14th century leg harness buckles

[Buster]

Klaus,

You are absolutely right to not want your buckles mounted on loops of leather. I do not think that I have ever seen an authentic medieval example of this practice for any piece of armor.

The fact that the Chartes armor is missing its buckles suggests to me that they and their mounting plates were silver, and were stripped by the Revolutionaries. The buckles and their metallic mounting tabs might have been attached short straps that emerged from the slots, but I think it's at least as likely that the mounting tabs themselves emerged from the slots. This later solution is one which I have used, and find that it looks good and works well.

Here is a link to the Met's image of St Micheal. http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/se ... fullscreen If you blow it up and wonder around in it, you can see that the buckles of his body armor appear on the surface without any hint of a mounting tab of any sort. This is consistent with the idea that a metallic loop emerges from within the armor. The same is true of his right vambrace and greave.

I interpret the red surfaces on St. Mike's legs to be broad leather straps which are riveted to the insides of the medial edges of the cuisses, and which probably devide into multiple narrow straps around the back of the leg. These would fasten to multiple buckles on the back of the cuisse. The cuisses from Chartes are very comparable. I have built several pairs of legs this way, and people find them comfortable to wear.

Mac

Not trying to change the thread, but were armour buckles ever really attached to leather straps? Whenever you see an armour buckle in 14thC art, it never seems to be attached to a strap. I've always tried to interpret this as a buckle plate attached to a very short strap coming out of the slot, but your interpenetration would more closely resemble the original sources.
And all the later examples I can think of off the top of head have the buckle plate riveted directly to the piece in one way or another, no leather involved.

[Scott Martin]

In all of the "original" armour that I have seen, the "buckle end" of the strap is attached to the armour using a metal strap. in the 14th century this passes through the plate and is riveted on the inside, 15th century (and later) the steel strap is on the outside and is more or less embellished depending on the style of the armour (even munition armours tend to have a few chisel marks for decoration)

Parade armours often have gilded hinges and buckles - any excuse for ostentatious decoration gleefully seized upon!

I'll let Mac, Wade and Signo jump in, they've played with a lot more of the real stuff than I have

Scott Martin

[Mac]

Not trying to change the thread, but were armour buckles ever really attached to leather straps? Whenever you see an armour buckle in 14thC art, it never seems to be attached to a strap. I've always tried to interpret this as a buckle plate attached to a very short strap coming out of the slot, but your interpenetration would more closely resemble the original sources.
And all the later examples I can think of off the top of head have the buckle plate riveted directly to the piece in one way or another, no leather involved.

Buster,

To reiterate....I don't think we are likely to find any examples of buckles secured with loops of leather. Metal tabs are simply superior in every way.

We do, however find buckles attached to the ends of straps. In these cases, the buckle is mounted on a metal tab, and the tab is riveted to the end of the leather strap. These are common on knees and elbows, and very common on the waist belts that hold cuirasses closed.

If you look at the St. Micheal in this link, http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/se ... fullscreen you can see that the buckles on his elbow cops are on straps. On his right elbow you can see the metallic mounting tab. On the left is is more obscure. We can also see that his right "demi-greave" is secured by a buckle mounted on a strap, but the location prevents us from seeing how it is mounted.

Mac

[Signo]

I'll let Mac, Wade and Signo jump in, they've played with a lot more of the real stuff than I have

Scott Martin

Please, don't put my name in the same sentence with them, they are real armour students and master armourers, I'm only an amateur that is lucky enough to live near some of the good places for armours. My understanding and knowledge in this field is pretty limited.

[RandallMoffett]

Mac,

I had never assumed all were joined with steel buckle plates but that makes me want to do a second take. One effigy I saw, Peter Courtenay, from the early 15th is in Devon and one almost needs to see it in person to get an idea of it as it is fairly worn but the straps for the rerebraces are showing and from what I can see has no buckle plate and if it did I wonder how it'd work as the angle would require the buckleplate to be curved I expect in a rather big way to get around the arm armour and upper arm. Now I suppose if the buckle plate was fairly long it may explain the rather uniform look that made me think leather or artist just forgetting.

Yeah just went to E and B and found this.... http://www.flickr.com/photos/sheepdog_rex/4496238407/ and the line drawing is clearer but not close enough.... http://effigiesandbrasses.com/monuments ... /original/

I do not know if any of my pictures are good enough to see it either though.

To be honest I have not ever put much time into thinking that as many of the effigies look the same going all the way around but I'll have to start looking at them as I am doing thing..... then buy some 22gauge again.

