The Armour Archive

Cap'n Atli

MTA 2008 Release The Anglo-Saxon Camp has been accepted for Jamestown's Military Through the Ages at Jamestown Settlement on March 14, 15 & 16 (Friday late-afternoon (5:00) setup, through Sunday afternoon to closing time.) m This year we will be doing: â€œEnglish Naval Detachment; South Coast of...

Cap'n Atli

I guess the Laurels and Pelicans would be an example of something that makes sense as part of the culture of the social club called the SCA, but is pretty ahistorical. (I imagine there have always been skilled courtiers and administrators to run royal and noble households, but not as a specific &qu...

Cap'n Atli

Time limitations for the reigns of the monarchs. It seems to me that back in the '60s the earliest monarchs reigned for a year, but it was soon changed to six months. One school held that it was to give more people a chance at the top spot; but the more cynical held it to be a means of limiting dama...

Cap'n Atli

For terminal Fleur de Lys ends on chest banding, I find that cutting the end into three equal thirds, and the length of the cuts equal to the width of the strap or a touch more, seems to work best. Bend the outboard two out of the way (as you would with a fork), neck down and draw out the middle one...

Cap'n Atli

X-Post The Longship Company is recruiting crew for a major Tall Ships event in Norfolk Harbor. Sail Virginia will celebrate the 400th anniversary for the settlement of Virginia at Jamestown, and promises to be one of the largest gatherings of Tall Ships in the Mid Atlantic in decades. Our vessels fo...

Cap'n Atli

Ya know, it's not a historical documentary, it's a film, like knights tale. Not EVERYTHING ALL THE TIME has to be period. When did the director say he was going for 100% accuracy?? silly people, get a life. Odd, I thought that this thread started with a request to separate the sheep and the goats w...

Cap'n Atli

Very nice job. I like the hasps for the lock.

How much does it weigh?

Cap'n Atli

Perhaps, someday, Hollywood will produce The Life of Maeryk!

So far, thank God, they've avoided John Blackiston, Regicide Judge, but give them time!

Cap'n Atli

Keep your head down; and take your sketch book for those fascinating ideas that always crop up in new environments.

Good luck and God speed.

Cap'n Atli

Note if you carefully examine the pictures from the movie that all of the English are dressed in red and all of the Vikings (the BAD guys) are dressed in black. Another triumph of Hollywood costuming! They even built a full-scale Gokstad style longship for the movie, used in (as I remeber) one scene...

Cap'n Atli

Further notes on rivetting

http://www.anvilfire.com/iForge/tutor/jdrivet/index.htm

http://www.anvilfire.com/iForge/tutor/j ... /index.htm

Cap'n Atli

At least in an Anglo-Saxon migration age context, you find a lot of coppiced ash, hazel and even willow were being used for spear shafts. Other odd woods creep in according to whatever may have been available due to time and circumstance. With a coppiced shaft, the head usually goes on the thick (bo...

Cap'n Atli

You may wish to check out the Anvilfire atticle on the Harbor Freight Russian anvils and modifications thereto. m I have one of the old 100 kilo (220 pounds) Russian Anvil ("Made in USSR") as my heavy-duty tool. It's served me well for the last ~17 years. The newer ones have softer faces, ...

Cap'n Atli

"He who pays the piper calls the tune." You can work with them, you can suggest, you can nudge, you donâ€™t argue. They can edit, and rearrange, and leave your "brilliant" sequence on the cutting room floor. It ain't art, it's sausage, and you do the best you can. Even when you t...

Cap'n Atli

On my article on Sword Forum that Wyrm linked to, above, please see the tables on the second page. Also, as a matter of course, javelins were shorter (and lighter) than your main thrusting spear, so you might have a couple of short javelins tucked away behind your shield, or stuck in the ground near...

Cap'n Atli

We were contacted by the producers for the Viking scenes, but it was one of those "...can you give us the sun, moon and stars? And we want them in two weeks!" situations. We couldn't, and so we lost out to the Lithuanians, with which they already had worked on some of the other scenes. I t...

Cap'n Atli

For your convenience:

http://www.anvilfire.com/iForge/tutor/jdrivet/index.htm

http://www.anvilfire.com/iForge/tutor/j ... /index.htm

http://www.anvilfire.com/iForge/tutor/rdnailh/index.htm

Roofing nails:

http://fasteners.hardwarestore.com/18-6 ... 92516.aspx

Some are shorter (I tend to use these):

http://www.comparestoreprices.co.uk/ima ... -3-0mm.jpg

Most are galvanized, but these can also be tinned, and tinning dates back to early medieval or Roman.

