MRL Does Coppergate; Opinions for a Friend...

[Cap'n Atli]

http://www.museumreplicas.com/webstore/ ... rgate.aspx

One of my friends has pulled this up and likes it a lot; but wants to know if it could be used for migration period. I don't think so, at least not without major decloning, which would sort of muck-up the reason for purchasing a fancy ready-made helm. Still, are there similar migration-age analogs?

Also; going from the photographs (click on image for further pictures), any guesses as to the quality?

[chef de chambre]

http://www.museumreplicas.com/webstore/eCat/Deposit%20For%20Coppergate.aspx

One of my friends has pulled this up and likes it a lot; but wants to know if it could be used for migration period. I don't think so, at least not without major decloning, which would sort of muck-up the reason for purchasing a fancy ready-made helm. Still, are there similar migration-age analogs?

Also; going from the photographs (click on image for further pictures), any guesses as to the quality?

You know, for an MRL thing, that doesn't look half bad. There are at least two helmets extant of this form, the famous coppergate hat, and another excaveted in Northumberland that is plain. I don't have the coppergate book, to say how exacting a reproduction this is, but going from memory ot looks pretty decent, and in comparison with the other one found, it looks in the vein of believable as belonging to a possible family of helmets from that region and era.

[Mord]

If we consider the "Migration Period" to be ending at, say, 500 or 600 AD, then, no, the Coppergate Helm wouldn't be of that period.

But...it all depends upon who is migrating and when. Certainly if we are discussing Anglo-Saxon England (which is where the helm was found), their period of migration ended long before the 8th Century.

Mord.

[Roibeard MacNeill]

My lady wife and I have been looking at the Migration Period (400-800) for some time now because she changed her persona to Late Visigothic last year.

Take a look at this helm:
http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ho/06/eus ... 2.50.1.htm

Just a Spangenhelm with minor floral motifs and slight ocular indentations on the brow. From the lloks of the piece it may have had a nasal and cheekplates (although it wasn't uncommon for helms such as this to be just skulls and not much else.

[Wolf]

its not a mrl line that i know of, i have seen this on other web pages for cheaper. its a nice repro, i hate how the mail goes the wrong way though.

[white mountain armoury]

Its pretty decent looking, i guess the issue would be that its a fairly unique piece, start to see more than one at an event and it would seem incorrect.
The Pioneer helm is less ornate, the Benty Grange is also an option.
IMHO the best option would be something from Halberds, or another armourer, that way your friend would end up with something more individual and unique.
How about a more exact time frame, i have a ton of images of spangs.
Is he doing the same period as you? Helmet cheeks or a lack of them makes a big diff in regards to time period
Here is a fairly simple spang i have had hanging around my shop for years.
Closer to your period than the Coppergate helm
<img src="http://www.whitemountainarmoury.com/sspng.jpg">

[Kenwrec Wulfe]

its not a mrl line that i know of, i have seen this on other web pages for cheaper. its a nice repro, i hate how the mail goes the wrong way though.

I noticed the maille issue too. Not a bad rep from my perspective. Brian Rainey has a lovely copy of the Coppergate book if he were to happen by here to make a comparisson...

[Lloyd]

It is less expensive than the CAS Iberia model:
http://www.by-the-sword.com/acatalog/Vi ... Helms.html

But, I agree the maille is wrong and it was dated to the mid-9th century, for a migration period helm, Mercenary Tailor has a nice one.

http://www.merctailor.com/catalog/produ ... ucts_id=69

And of course, if you really want to go "all the way":

http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic ... 25&start=0

[Cap'n Atli]

It seems to me that the problem with flashy, historic, well known helms like Coppergate or (especially) Sutton Hoo is that they are too identifiable and too tied to their time period to be anything but what they are. I would welcome a Sutton Hoo for a filming on our ship (with the right head and tail posts and rigging modified- umm, the ship, not the helm) if we were portraying that period and the "kingly" individual were wearing it with the full panoply. However, two Sutton Hoos or two Coppergates at any reenactment would be too much. A half-dozen Sutton Hoos would pretty much blow us out of the water.

I always feel more comfortable with individual variation, especially since most of the historic examples were probably one-off custom jobs made to fit the size and the taste of the (undoubtedly very rich) owner.

Shameless plug for armorers:

I really think people are usually much better off in either purchasing somewhat generic helms, and having an armorer personalizing them; or in going to an armorer and saying: “I want a helm based on such-and-such, but with these modifications (if they’re within the historic period).â€Â

[RandallMoffett]

Atli,

I think the general form of the helmet as being possible still a hundred or so years later not too hard to believe. Look at the simple conical top it lasted for a very long time.
I think the more generic helmets with a few modifications a good idea. I had a few years straight where everyone and their dog wanted a spangen helmet so I started making some interesting ones with 4-8 panels, one with only a brow to neck band and panels overlapping, chech pieces, neck guards, nasals, spectacles, I just had to break the monotony or I would have gone crazy.... Any ways there is alot one can do with a spangen helmet as a number of armourers here have shown. I went to a LH group and they all had gjermanbuish helmets except some were missing the spectacles and spike. I had a good laugh at the conformity but at least they had alittle variation.

RPM