Some interesting things to think about.

RPM

[wcallen]

Not trying to change the thread, but were armour buckles ever really attached to leather straps? Whenever you see an armour buckle in 14thC art, it never seems to be attached to a strap. I've always tried to interpret this as a buckle plate attached to a very short strap coming out of the slot, but your interpenetration would more closely resemble the original sources.
And all the later examples I can think of off the top of head have the buckle plate riveted directly to the piece in one way or another, no leather involved.

Buster,

To reiterate....I don't think we are likely to find any examples of buckles secured with loops of leather. Metal tabs are simply superior in every way.

We do, however find buckles attached to the ends of straps. In these cases, the buckle is mounted on a metal tab, and the tab is riveted to the end of the leather strap. These are common on knees and elbows, and very common on the waist belts that hold cuirasses closed.

If you look at the St. Micheal in this link, http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/se ... fullscreen you can see that the buckles on his elbow cops are on straps. On his right elbow you can see the metallic mounting tab. On the left is is more obscure. We can also see that his right "demi-greave" is secured by a buckle mounted on a strap, but the location prevents us from seeing how it is mounted.

Mac

Since my name was used and Mac has posted a nice picture, I will just agree.
Buckles are attached to metal mounts. The metal mounts may be attached directly to the armour, or secured to a leather strap that is secured to the armour. The general pattern seems the same (details of decoration and form change) 14th-17th c.

Wade

[RandallMoffett]

I am assuming to make them sort of like with hinges. I use a rounded straight chisel and hammer it then fold it in half then cut the opening?

Just found some 20 gauge I made some things from and figure they might be useful.

RPM

[Mac]

Randell,

Yes. Make them like hinges.


That 20ga will serve you OK. You certainly will not need anything heavier for most buckles. I use stuff in the range of .025" to .032" for most things.

Mac

[Scott Martin]

I'll start with some construction notes aimed at Randall

A big reason that I did this was to try a number of construction methods so that the "published" one was the fastest and easiest I could come up with. "Making a hinge" was one of the methods I abandoned early Many of the steps are hinge-like, but the inability to pull the hinge pin complicates construction, and the extra "depth" needed for the tongue makes some of the efficiency "cheats" used in hinge ineffective for buckles.

With buckles, since the tolerances are much less tight than with hinges, I find that it is fastest to determine the slot length and then punch two holes with a roper-whitney and open the slot with a jewelers saw. This method takes less about 2 minutes once you get the hang of it, and there's no filing or other clean-up. Bending and tidying up the "knuckle" is another couple of minutes (if you are doing this assembly-line style) and I can't make a half hinge using Wade and Mac's methodology that quickly. As noted above, the challenges are all of the things that make a buckle different from a hinge: you need more "depth" for the tongue than you need clearance for a hinge, and you would need to remove the knuckle piece (and re-deform it when done) because unlike a hinge pin it won't slide out, so you would need to define the shape twice instead of once with this method.

for a 1/8" buckle frame with a 2" finishing nail as a tongue the hole spacing is 5/8" center to center with a 1/8" punch, so the finished slot is 3/4" x 1/8" with rounded ends. This will be slightly different with a piece of slit 16ga as the tongue (a more correct tongue) and you may then want to file the cut-out for the slot square. I'll try to get a tutorial up this week.

Note that UNLIKE hinges, you need to do the tongue first, so you can't just smush the "hinge" part in the vice, because the "pin" won't slide out (since it's a closed frame) My best compromise was to fold the material with my fingers around the frame, and then open the vice (with soft jaws) to accommodate the pin and "wrap" metal, then use a chisel to define the "wrap".

Pics to follow later today, once I download them from my camera.

I'd also suggest 24 Ga instead of 22, since this will provide a more typical final thickness - it looks like these were often hammered together after the "wrap " - some hinges that I have seen look like they have been forge welded together, and I suspect that this would make sense for buckles as well - Mac and Wade?

Scott Martin

[Mac]

I go about it differently.....(of course).

---Fold the strip of shin steel around a nail that is slightly larger in diameter than the bar of the hinge.
---Clamp the strip and the nail in the vise and lightly hammer the roll until it is nice and round.
---Remove the nail.
---Return the folded strip to the vise and make two cuts with a fine, dull hack saw.
---Extend the folded strip up a bit in the vise to accommodate the thickness of the tongue that will be wrapped around the bar of the buckle.
---Cut a bit deeper with the saw.
---Cut across the jaws of the vise with a narrow chisel.
---clean up the resulting notch with a file if necessary.
---Open the folded strip just enough to snap it over the bar of the buckle.
---Close the folded strip back down to capture the buckle frame.
---Make and install the buckle tongue.

