View Full Version : High-res images of legionaries
Kολοσσός
12-06-2007, 03:53
Wikipedia has some very nice images of legionaries (re-enactors) in full gear.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1e/Wells_0706_054.jpg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/12/Roman_soldier_end_of_third_century_northern_province.jpg
tasty Lorica segmentata with a funky looking auxilia guy :laugh4:
Philippus Flavius Homovallumus
12-06-2007, 04:20
tasty Lorica segmentata with a funky looking auxilia guy :laugh4:
Nope, four legionaries from different periods. That first pic is just painful to look at though.
russia almighty
12-06-2007, 04:38
Whats that second pic of ? :inquisitive:
Kολοσσός
12-06-2007, 05:33
Whats that second pic of ? :inquisitive:
The second image is a legionary from the 3rd century after the birth of Christ. As the Roman empire entered its final centuries the legionaries no longer looked like the legions of Caesar Augustus (top picture) that we're so used to seeing in reenacting events.
Kολοσσός
12-06-2007, 06:34
Those cheek plates on helmets are pretty cool. How come modern infantry doesn't wear a full helm anymore and keep the face exposed? A cheek plate won't stop a bullet but it will protect from blast effects.
Over Specialization and MOPP. Because of the type of weapons commonly employed, with the greatest causality causing power, modern infantry body amour is not designed for that type of close combat.
Intranetusa
12-06-2007, 06:54
The second image is a legionary from the 3rd century after the birth of Christ. As the Roman empire entered its final centuries the legionaries no longer looked like the legions of Caesar Augustus (top picture) that we're so used to seeing in reenacting events.
No, months of learning history from the EB members have taught me that the legionaries of Caesar would've still worn chain mail armor. Lorica Segmenta/iron band armor didn't become widespread until the 2nd century CE.
NeoSpartan
12-06-2007, 07:03
Intranetusa, Ceasars legions wore mail yes.
Internautus III is talking about the look and weapons of legionaries in Ceasar/Augusot's time VS that of Costantine's time
So what are the dates on the guys from the first pics? One appears to have an iron helmet, the other two look bronze-ish. One of the "bronze" helms appears to have a hmm... nubbin or something sticking out of the top. I suppose even small differences make a big difference sometimes. The soldiers of wwI don't look like soldiers from the Iraq War... but maybe laymen 500 years from now will have trouble recognizing that difference. ;)
TWFanatic
12-06-2007, 15:45
Caesar Augustus, not Julius Caesar. Augustus did employ the lorica segmentata, though in small numbers. The first archeological excavation of the armor was at Teutoburgerwald, a battle which took place in 9 AD.
Intranetusa
12-06-2007, 16:46
Caesar Augustus, not Julius Caesar. Augustus did employ the lorica segmentata, though in small numbers. The first archeological excavation of the armor was at Teutoburgerwald, a battle which took place in 9 AD.
Well Julius Caesar and Caesar Augustus ruled within a 60 year window. I'm sure Augustus's legions did use the segmenta, but the majority still used mail, and should be represented as such. Or we get people like reactors and the history channel who thinks that the lorica segmenta was used from the Punic Wars till the later CE-era barbarian invasions.
Geoffrey S
12-06-2007, 17:41
Those cheek plates on helmets are pretty cool. How come modern infantry doesn't wear a full helm anymore and keep the face exposed? A cheek plate won't stop a bullet but it will protect from blast effects.
Pretty bad for spatial awareness through sight and sound.
/me likey the first photo.
The second photo is strange...
CirdanDharix
12-06-2007, 19:10
To me, the pics on the second photo's shield look Christian. Is it me being nOObish or is that really the case?
The pic represents a legionary from the late Roman Empire, around 350-450 AD, so yes, the pics are Christian because the Roman Empire was Christian by that time. (If anybody can say the exact date when the empire made Christianity its official religion...?)
Watchman
12-06-2007, 22:23
...you mean, like Mithra Slaying The Bull at the six o'clock position...?
Kολοσσός
12-06-2007, 22:35
If anybody can say the exact date when the empire made Christianity its official religion...?
313 A.D. under emperor Constantine the Great.
The General
12-06-2007, 22:43
...you mean, like Mithra Slaying The Bull at the six o'clock position...?
Yeah, I noticed that one too...
>_>
beatoangelico
12-06-2007, 23:43
313 A.D. under emperor Constantine the Great.
wrong, 391 under Thedosius I. Constantine only allowed freedom of worship for all religions, including christianity.
Philippus Flavius Homovallumus
12-07-2007, 00:32
The second pick is almost certainly meant to be a legionary of Constantine date, so 330 or so. The top pic would nominally be Claudian but in reality quite a few of the details are wrong and the guy on the right doesn't have his armour on properly.
