Quote Originally Posted by Kraxis
While the placement of the shield is perfect almost, the size is a bit small still.

Anyway, I am absolutely thrilled that they have managed to get them to use the pike twohanded (something we have been told was too hard to get to work). That alone makes EB worth the effort to check out.
I've been looking at this more closely and I'm not sure what it should be. The image is much better, but it still looks like the shield should be shifted more to the soldier's left, and it should be larger reaching up to the shoulder. Part of the problem might be that the shield is being placed too square to the front. The illustrations I've been looking at recently make it appear that it would tend to wrap around the left side more.

I'm not satisfied with most illustrations I've seen of this (including Connolly's.) The center forearm grip would define the limit for the width of the shield. However, the elbow must rest in the bowl to the left of the grip (roughly 4 to 5 inches from the center of the shield. So the shield cannot be overly curved in the center, or held at much of angle relative to the forearm bones. This limits the radius to the distance between the forearm grip and the knuckle on the base of the thumb (if the forearm grip is centered.) I'm a little less than 6 feet tall, and my arms are lanky rather than short, yet this distance would only about 10" to 11" for me (with another ~4" for the outside of my elbow to the grip.) That would limit the shield diameter to about 20", rather than the 24" range I've seen recorded--probably more like 18" for a typical adult male of the time.

I suspect that the center forearm grip might have actually been placed off center by several inches (towards the hand.) This would allow for a wider shield with the center lying over the elbow. It would also provide counter torque to the sarissa being held in the hand. The center mass of the shield would be over the elbow while the grip would be moved a few inches toward the hand, thereby producing some torque. This would also lift the shield slightly when the forearm was lowered and lower the shield slightly when the forearm was raised.