Rather than cutting, extending in the vise, and cutting again, you might cut it all at one go. However, this makes it more likely that he work will chatter under the saw.

Sometimes I make and install the buckle tongue before making the folded mounting tab, but this necessitates opening the folded tab significantly more in order to instal the complete buckle. This seems like a small thing to worry about, but sometimes the tab does not close back down as nicely after it has been asked to open that far.

Mac

[Scott Martin]

Sometimes I make and install the buckle tongue before making the folded mounting tab, but this necessitates opening the folded tab significantly more in order to instal the complete buckle. This seems like a small thing to worry about, but sometimes the tab does not close back down as nicely after it has been asked to open that far.

This is why I went with the method I ended up using, since the "wrap" didn't go back toa nice shape after threading the frame and tongue back through. I also don't have a consistent "round" back to the frame, since I need to flatten the area on the sides so that the chisel work is "correct" although I guess I can pull back on that a bit if it's going to significantly aid construction.

Mac, are you using a slit sheet for a tongue (rectangular cross section) and if so, what are the dimensions that you use? my guesstimate based on photos is around 3/32" to 1/8" wide and 16-20 ga (0.040"-0.0625") thick.

Using slit sheet will make it significantly easier to do the tongues, since you have less worry about side shear on assembly - sheet doesn't "roll" as much, and your tolerances are tighter.

Scott Martin

[Mac]

This is why I went with the method I ended up using, since the "wrap" didn't go back toa nice shape after threading the frame and tongue back through. I also don't have a consistent "round" back to the frame, since I need to flatten the area on the sides so that the chisel work is "correct" although I guess I can pull back on that a bit if it's going to significantly aid construction.

When I am making wire buckle with flattened surfaces, I do not flatten the bar which will be inside the tab. Leaving this part round makes the frame move more freely on the tab, and the tongue move more freely on the frame.

Mac, are you using a slit sheet for a tongue (rectangular cross section) and if so, what are the dimensions that you use? my guesstimate based on photos is around 3/32" to 1/8" wide and 16-20 ga (0.040"-0.0625") thick.

Sometimes I cut the tongues from sheet, and other times I make them from wire. If I can tell how the one I am copying was made, I do that. If I am suing sheet, I typically use 14 to 16ga (.075" to .058") for small to medium buckles. Lighter gauges than that can bend under load. The 1/8" to 3/32" range is a rough equivalent for wire tongues.

Using slit sheet will make it significantly easier to do the tongues, since you have less worry about side shear on assembly - sheet doesn't "roll" as much, and your tolerances are tighter.

You have lost me entirely here, Scott. Can you say this another way?

Mac

[Buster]

The simplest method I have found to make these is to simply cut a rectangle, drill a hole in the center, fold it around a nail, hammer it with a square punch so the "bulge" is all on one side, put it in a vice, then just file the hole until it becomes a slot of the required size.
A Scott mentioned, 22 gauge (or even 24 gauge) will usually be okay for this.

[Scott Martin]

Using slit sheet will make it significantly easier to do the tongues, since you have less worry about side shear on assembly - sheet doesn't "roll" as much, and your tolerances are tighter.

You have lost me entirely here, Scott. Can you say this another way?

When making the tongue out of round stock, it has a tendency to roll until it is bent since all "sides" are the same. This also means that only a very small strip of the tongue is in contact with the frame. When using a slit sheet, the cross section is rectangular, so the "flat" of the rectangle stays on the buckle frame, This gives better contact with the buckle frame, and results in a better fit over a larger area than a round tongue.

Simple translation: I'll be using slit sheet in future because it appears to have been much more common, is easier and makes for better construction.

Mac, are there any buckles that you are aware of prior to the 17th century that used round tongues? all of the ones that I have found thus far (avant, a few maximillion sets, the Churburg harnesses) all seem to use a rectangular cross section (although some of these use a "triangular" shape as viewed from the top, which I thought was interesting)

Buster, I think that Mac is dispensing with the initial hole and "alignment" by just wrapping the rectangle. He then cuts out the slot in the middle with a hacksaw (down both sides) and removes the "flap" with a chisel - this is much less work than the filing you suggest, with an indistinguishable result.