CaesarAugustus
12-07-2007, 00:40
To me, the pics on the second photo's shield look Christian.
...you mean, like Mithra Slaying The Bull at the six o'clock position...?
:laugh4:
Pharnakes
12-07-2007, 01:48
in reality quite a few of the details are wrong and the guy on the right doesn't have his armour on properly.
Yeah, I was thinking that if segentata was really like that, it couldn't have been much use.
TWFanatic
12-07-2007, 02:34
Well Julius Caesar and Caesar Augustus ruled within a 60 year window. I'm sure Augustus's legions did use the segmenta, but the majority still used mail, and should be represented as such. Or we get people like reactors and the history channel who thinks that the lorica segmenta was used from the Punic Wars till the later CE-era barbarian invasions.
Hence why I said:
Caesar Augustus, not Julius Caesar. Augustus did employ the lorica segmentata, though in small numbers. The first archeological excavation of the armor was at Teutoburgerwald, a battle which took place in 9 AD.
Boyar Son
12-07-2007, 02:36
Dam look at those legionaires from their heyday. I would NOT want to fight them...
in fact I would run the other way before I'm another victim of Romes gladius...
Gotta be some warrior to fight them, props to all those who did (except horse archers, so easy in fact it should be cheating)
Watchman
12-07-2007, 02:48
(except horse archers, so easy in fact it should be cheating)...except, of course, the steppe-pattern horse-archery method of combat is a very difficult art in and by itself... ~;)
Boyar Son
12-07-2007, 02:59
...except, of course, the steppe-pattern horse-archery method of combat is a very difficult art in and by itself... ~;)
are you sure its not confined to:
-knoweledge of the use of bow
-knoweledge of horseback riding
-knoweledge of not falling off and controlling the horse while in combat and galloping
-groups and order (such as stick to your group leader or banner and follow)
Watchman
12-07-2007, 03:03
Aside from the little detail several of those aren't exactly a piece of cake (especially when done together), quite. There's been quite a bit written on the archery combat techniques characteristic of the nomads of the Great Eurasian Steppe; they are, for example, rather different in execution from the horse-archery tactics of sedentary peoples.
TWFanatic
12-07-2007, 03:07
Did you not just disprove your own point? I'd like to see you hang off the side of a horse and shoot an arrow under its belly.
That said, I agree that HA are tactically too easy to use in RTW (and all its mods). Any old new person could unfairly defeat a vetran by spamming them.
russia almighty
12-07-2007, 04:57
Since that was brought up how did sedentary horse archery work ? Was it that they would hang out in an area mounted , fire a few barrages and if the enemy gets to close they gtfo ?
Still in the late era wasn't a scuttarish shield still being used ? At least invasio barbarorum made it seem like that .
CirdanDharix
12-07-2007, 14:33
...you mean, like Mithra Slaying The Bull at the six o'clock position...?
I was thinking of the angel (?) at 3 o'clock. Didn't notice that the lower picture was Mithras (though where's the serpent? am I just blind?).
Intranetusa
12-07-2007, 14:49
313 A.D. under emperor Constantine the Great.
Popular misconception...even RTW: BI get's it wrong lol.
wrong, 391 under Thedosius I. Constantine only allowed freedom of worship for all religions, including christianity.
Yup
Watchman
12-07-2007, 14:56
I was thinking of the angel (?) at 3 o'clock. Didn't notice that the lower picture was Mithras (though where's the serpent? am I just blind?).Winged figures as deities or their messengers aren't exactly a new or specifically Christian thing you know... ancient Mesopotamians already portrayed several of their deities with wings, as did the Greeks.
CirdanDharix
12-07-2007, 15:01
I know, but it's the style that makes it seem more like an angel to me; it looks more medieval than what i'd usually associate as ancient. But then, what do I know about artsitic history? Pretty much nothing.
delablake
12-09-2007, 12:57
wrong, 391 under Thedosius I. Constantine only allowed freedom of worship for all religions, including christianity.
actually it was in 380 with the edict cunctos populos,
CUNCTOS populos, quos clementiae nostrae regit temperamentum, in tali volumus religione versari, quam divinum petrum apostolum tradidisse romanis
religio usque ad nunc ab ipso insinuata declarat
thereby raising "the religion of St. Peter" to the status of State Religion
in 391 paganism was outlawed, thus ending freedom of worship, one of the factors that granted Rome the absence of religious wars except the ones against "The Judean People's Front". Or was it "The People's Front of Judea"?
:beam:
CirdanDharix
12-09-2007, 16:45
I think it was the "Popular Front for the Liberation of Judea". The "Judean People's Front" is that guy over there :smash:
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