logic, you could argue that a lot of things happened which stretch credulity. We can't disprove the theory that aliens from Beetelgeuse came down to earth and gave hieroglyphics to the Egyptians, but I wouldn't call that history. If you want to do fantasy, go for it and mix and match at will. If you want to be accurate historically, stick with what we know was true to the period.

That said, I am very interested in your persona, as my persona is Romano-British. I am more of the Roman noble class type. Have you settled on garb? Even though kilts weren't worn, I think you could do plaid pants? Oisin, can you enlighten us on the use of plaid in the period?

If you are a forester/outlaw, I suspect that you would not be armored (at least not with mail). I am cheating history a bit by using leather armor. I have commissioned a leather subarmalis that will be thick enough to count as armor on its own. I'm doing this because of a health issue (bum shoulder) that makes mail hard for me to wear. If you don't mind a little inaccuracy, leather would seem to fit your persona better than mail.

Anyway, keep us informed of your progress.

YIS,
Rufus of Dragon Coast

Oh I agree, if I were going to make an outfit to match historical information exactly I'd be looking for artifact reference images before I made my sword, and in fact I think I know what blade type I am doing anyways, so I could do that part now. I don't think changing the shape of the pommel to suit my own style is the same as implying Stargate is historically based though. More like "you found 200 swords? Well what about the other 10,000 that were around? What if they had some variations in their aesthetics, like this". Again, i don't intend to change much.

I am aiming to stick to historical as best I can simply because I am also building my sca persona at the same time(despite being 8 years late). Granted, society for creative anachronism leaves just enough room for small aesthetic alterations as well, just trying to feel out which ones are at least somewhat realistic and which ones are not.

My sca persona up til now has been Cedric ap Cadugan, but I believe that would make my father welsh and I am changing that. My Belegarth persona has been evolving under the name Cedric Hésin Ráca, and now I believe I've settled on a Dúnedain ranger. So really, to get my Bele persona done, I simply take whatever I make for the sca and add some armour and weapons that would befit a Dúnedain without worrying about period

And yes, I do want to add leather armour to my Bele kit if not both. I love lamelar, but if it's just utterly rediculous to suggest having it in the 550-650 range then I will keep that for my Bele kit only.

Under the assumption that I was a forester/outlaw (good descriptor Warwell) in the 550-650 range, stealing what I can from the rich bastards traveling down the roads, could I have gotten ahold of lamellar (silr road trade?) or courboulli leather pieces?

Since both Oisin and I are long winded I realize all the questions that haven't been addressed are effectively buried, so here's a list, hahaha, can you tell I'm a little ocd? I'll be looking these up between working in the smithy so don't feel like I am being lazy, just figured if anyone knows them already they can share, and if not I have a list. Sounds like a few people want similiar info so this thread has really turned into a sub-roman briefing :-P

1- Silk Road traffic history through the 500-750 range, specifically related to Briton and Ireland.

2- What was Ireland called in the 500-750 range anyways?

3- Lamellar occurrences in 500-750 frame for both Briton and Western Europe. And potential acquisition.

4- Courboulli leather occurrences in 500-750 for both Briton and Western Europe, and potential acquisition.

5- Bow types present in both Briton and Western Europe for 500-750(mainly what sort of horn-bows and recurves were coming in?)

6- The theoretical pommel question, can the aesthetics be poked at a bit?

7- History of Ring pommels(I'll do this one)

8- Languages present in briton/ireland in this 550-650 range.


Cool.
Oh and the only plaid I'll be wearing is torn up pajama pants for extra warmth

1. The silk road did not go to Britain or Ireland. It ended further southeast and some things were then traded further north and west in Europe. Silk and some other luxury items were available to the upper classes.

2. Hibernia in Latin, probably Eriu in Old Irish. Not sure about that last, though, my knowledge of Old Irish is very limited.

3. None that I know of.

4. There's no evidence it was being used for armour, but the technology of boiling leather would have existed. Leather armour has a number of critical flaws that make it less suitable than either maille or, imo, linen armour. Boiled leather certainly has other uses, though.

5. Roman army used a lot of recurves, not sure about specific construction. You probably would have had access to either recurve or single-stick longbows.

6. Define what you mean . . . you can do whatever you want, but if you want to be be historic, you have to stick to history. Do you just not really like the look of typical Migration Era swords?

7. You do that. ;-)

8. Britain--Breton, Latin (becomes less important through time), Old English (becomes more important through time), Pictish, Old Irish (a fair number of Irish settled in Southern Wales especially). Ireland--Old Irish, maybe a bit of Breton, Latin with the clergy.

Ok, so, of course every piece was different in slight ways, and making your own customized model based on the style and technique of existing samples would be fine, imo, although some living history diehards insist that every item you wear be based on an actual find. I like personalization, though.

The problem with your greater argument, though, is one of statistics. Let's say your numbers are exactly correct (which of course they aren't) and that there had been 200 swords found from this period of a total of 10,000 that were made in or imported to Britain.

Those 200 swords are, barring any systematic preservation bias, which is certainly possible, effectively a simple random sample of 2% of the swords of the place and period. This seems to me to be a statistically significant fraction of the total body . . . which means that, statistically, they should be fairly representative of the whole assembly. That is, if a type of sword existed in significant quantities, we should have an example of it archaeologically, although it is of course possible, although unlikely, that none were preserved.

Of course, it all changes once you go to real numbers, but I don't have those numbers, so it's somewhat of a moot point. The basic idea stands, though, in that we are forced to assume that our sample is statistically relevant.

Alright, you are my hero, you should come to chaos wars.

Based on that I think I am going to forge my blade to match the blade style of that era as exactly as possible, and then base my handle pommel hilt on archeological references, but add my own personal style to it too. I don't think that is unreasonable in a "creative recreation" sense, and I know no one in bele will care.



As for the ring pommel. Initial research shows that the romans did it, as we already know, on their spatha(that is a spatha right?) and some of their shorter gladius, though not as often as far as records suggest. These swords stuck around in use during post-rome but as far as I can tell they were shortly after discontinued by smiths, because the latest example of a roman/britain one i could find so far is like 450. The only other thing to compare was the irish ring-pommel monster sword, which was around 1500, and nothing like the ones the romans made as it was a hidden tang that was put through a ring and piened in place. Here are some (bad) photos.

http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/download.php?id=7860
http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/download.php?id=7867
http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/download.php?id=7870

and a super sweet repro
http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/download.php?id=7870
compliments of my armoury