Pictures of my construction may be delayed until tomorrow - I spent the day articulating a pair of mitten gauntlets, and it looks like I have (finally) got the tolerances down to something workable (thanks to Wade for some reality checks on the real thing). It's tricky getting more than 30 degrees per articulation in a piece slightly over an inch deep...

Scott Martin

[Mac]

Using slit sheet will make it significantly easier to do the tongues, since you have less worry about side shear on assembly - sheet doesn't "roll" as much, and your tolerances are tighter.

You have lost me entirely here, Scott. Can you say this another way?

When making the tongue out of round stock, it has a tendency to roll until it is bent since all "sides" are the same. This also means that only a very small strip of the tongue is in contact with the frame. When using a slit sheet, the cross section is rectangular, so the "flat" of the rectangle stays on the buckle frame, This gives better contact with the buckle frame, and results in a better fit over a larger area than a round tongue.

Simple translation: I'll be using slit sheet in future because it appears to have been much more common, is easier and makes for better construction.

Scott,

I see what you mean now. The lack of contact area is not really a problem with solid frames, but it could be trouble if the frame has a butted joint in the place where the tongue will be. Sometimes, when I use wire for a tongue, I begin by slightly flattening the area that will be curled around the buckle frame. This makes the curl easier to make, and less likely to force the joint in the frame apart.

Mac

[Mac]

Mac, are there any buckles that you are aware of prior to the 17th century that used round tongues? all of the ones that I have found thus far (avant, a few maximillion sets, the Churburg harnesses) all seem to use a rectangular cross section....

Although sheet metal tongues are probably the more common of the two, I think that wire tongues are not at all uncommon.

Here is a pic that we have seen before. It looks like a wire tongue to me.


Wire tongues were the "standard of the industry" in small pewter buckles, so I tend to think of then first; having made many grosses of them.

Mac

[Mac]

.... some of these use a "triangular" shape as viewed from the top, which I thought was interesting.

Here is how I generally make sheet metal tongues. I learned it by copying an early 17th C buckle, but the shape goes back. The wide, flat proximal end is easy to curl. The narrow but tall distal end will pass through a small hole in the strap, and is strong and does not bend under loads. The turned down tip is easy to engage and disengage from the strap. The "sway back" makes the tongue more perpendicular to the leather where it goes through the hole. All in all, it is the ideal of buckle tongues.



That mysterious "final shaping" happens once the tongue is installed in its frame. A couple of taps with a hammer puts in the "sway back". You can also defer the turning down of the tip until the buckle is installed as well. That makes it easier to make sure it is in the right spot, but it does complicate the clean up a bit.

Mac

[Scott Martin]

I was plannng on just cutting a triangular section of sheet, but your method will result in a much more robust tongue, with a near square (or near circular depending) cross section where it engages the leather hole. Very elegant. As your illustration so clearly shows, the flat profile is much easier to work as a "wrap" and the construction rapidly approaches that of a hinge. This flat cross section will also be much easier to "thread" into the frame.

What tongue material do you use? At 14-16 Ga thickness that's a lot of "beef" for the tongue, particuarly if you are building it up at the end: I would expect much lighter material to work well, but I am using either stainless or carbon steel, I can see that the thickness wold be needed using mild steel.

I do the "turn down" shaping by hammering the tongue against the frame and then filing the tongue back to a smooth profile. Since I have work hardened the frame a LOT by ths time, this generally doesn't even leave a scuff on the frame. With the tapering of the tongue on the distal end that you are doing (and the subsequent work hardening) doing it this way may leave a slight depression. I note that with many modern cast buckles there is a depression to hold the tongue, so this may be a "feature" of doing it this way.

Interesting how actually working on this stuff tends to converge techniques... Thanks to Mac and Wade for kicking my butt into spending more time *doing* instead of *thinking*

Of course I still seem to spend too much time on interweb forums...

Scott Martin

[Mac]

Thanks to Mac and Wade for kicking my butt into spending more time *doing* instead of *thinking*

Thinking without doing and doing without thinking are errors of more or less equal magnitude. The first results from listening to the left brain the second is the result of obeying the right. As is so frequently the case, The Path lies somewhere in the middle.

Mac

[Scott Martin]

As promised (threatened?) some pics reflecting the "better" construction method. These may get updated again as I try Mac's variation and a rectangular tongue

First I rough bend the strap and feed through the tongue

Loose_Buckle_Strap.jpg (65.58 KiB) Viewed 224 times

Then I place the "knuckle" in the middle of the soft jaws (took the picture before I figured it out) and use a blunted chisel to close it up. With the knuckle and tongue "unsupported" it means that the tongue doesn't deform at all, and the edge of the vice jaws is a good suport to keep the chisel from making the buckle fly when struck.