(Edited for shift-key failure. Stupid shift key!

)

Cap'n Atli

Cap'n >>>SNIP<<< The only positive argument for unnatural ageing might be for something that was older than the time period portrayed, eg in 15thc setting there may be a 14thc box, so something a hundred years old would not be as new, but aging a box to replicate that is a skill in itself. An excel...

Cap'n Atli

Ageing or "Patination" One of the nice things about being in the reenactment area for a number of years is that you use stuff long enough for it to look "used". It develops wear patterns and the usual scrapes and scars. We save our more ragged gear for the newer members who are s...

Cap'n Atli

Hmmm; big baggy pants- That should put lots of cushioning between your tail-bone and the rowing bench. Want to come "west" and row with us? As for colors, why aren't you wearing the traditional colors; you know, mud, dung, drab (w/o olive- olives are from the Mediteranean and we can't prov...

Cap'n Atli

We just sew the puppy on. For tinder we've used linen tow, linen char cloth, and tried shelf fungus soaked in salt peter. I have tried to char the shelf fungus, but the one attempt wasn't too successful. Then again, that series of experiments got interupted by other activities. At camp we just steal...

Cap'n Atli

The upper parts of the stem and sternpost of the Gokstad ship either projected from the burial mound or, at least, the preservative blue clay layer, and rotted away. Since there was no direct evidence of a dragons head, a lot of artists and scholars use the "clip-point Bowie" style termina...

Cap'n Atli

Mail and Beowulf Mentions and kennings for mail are all over Beowulf. He even goes swimming* in it. But then, again, he and his associates are heroes. The vast majority of oar pulling spear toters undoubtedly fought in their shirts and added protection as luck, and fortune, and the command structure...

Cap'n Atli

THE "R" is SILENT?!!!

Cap'n Atli

As far as I'm concerned, "Viking" is a perfectly acceptable word when dealing with the 21st century public. We then tell them that it is a verb, as well as a job description. It's part of their education. If I use the term Viking here, you also know what I'm talking about by the context; w...

Cap'n Atli

Early Period Documentation I've had some long discussions about this with our NPS historians. Even dealing with the early colonial period in North America, our understanding and interpretation changes with the turn of a spade or a trowel. (Check out Jamestown, of late!) We tend to view the lack of i...

Cap'n Atli

...or you can put the broad rivet head on the board side of the shield and neatly rivet the end down on the flange of the boss. I've done it both ways.

Cap'n Atli

500-1100, give or take a bit. For SCA purposes I think that works, historically its a bit more muddy. It's interesting, too, that the First Crusade kicks off in 1095. Before that military force is mostly focused on defense from migratory groups such as Vikings or Avars. With the Crusades it turns o...

Cap'n Atli

WARNING: Personal Rant! It's that d@mn Sheldt Bird again! Every other replica longship ever built tacks on a copy of the Sheldt Bird to the bow, usually out of scale. It may be Saxon, it may even be Frankish, but it may very well not be even pre-Viking Scandinavian. It's probably earlier than the V...

Cap'n Atli

If you can lay your hands on it, or pull it throgh an inter-library loan, and you're really into the metalwork aspect , I would recommend: Medieval Decorative Ironwork in England by Jane Geddes Â© 1999 The Society of Antiquaries of London Burlington House Piccadilly, London W1V 0HS ISBN 0 85431 273 ...

Cap'n Atli

I'll post tonight from my library. You should be able to pull some from ILL.

Cap'n Atli

Talk to some ofthe folks who have been through Outward Bound. Actually, I've been to Outward Bound, prior to the first of the two encounters I noted above. Interesting. If you don't mind me askijng, how old were you, and what did you learn? Meanwhile, I'm not saying that learning a fighting skill, ...

Cap'n Atli

Note: The physical combat is part of the discipline. Nothing like pain, defeat and humiliation to get your attention, or drive you away. But I also think that there are a number of other physical activites that would also have the same, or similar, results. Talk to some of the folks who have been th...

Cap'n Atli

I would also suspect that a lot of these folks are between 16 and 25. There is a lot of "growing-up" that takes place in those years, and they adapt quickly to the new social milieu as well as the physical discipline. Itâ€™s amazing what can be done with this age group in a boot camp! For ...

Cap'n Atli

I'd go with 14 ga. for Scadian combat. Working it might be more difficult, but the extra strength and mass would be more protective, especially should your early attempt have any design or concept flaws. These guys play rough. "Armor does two very important things: it keeps the insides in, and ...

Anglo-Saxon Camp for Military Through the Ages

Recruiting Crew for Viking Expedition to Tall Ships Event