Tightening_Buckle_Strap.jpg (42.42 KiB) Viewed 224 times

Sorry about the focus, I needed a hand for the buckle, a hand for the chisel and a hand for the camera...

Scott Martin

[Mac]

Scott,

Here's a couple of things.

Your frames are getting a bit "bulgy". The sided are not a straight as the originals. This always happens to some degree, and there are two places where the bulge creeps in.

The first is in winding the wire around your mandrel. There is always some springback. I sometimes use heat on the corners as I wind up the wire; especially with heavier stuff. You can also make some headway against it by hammering the sides of the coil before removing it from the mandrel. Other times, you might have to correct each side individually on a square horn or stake, and then tighten up the corners individually until the frame closes again. Another possibility that I have not tried would be to make the faces of the mandrel slightly concave to correct for the inevitable springback.

The second is that sometimes the sides get bulgy in the flattening. Here, again, the correction must be on a square stake or horn.

The other thing I want to mention is the decorative cuts. Like I mentioned over on the AandAF, I have never been quite satisfied with using a chisel to make them. I think it might be good to try making the decorative cuts with a file instead of a chisel. A square or rectangular file will do the trick, I think. A file with a safe edge might be a bit easier to control.

Mac

[gaukler]

Buckle pins seem to be a bit different on the copper alloy side. I did a quick count- I have 34 medieval buckles with pins in my collection. 8 of them have wire or round stock for the tongues, and only one of 34 has any sign of a tip bend.

[Mac]

Buckle pins seem to be a bit different on the copper alloy side. I did a quick count- I have 34 medieval buckles with pins in my collection. 8 of them have wire or round stock for the tongues, and only one of 34 has any sign of a tip bend.

Gaukler,

I think the tip bend thing comes into its own in armor buckles, and perhaps spur buckles as well. These are applications where there is not a lot of slack in the system, and it helps if the tongue can find the hole in the strap easily. I have certainly seen bent tips on armor buckles, and in my experience they work better than buckles with straight tipped tongues.

Now, that said, I have to admit that I haven't done a survey and I don't have any numbers to back me up. Perhaps I have been caught making "improvements" on history. If so, I am ashamed.

Mac

[Scott Martin]

Your frames are getting a bit "bulgy". The sided are not a straight as the originals. This always happens to some degree, and there are two places where the bulge creeps in.Mac

I hadn't noticed that, but once pointed out is is faily obvious. I'll try to deal with that with a "post-heat" and flattening - things to remember for the next time I'm making frames!

The other thing I want to mention is the decorative cuts. Like I mentioned over on the AandAF, I have never been quite satisfied with using a chisel to make them. I think it might be good to try making the decorative cuts with a file instead of a chisel. A square or rectangular file will do the trick, I think. A file with a safe edge might be a bit easier to control.
Mac

I need to round my chisel tip a bit more, and I think I can come a lot closer by doing the chisel work and THEN filing / sanding, since that will remove the "splash" caused by the chisel displacing metal. I do understand what you mean though, the period decoration is all below the level of the buckle face, with no disruption above or to the sides.

Marc, I'll hope to pick your brain some time in the near future - drop me a PM when you're on this side of the water and we can grab coffee!

Scott Martin

[wcallen]

These are NOT armour buckles.

But if you want to stare at some tongues on some 14th c. and similar buckles:

http://www.allenantiques.com/images/cr-trinkets6.jpg

There is some real variety in the way they are made.

I think that the final end result I get on mine is basically like what Mac does. For some reason I just don't "feel" making them out of sheet - note, many of the real ones look like they were sheet, so I am in no way claiming that isn't right. I work from round stock, but I flatten the back one way and the front the other way and then grind away the excess so the final result is very similar.

YMWV - your mileage WILL vary.

Wade

[RandallMoffett]

Do the metal tabs for the buckle go through slots then like other 14th century straps?

[Scott Martin]

The metal tabs go through slots (for 14th century equipment) so that it appears as if the buckle is mounted to a "bump" of metal on the armour. Looking at other extant armours (to the 17th century) it appears that the metal tabs were the normal method of attachment for buckles - leather straps securing buckles to the plates are a modern thing.

Scott Martin

[wcallen]

The metal tabs go through slots (for 14th century equipment) so that it appears as if the buckle is mounted to a "bump" of metal on the armour. Looking at other extant armours (to the 17th century) it appears that the metal tabs were the normal method of attachment for buckles - leather straps securing buckles to the plates are a modern thing.

Scott Martin

To be really clear - the thing that both Mac and I are saying they just didn't do is secure a buckle to something using a loop of leather (like modern belts).

The buckle is secured to a plate. The plate is often then riveted to the armour directly, but it can also be secured to the end of a strap that is then secured to the armour. Mac posted a nice picture that certainly illustrates this and probably also shows ones that are secured directly to the armour by the plate, but those are less clear because they are harder to see under the tail end of the strap.

Wade

[gaukler]

I don't specifically collect spur and horse harness buckles, but I do have some in my sales stock.
Out of 16 with complete pins, 7 are iron, 9 are copper alloy.
In iron, two have wire pins, 5 have sheet. Three have bent tips, and three have the curve that Mac likes.
In copper alloy, 3 have wire, 6 have sheet. Two of the wire pinned buckles are pretty small, and may not be spur/harness buckles. Five have bent tips, and five have the curve. Some of the curves may be as a result of use.

[Mac]

Gauckler,

I'm glad to see examples of the "sway back" and the down curved tip in those spur buckles. I feel at least partially vindicated.

I have read of buckles whose tongues were curved, described as "having deformed in use". I am not at all sure I believe that that is the most common way for them to get that shape. In my experience, buckle tongues that are weak enough to curve under stress, usually keep right on curving until they pull through the frame. I had a group of brass ones fail that way as a result of having annealed them after the shaping. As a result of that experience, I am now careful to leave them in a work-hardened condition.

Mac


(edited for grammar)

[Scott Martin]

I'll concur with Mac on the unlikelihood of "curve in use" - it takes a fair amount of force to deform the pin such that it gives that nice "sway" and conforms to the frame - I (briskly) used an 8 oz hammer, and it took multiple strikes (then tidied up with a file)

For this to deform "in use" would shred a *lot* of leather as I would expect that the leather would tear before the metal of the pin would deform, particularly since period strapping tended to be less "over the top" than what is generally used in recreation (and from what I have seen of Wade's collection, Buff was used a lot more)

On another topic, I used Mac's technique (mostly) to build another buckle - it's workable, but the cutout for the tongue needs to be significantly larger so that the tongue can be built through: this will be less of an issue for slit sheet tongues, but I didn't have one handy, and my "heavy" metal thicknesses are at a friends house since I'm working on gauntlets at the moment. 12 discarded articulation stacks = technique refined for decent (as distinct from good) gauntlet articulations. I'll drop those pics in the "droop" thread.

Pics will follow at a slightly later date...

Scott Martin

[Scott Martin]

The promised (threatened?) pics

Macs_Method_2.jpg (58.45 KiB) Viewed 78 times

Macs_Method_1.jpg (66.42 KiB) Viewed 78 times

I took a bit too much material off when I trimmed the tongue end, but it's still more than sufficient to keep the tongue from falling off the frame. These move more freely, but whether this is from a less mangled tongue, or because there is more clearance in the metal strap needs more testing...

As Mac has noted, I need to make some new frames that aren't "bulgy", and maybe I'll manage to get them a bit more symmetric as well.

Since I forgot to actually mention Marc's pics in the previous post (although I meant to) thanks for the additional info.

Since I didn't state the REASON that I'd expect iron buckles to have more "slit" and less "round" tongues (particularly for earlier period buckles) I thought that I should do so now. The impurities (silica inclusions) in iron and steel made it impractical to draw wire from (through drap plates) at least in the early part of the middle ages. I anticipate that silica inclusions would also do Bad Things to your draw plates.

Does anyone know when drawn iron or steel wire made its appearance? Alternately you can get a round cross section by slitting and then hammering (drawing down) . Drawn copper alloy wire dates from pre-roman times - different impurities which don't affect the ductility.

Scott Martin

[Tom B.]

Here are some examples from 15th century showing tongues like Mac's.
This is from the breast plate in the Herbede find. (first pic is from the Brigandine book discussed in this thread)

[RandallMoffett]

Not to side line this thread but what the heck happened to that breastplate? Was it for the joust or something? All those holes?

Thanks for the buckle images.
RPM

[Signo]

For what I remember those findings have been made in a place that was damaged by a fire and the building collapsed, the breastplate was probably intended for some combat sport.